El Futuro

1/26/2008

Living at the end of the world gives me a lot of time to think, especially at night. And what else is there to ponder, but my future? I suppose some people would chastise me for not living in the present, but it is kind of hard to live in the present after seven o’clock when the whole town shuts down. In order to entertain myself for the next three or four hours I watch movies on my laptop, read books, write blog posts, work on puzzles, muddle over what projects I can start so that I am not such an ineffective volunteer, crash in on Brian or fret about what I’m going to do with the rest of my life.

Being that I had NO idea what I wanted to do with the rest of my life, the last 6 months in Cabricán have been very useful in narrowing down the possibilities:

A) Writing – My mother loves this idea. I’m not certain. I’ve never believed myself to be a good writer, but recently it’s become not only therapeutic but also extremely enjoyable. Travel writing would be my dream job. How great would it be to travel for free?

B) International Development – Broad category, I know. To broaden it even further, development in general. I would love to go back and work for the Latino Community Credit Union again, but I also want to work in a big city for a while. Washington, DC captures my attention because of all the opportunities in development. San Francisco as well, not because of development, but because I would love to work on the west coast and San Francisco seems like it would be a great city to live in.

C) Masters – Go back to school and get my masters in…? (Obviously not well thought out).

D) Veterinary School – This would clearly take a little extra work, given that my last science class was intro to biology my Freshman year at UNC and my last math class was AP statistics… which, scary to say, was five years ago now. I’m currently reading this book, “Mountains Beyond Mountains” about Dr. Paul Farmer a graduate and now professor of Harvard Medical School who spends half of his year providing free medical treatment in Haiti. He is also, coincidentally, a Dookie, so I guess some people who graduate from that place turn out okay. I think it would be neat to do the same thing but as a veterinarian.

E) Dirty Hippie – My definite plans upon completing my service, are either motorcycle diary-ing it backwards to Tierra del Fuego (sans the motorcycle, although I haven’t ruled that out completely) or buying a piece of junk car and driving up through Mexico back to the states and hitting all those places I’ve always wanted to see like Yellow Stone National Park and the Grand Canyon. Of course, by that point, maybe I will be ready to come home… or maybe I will become a professional dirty hippie and book it around the world on a shoestring budget for the rest of my life or until I get bored of seeing new things.

Of course, maybe I’ll just be a professional dirty hippie with a masters in (fill in the blank), who travels the world providing international development in veterinary care and writes about her experiences. Perfect!