Whirlwind Reflection

     As a new graduate school I am often asked "Why do you want to go to graduate school?" Or "Why do you want to be a Social Worker?" These are difficult to answer, and are even harder to answer when asked by professors or prospective internship bosses. These are hard questions to answer because they cut to my soul. They ask me to share part of me that I might not want to share. The questions also ask me to decide right now what I want to do for the next 5, 10, 20 years of my life. I do not specifically know what I want to do, or what triggered within me to finally apply for graduate school. I do know that if I had attempted graduate school any earlier I would not  have been successful.
     I graduated college in 2008 with my BA in Psychology. My professors encouraged me to go on to graduate school. Like many of my peers I declined because of a man. Had I known then that my relationship with him would be over in two year, I probably would have gone straight to graduate school. Yet, it was not until I studied various jobs that I realized Social Work was a better fit for my soul.
     Figuring out what to study and where to study was difficult, but the months leading up to my first semester of graduate school became emotionally difficult. I was moving thousands of miles away from where I had lived my entire life. I had to say good-bye to friends and family and pray my car would make the drive across country. Fortunately, I have family where I am attending school. I am not alone here. I never realized how attached I was to my hometown. It seems sad to me that I cannot visit the local shops I love. Yet, the places that store the painful memories for me are gone as well. Graduate school has marker a new beginning for me.
     The hardest good-bye that I said was to the man I am currently dating. In many ways he is so strong and can hold me up when I need him, even though we are over 1,000 miles apart. In other ways I renew his strength, or at least that is what he tells me. I do not know much about successful relationships, but I do know that he treats me with a level of respect and dignity that I am unaccustomed. We are both in graduate school studying similar fields. It has been nice to have someone who knows me to talk to when my term paper is due and I am worried I will never finish. He is there in that moment with me, and feels exactly the same way.
     Well, I haven't quite answered the questions I posed in this post. The explanation is long and will take time to write. Since Winter Break begins in a week or so, I will have more time to catch everyone up on my story.
Keep reading my blog!