I’m back!!

Well, hello family and friends!  After a two year hiatus from blogging, I am about to go out and explore the world again.  And really, it’s only fair that I bring you with me.  In the two years since I have returned from England, I have been very very busy what with my senior year of college, training a horse, creating a research model, graduating, working with the mentally ill, buying aforementioned horse, visiting friends, and just being my normal old crazy self.  And through all that, there has been one constant:

The Peace Corps.

Now, I can’t quite explain what Peace Corps was in its constant form.  It was a motivator, it was a dream, it was a goal; it was a thorn in my side, it was a lesson in patience, and it was a reminder that anything involving the US government moves at a glacial pace.  To summarize:

• June 2010- I arrived home from England and immediately began my Peace Corps Application
• September 2010- Peace Corps sends me background check forms and fingerprint charts.  I get these done and send them in.  US Postal Service loses them.  I am sent a second copy.  US Postal Service loses them before they reach me.  I am sent a third copy.  I return it via FedEx with a tracking number I watched daily.
• November 2010- I get an interview!!  Go up to NYC, have a lovely chat.  Two days later I am nominated to teach science in Sub-Saharan Africa.  My mother begins to pray for a place with shade for little albino me.
• January 2011- I run around like an idiot to the dozens of doctors I have to fill out the medical check.  During this time I get tons of shots and tons of blood drawn (and coincidentally scare some nurses to death because I am too stubborn to admit when blood loss makes me dizzy). I am told that once I send everything in, I will hear back in one to five months.  Cue excruciating wait.
• May 2011- I curse Dickinson for announcing at graduation that I am already in the Peace Corps when I told them I have not been accepted yet.  Pray to the jinx-gods to ignore this.
• June 2011- At the very end of the fifth month, I get a letter from the Peace Corps.  I have been medically deferred because of my chronic daily headaches and all the medications I’ve been on.  Lot’s of anger went on, but I took a few (million) deep breaths and waited the next three months before I could return to the neurologist and prove I’m fit for service.
• September 2011- Medically cleared!!
• December 2011- I am visiting boyfriend in Carlisle.  Peace Corps has said my assignment will be at home any day.  My parents call me when I am two hours away, tell me it’s arrived, and then hide it from me!  I come home and dig frantically around my room whilst cursing my father for hiding it.  Unhelpful boyfriend just watches and laughs.  Finally find it and tear it open.  I’M GOING TO GHANA!!!!  On June 4, 2012.  To teach high school science.  Many calls, texts, and hugs later, I am still in a daze.

Since then, I have been so busy with work that I’ve only done bits and piece to get ready.  But this month will be dedicated to finding useful things, studying high school science, eating all the chocolate I can get my hands on (no chocolate in Ghana from what I hear- devastated), and spending time with those I love.  Which means if you are reading this, call me.  Let’s do lunch or something before I go.

Anyways, I really had just been planning on saying “I’m back!  More to come when I’m actually somewhere cool.”  Sorry about that.  I guess I tend to be long-winded.  But to sum up, I will be in Ghana June 4, 2012 through August 15, 2014.  This has been my dream since I was thirteen and sitting in Ms. Meyer’s (*sorry Steph, always confuse them) English class, doing a career-predictor test.  And while I am most definitely nervous, I am so so very excited.  Sometimes it just hits me and tear up a little.  I truly can’t wait.  And I promise to do my best, through here, to include you all in this.