Looking Back, Looking Forward

I'm one (ungraded, 3-page) paper, and some editing away from the end of my first year here. The past week and a half have been kind of a blur, I've been writing a lot and have a weird cold or allergies or something, but now the writing's done and I'm (maybe) on the upswing, health-wise, so I finally have the opportunity to take a step back and think about the past few months. First of all, my friends are really leaving, or at least two of them are. I'll be seeing Sam and Laura again at the conference in Maryland in a few weeks, but, you know, it's going to be different. The three of us got dinner and did trivia last night, and then Laura sort of kidnapped us and took us to DQ. It was weird and hilarious, and I'm a little disappointed to know my days of being kidnapped, locked out of the car and then driven away from, and yelling things frantically as we rapidly approach red lights are coming to a close.

Good things are coming up for me, though. First of all, I can make an official announcement about this summer: I'll be working as a pandemic planner for the USDA's Food and Nutrition Service. Even though that sounds way, way cooler than it actually is, I'm looking forward to it and think it could be a lot of fun. I'm also hoping to do some volunteer work for the Red Cross in Fargo, which, in combination with my thesis proposal and potentially starting a political organization, should keep me pretty busy. Second, within the next month I'll be seeing a good 50% of my favorite people in the world, and after this summer I will have seen approaching 100% of my favorite people in the world. I'm heading down to Northfield and Minneapolis on Friday for some fun times with many friends, which should soften the blow of simultaneously losing a big part of my social network in Fargo. Third, ok, here's just a list of other things happening this summer:

• The Antiques Roadshow on May 31 (still looking for somebody to come with me! If you're in Minneapolis you'd have to take the bus up to Fargo, but I could drive us to Bismarck and back to Minneapolis on June 1)
• Conference in Emmitsburg June 2-3, I'll be presenting a literature review (basically) -- Sam, Laura and I just did a run-through on Thursday, and I'm feeling pretty excited about that now
• Washington, DC, June 3-10, ahhhh I'm so excited for this. There are so many people I want to see, so many places I want to go, so much food I want to eat... Plus I'm going to try to head over to the USDA to meet the people I'll be working with remotely this summer. There's a chance they'll pay for me to take another trip or two out there later in the summer, stay tuned for that.
• Already getting super excited for an enormous party that E is throwing in July, with a huge number of people from all over the world, and a huge amount of beer. 
• Concerts: so many concerts. Trampled by Turtles, Doomtree, Blitzen Trapper, The 4onthefloor, The Flaming Lips, Sharon Van Etten -- it's going to be a great summer for music in Fargo.
• My parents are coming out to Fargo in July, which will be weird and great
• I'm going out to see my parents in Boston, as well as many friends, and will hopefully also go down to NYC to see Niko and Becky, who just started an internship with a fashion designer in Soho, because she's fancy
• Am I going to Milwaukee one more time? I might be, I've got to figure that out soon.
• Also hoping to take a trip out to Seattle and Colorado to see Hannah and Lia

Do I have time to do all these things? Well, probably not, no, but I'm going to do my best. Even if I don't get to everything, I think it's going to be a good summer, and as sad as I am that things are going to be changing, I'm also excited about what comes next.