don't even know where to start with this one...

yes, i have been blog-absent for quite sometime now, but i swear to you, it is within good reason. first of all, as all of you recent college grads can well attest to, once you start working, sleep becomes increasingly more appealing than spending time blogging into the wee hours of the morning. (i ought to know, i have to be at work at 7 a.m.! me! 7 a.m.! --- i know there are some of you reading this right now who are shaking your heads and laughing uncontrollably) secondly, as i might have mentioned to you, since i am dirt poor and have no money to speak of, i pirate my internet connection off of my neighbors - the gonzalez family.

hard to believe this, but i have now been in mexico for 11 days. i'd be lying to you all if i said that the last 11 days has not been the most difficult, challenging, doubtful, ________ (feel free to fill in the blank with any other pejorative word) days of my life. to begin with, i had the most hellacious travel experience in the history of mankind; here's a little sampling: left the states way earlier than ever intended, thus had no time to pack nor say goodbye (perhaps this was for the best? we all know how i am at goodbyes), left my wallet at our house in shallowater, which had my id, which i needed to board the flight that left in 20 min., missed two flights only to end up in phoenix, arizona at 12:24 a.m. only to learn that my luggage was still in dallas. i spent the "night" (four hours) at a comfort suites in phoenix only to wake up at 4:30 a.m. in order to catch a bus to nogalez, arizona. for those of you who have never been to nogalez, please take my advice and don't bother stopping off at this border town, it would be in your best interest. it was the first time of many that i thought i might perish on my little journey in mexico. once in nogalez, i spent an entire day at the mexican consulate's office trying to obtain my mexican visa, but for some reason they thought all of my documents were fake...thank you go english. i finally got the visa (i have to say it's a pretty cool looking document) and boarded a bus to hermosillo, sonora, mexico. everything that anyone has ever told you about riding the bus in mexico...well, it's all true. i won't take the time to explain my big "welcome" to the company, but let's just say it was pretty negative. (keep in mind this is on day 4 of the commute and still i only have the clothes on my back.)

all of the events i described above added with some unfinished business back home caused me to have quite the meltdown. i would like to take the opportunity now to thank my dearest allison greer, jessica hartsell, crystal boyd, kent truett, bill sowder, and the ever-so-wise taylor harris for coming to the rescue and dealing with my neurotic state. someday i hope to return the favor.

rest assured, things have gotten much better. although i often feel like i am in the peace corp. and living in what i like to call my bohemian bungalow, i know this was the right decision for me at this time in my life. i absolutely love teaching and my students are what gets me through each day. i have no idea if i will make ESL my career, but there is nothing like seeing that proverbial lightbulb go off in their heads when they finally understand something. it has been such a gift to share my life with them. i'm also learning a lot about people and diversity. you can take all of the sociology and anthropology classes that a university can offer, but i don't think anyone can understand the true meaning of that word until you have been thrust into the situation i have been placed in. as my own mother can tell you, it was a youthful wish of mine to be chosen as a cast member of the real world for many years and like most things in life, you should probably be careful what you wish for - because yes, i now star in real world: mexico! where seven strangers... picked to live in a house...work together and have their lives taped... to find out what happens... when people stop being polite... and start getting real...

of course we have all of the token characters: black gay buddhist man, cool avante garde chick who had a child at 19 and prefers to watch foreign films, rather handsome looking young man who prefers to distance himself from everybody because of a girlfriend back home, wild-as-hell boy from tennessee who loves to drawl and drone on and on about how if you're not living for the lord you're going straight to hell (yet he loves to smoke cigs and sleep with mexican senoritas), etc. where does shannan fit into the equation? you guessed it, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed little girl from the south who is still not jaded from the "ways of the world." who did the casting for this show? it couldn't have been more cinematic.

since all 15 of us work together, live together, and socialize together, you can be sure that the tempers flair. on a daily basis, i deal with conversations on religion (is there really a pre-disposed gene found in people to love jesus?), race (man, you don't know what it's like to be me...you don't know what it's like to grow up in the ghetto of atlanta!), money (oh shannan, you're just a spoiled little country club brat...) and the ever-growing sexual tension in the house (did you guys see x and y last night! omg, they couldn't keep their hands off of each other...let's take a poll to see how long it will take them to hook up...)

some days are worse than others. i'll be doing perfectly fine laying on the beach or strolling through the neighborhood and loving the fact that i'm in another country -- and then all of a sudden, the homesickness hits. it comes like a wave and is triggered by the smallest of things. a reminder of an old memory from college, a song that comes up on shuffle from the ipod, when i check to see which texas country artists are on tour and realize that this is the first time in close to 10 years that i won't be going to see any of them live in concert.

to reiterate, i need to be here right now. i have to do this for myself. i have to know that this was something i could do, not something that i always talked about doing. unlike some people, i can't reconcile not chasing a dream or ambition. i need to be here to experience personal growth, to become a stronger person. to gain wisdom...resilience...tenacity...follow through. i need to ask myself, what can i learn from this experience? why did God put this desire in my heart to be here? but more than anything to do with ME, this company needed a breath of fresh air. the morale was very low when i arrived and if i can somehow be apart of maximizing optimism and motivation here, this journey of mine was not in vain.

as always, i miss you all so much and i think about each of you every day. please continue to keep me in your thoughts and prayers.