I got an email about two weeks ago from my city coordinator asking us if we wanted to do a second year of LVC. Are you kidding me? I feel like I just started my time here in Baltimore. Okay, its been 4 months exactly today since I started as a volunteer and I’m finally comfortable with my day to day. I’ve made friends outside of LVC and I really like it here. It took four months to get to this place of content and now I’m forced with the decision to do it all over again.
In all honesty, I thought doing a year would be enough for me. It’s great that I’m out of my element, I have got a great job to put on my resume and now I can go on my merry way to start my life. Right? I’m starting to think not. I started researching grad schools and all the programs I’m interested in I easily qualify for except for 2 years of prior work experience. I’m pretty sure camp counselor and babysitter don’t really count for my MBA. So as I started researching more I realized that I really didn’t want to be a volunteer in Baltimore next year, I love it here and could live here, but I don’t think I could do exactly what I’m doing for another year. So I thought to myself, what could I do? I could go sleep on my mom’s couch for six months while working a retail job until I figured things out. I could jump on a cruise ship and work for a while to save up money. I could start applying for jobs and see where life took me. None of these sound like bad options, but none of these sounded exactly ideal either.
Then it hit me, what do I consider my home? Its where the heart is right? Well I have never been so in love with a place like I have been in Northern California. It has everything I think want. (I’m 22, I don’t know what I want.) But financially I get just afford to move back, I need a game plan. Then I really started to consider doing another year of service in the Bay Area. The truth is I love living in community and I love being a volunteer, so why not?
So here I am, 2 days and 8 hours away from Southern California, and I’m already planning my next excursion when I should be thinking about that In n Out Burger I’m getting as soon as I’m picked up from the airport.
I really don’t know what I should do. I should comment on the fact that American culture has gotten us so stressed with the idea of being happy and making it that we can’t just enjoy what life has to offer us. I should just relax and let the cards fall into place. I could jump into action and plan my life and not be afraid of failure. But alas, I’m confused and okay with it. So on January 18th I may be signing up for another year, I may not. Am I stressed about the decision? Heck yes. But that’s okay, right?
It could be worse, I could move home. Right Mom?
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