I begin my tour of the country!

Tuesday, July 15, 2008
11:00 AM
I hate when you accidentally start to think about something. Something that you know you shouldn’t think about because you know it’s just going to make you upset, but once you’ve started to think about it, you can’t get it out of your head, no matter how hard you try so then you’re just stuck thinking about it for hours and you end up miserable. That happened to me yesterday. It sucked because it happened in the car on my way to go work out and ruined my workout. I usually love to work out and I feel great doing it and great afterwards. Instead I just felt crummy and didn’t want to be there. I stuck it out for 45 minutes and am glad that I did, but I wish I could have enjoyed it more. Thinking about the things I shouldn’t have been thinking about made me even more happy that I’m here right now and doing something different with my life and in a way kind of escaping from the things that I’m used to. I think it’s really good for me to get away from everything and everyone.

Today Nicole and I left for Convention. We got up around 5:30 (eastern time) and our flight left around 8:30. I slept the whole way to Denver and when I woke up, due to the time change, it was only 8:45 (mountain time). It felt like time just completely stopped while I was asleep. It’s kind of a weird feeling. Nicole and I are not sitting in the airport waiting for our connecting flight, which doesn’t leave until 11:45. It’s about 11:15 now, so we’ll probably make it over to our gate in just a minute. I’m really excited about convention. I know it’s going to be a lot of work while we’re there because there’s a lot of stuff that we have to help with, but it’ll be nice to be out of the office and doing different things and seeing different people. We’ll be in Albuquerque until next Monday and then, because our boss is taking time off, we don’t have to be in the office again until Thursday. I’m really looking forward to having those two days off after convention to unwind and relax. I don’t really know what Nicole and are I going to do, but I’m sure we’ll think of something. We ended up getting out of work early yesterday, thank goodness, and we sat in the living room in silence, each reading a book for like 4 hours. It was lovely. I really like that we get along so well, but don’t feel the need to talk all the time. And, for some reason, I’m really glad that she and I haven’t like “opened up” to each other and shared things. I like that we’re friends, but not really. I don’t know, it’s weird. I’ve realized since starting this job that I’m kind of an anti-social hermit. Nicole is almost always on the phone with someone (it always seems like it’s someone different) and unless John or Sandy call me, I’m never on the phone. I bet it seems to her like I don’t have any friends. I do. Lots of them. I just prefer not to talk to them. That sounds awful, but I don’t mean it that way. I’m just not the best communicator. They all know that. That being said, feel free to call me anytime! I wouldn’t mind communicating with people more, I’m just not so good at initiating it. Time to catch a plane.

2:30 PM
We have arrived in Albuquerque! It’s really pretty here, but I definitely don’t think that New Mexico is some place that I will ever have the desire to live. Much to dry and brown and southwestern looking for me (go figure). The hotel we’re at is beautiful. We’re staying at the Marriott Albuquerque and we can see the mountains from our room. Speaking of which, our room is AMAZING! It’s certainly a lot nicer than the apartment we’re staying in back in Indy. We have a nice big flat screen TV and everything. There’s a 24-hour fitness center, which is nicer than the gym I have a membership to and it includes complementary bottles of water and also has a sauna! Nicole and I are pretty excited about that and are definitely going to try it out! If we want to use internet in our room we have to pay $10 a day (no thanks) or we can just go down to the lobby and use it for free there. This hotel is seriously nice and I’m excited to be living here for the next week. I hung up my clothes in the closet, put my other stuff in drawers and made myself completely at home. We have a staff meeting at 4 and then we’re all going to someone’s house for dinner. We should be back to the hotel around 9 or so, and if I’m not too tired I’m definitely going to hit the fitness center and sauna, then maybe the pool to cool off! Tomorrow is registration and (obviously) when everyone else arrives. I’m definitely going to want to spend some good time with my girls from our chapter when they’re here, so I’m going to take advantage of them not being here tonight and try and be healthily productive!

I was thinking about thing on the plane this afternoon and I think I have decided I’m ok to wait to have kids until I’m 30. I really want to be a young mom and I want kids more than I want anything else in life, but I really also want to travel and explore the country/world and explore being me. I want to take advantage of being young and make the most of it while I can. I was thinking about all the different places that I could live, even just in the US. Maybe move to a different state every two years or so to really experience some different places. I don’t really know if that’s realistic, but at this point I don’t see why it wouldn’t be. But, we’ll see how I feel about traveling once I get done with this job. Obviously, traveling every week for nine months is a lot different than every two years, so hopefully I’ll still be up for it! I have also realized recently that me desire to have kids and a family is not something that is dependent on me having a husband. While of course I would love to meet someone, fall in love and start a family that way, I realize that is not the only way to have a family. I want kids and I’m going to have them one day, single or married. Single will obviously be more of a last resort. I think I’ve started to think this way because I’m seriously starting to doubt love. Not that it exists, but more whether or not I’ll find it and if it will last when I do. I used to be terrified of never getting married, but lately it doesn’t seem like the end of the world. I can still most of the things I want in life without having a husband so it doesn’t seem like the end of the world if I never find one. I would, of course, prefer to find that one person that is able to make me happy and I’m able to grow old with and share all of the things I want to do in life with him, but I don’t want my life and my happiness to be contingent on that. I am a great person and there’s no reason I can’t live a great life and be happy without a man should that be how my life pans out. I feel like that’s something every girl is kind of told/thinks in the back of her head but doesn’t really believe it. At the moment, I really believe it. Nicole and I were walking past some pay phones in the lobby and it reminded me of all the trips I’ve been on where I’ve made time at the end of the day to call who ever I was dating at the time. It feels nice to not have to think about that right now. I’m here for me and I get to fully enjoy all of this without something or someone tugging at the back of my mind. It feels good to be happy about being single. I was happy about being single last spring (my junior year) but then after last summer I was pretty miserable with it, until now. Like I said earlier, it’s nice to escape my normal life and what I’m used to. It’s especially nice because this isn’t a short vacation that’s going to end soon and spit me back out where I started. This is my life. I love it.