One of the marked differences about being at home is that I no longer lie with my close friends nor am I within walking distance. I have to drive to them. There is also a marked lack of activities here. Not like fun times in Boston. This just means that we must get creative. Blerg.

Blergdeblerg deblerg. Empty mind. Laziness.

I’m currently watching news coverage of the tornadoes in Oklahoma and Missouri. It’s terrifying. And terribly exciting. Part of me just wants to be studying it, figuring out where it comes from, how to predict it better. To feel the adrenaline of following it, but not just an idiot’s errand, following it in the pursuit of science. It’s a terrible thing. So far 124 confirmed dead in Joplin with 1500 missing (many most likely due to lack of communication). I’m watching CNN who is posting photos of people missing. It’s heartbreaking. Will Norton was sucked out of the sunroof on the way home from his high school graduation. 10 from the tornadoes in Oklahoma plus the missing.

The truth is that this extreme weather is the new normal. Larger tornados, hurricanes, blizzards, heat waves. Climate change has far reaching and immediate effects. Fatal effects. I think I could be very happy getting a degree in EAPS. I’m not crazy in love with rocks, which every person who I’ve mentioned doing EAPS to mentions the fact that EAPS people are in love with rocks. I love the weather. Climate change. Oceans and atmosphere. Working on the things that are changing constantly. Rocks are great, but I do not want to spend my whole life with them. It’s the thrill of the tornado siren (and the less thrilling computer models) that are the interesting aspects of eaps. I decided that should I decide that engineering is not my thing after this next coming semester then I will switch to EAPS.

I don’t know how to find myself, what I want. Find myself in so many different ways. From career to interests to what I want. So much confusion, but that is adolescence and that is life.

I am very happy about how my life is proceeding at this point though. I attend MIT, learning so much at the best institution for science, learning, and engineering in the world. I’m surrounded by incredibly intelligent people– people who love to learn and build (and whine a bit) and discover. This summer I’m pursuing my interests. I’m going backpacking for 30 days in the Rocky Mountains– a trip where I’ll learn about backcountry logistics and safety and cooking but where I’ll also learn so much about myself. I’m going to Uganda for a month, going to work to improve the lives of people by helping them and introducing them to technologies. I’m traveling to Africa, experiencing a new culture and learning from new people. I will grow as an engineer and as a person.

Returning to the video of the tornado coverage. I just want to help. I want to sign up for the Red Cross Disaster response teams. I don’t have a solid job the last three weeks of July. It’s crossed my mind before. The dogs that can smell living people. The doctors. The walls collapsed of a Home Depot but the shelves still standing.

It was at this point that I became tired of this. I cannot allow this to be my summer. Of course, two months of my summer will be adventuring, but the five weeks I spend at home must not carry on like this elsewise I shall melt into a puddle. Brain atrophy is a terrible thing. I am, of course, allowed the occasional lounging, but I must make my free time more exciting.

Thus the re-re-re-re-re-start of this blog. I aim to write at least one entry every day. This will provide at least one creative and productive outlet. I will get to exercise my writing skills, an activity that I have not done for a very long time outside of 2 page Spanish papers analyzing Cronica de una Muerte Anunciada in intermediate level vocabulary. It’s an activity that I miss very much and would like to hone.

So here it begins. I sit and listen to the wonderful gift of music courtesy of Emily Wean and dropbox.

P.S. My usage of Hello (blank) Hellooo is growing increasingly frequent. Except no one here will ever get it. Of course the only person who gets it in Cambridge is Caitlin Sample so this really does not make that much of a difference.

This is bad. This is me getting it back together. Here is some accountability. Though it’s not really real accountability because no one is reading this. But it will help me. So bear with me, nonexistent reader. I will finish this report by 6PM. That is 40 minutes from now. Nooooo problem.

It’s spring break, and you know what that means. Well you don’t, so I’ll tell you. It means spring training! Two a days in the snow and cold but we get stronger and faster every practice…

Except for me. I am not getting faster. Because my rib hurts. I suspect (and hope) that I pulled an intercostal muscle. There’s also the chance that I am developing a stress fracture, an injury that takes longer to heal and has more lasting effects. Regardless, there’s little that can be done other than rest it. Which sucks.

What really sucks is taking so much time off, having it feel better, and then getting on the water and it hurts again. Not a good feeling at all. In fact, makes me cry sometimes. This morning it hurt during the first piece. I’m just so frustrated because I stopped erging when it began to be sensitive and it’s only gotten worse. I can’t get faster. I am letting my team down. If I can’t race, we’re in trouble because we might not have to numbers to have the amount of boats we need.

But I need to put my health first. I row because I like it and because I want to be healthy and exercise and set a precedent for future health. Breaking my rib forever is the opposite of what I want to do. I would much rather take the rest of this season off and be able to come back fully recovered and able to row and erg next season than push myself too far like two girls on the team did. They may have rib problems for the rest of their lives. And rowing isn’t fun when it hurts even more than normal and I feel so guilty all the time and I can’t get faster and better.

Such frustration. I hate it.

Two words: Roadable Aircraft

aka: the next step towards the flying car

So it was this morning that my family drove the hour down to Oshkosh and waited an additional 30 to 45 minutes waiting in traffic to get into the parking lot. I occupied myself by counting the license plates from different states (23… well 22 states and a government vehicle). For those not in the know, the EAA is a huge deal. In fact, the control tower used by EAA becomes the “Busiest Control Tower in the World” according to the Green Bay Press Gazette and the large banner strung below its windows. According to this morning’s PG, last year, on July 27, EAA tower had aprox. 3,400 some flights while O’Hare had some 2,900 and Atlanta 2,400 something. People come from all over (as evidenced by the license plates) and stay for the entire week; a ton of people actually camp on the grounds. Finally arriving at a parking lot and walking to the main entrance, we picked up our wristbands at WillCall and walked to the MIT Club area. We arrived just in time for lunch, sandwiches and veggies and all sorts of lunchtime goodies (including ice cream sandwiches). I met the President and some of the board members of the MIT Club, all of whom were glad I could make it and welcomed me.

This is when it started to become real. Everyone that I talked to offered me congratulations on my acceptance and decision to attend MIT. These people had already graduated from there and done great things. I’m just an 18 year old who in some way, unknown even to herself, received an acceptance letter on pi day. It’s not just some distant ‘someday’ anymore. I leave in less than 1 month.

One month. Ah! Terrified and excited.

Continuing, we heard a presentation from Carl Dietrich (my spelling is questionable), founder and CEO of Terrafugia, the roadable airplane. He gathered a small group of fellow students and created a flying car with limited budget and in a remarkably short period of time.

This is “This is really happening part 2″

I realized that although my ideas about my future career change from day to day, I could potentially create my own product. Design. Idea.

And, duh, this has occurred to me before, but never before has it been so real and tangible. This guy left MIT and started creating flying cars. And will be producing and selling them.

This is why it’s so scary. I have no idea what is coming. MIT will be completely different than anything I have ever experienced before. It opens opportunities that I never knew existed before. I create my own opportunities.

And so with the growing feeling that one day, I too will be an MIT alum, I watched the fantastic airshow. Even my newly 13 year old sister rose out of her grumpy slouch and eyerolling behavior to enjoy the show. Of course, the show lasted for over two hours but included crazy stunt flying involving cars, high speeds, loop de loops, tons of tricks I do not know the name of, and formation flying. Even planes flying in formation AND doing tricks.

My family and I walked among some of the planes, though the show was so large we had little chance to explore as much as I would like before the complaints from all sides began. Mom retold stories of all of her uncles in the Air Force, flying P 51′s in Japan and Italy or being paratroopers or Grandpa Ed flying DC 3′s in the Sahara in the late thirties.

I had much more eloquent phrases and ideas and parts of the day to describe in my head, but after such a day, I am exhausted. Perhaps I shall revisit and revise later. But now, sleep.

I shall count airplanes as the loop the loop in my dreams.

Or maybe not, because that could be rather naseau inducing.

Just sleeping shall be fine.

So it was, as I stood in water watching water, that I thought of a blog, requiring a computer screen, which absolutely should not be mixed with water. Perhaps this is my nature: it’s sunny out, but I wish it was raining so I could go to a movie without feeling bad about missing the sun, I have homework but I don’t want to do it (actually, that’s not a paradox. at all.)

Anyways (being concise is not always my strong suit). Welcome.

These are not yet notes from a new new town, just a town, which two years ago was new.

And the glorious plan I glimpsed has faded away as the water runs in the drains. I am left with nothing to post. Oh, the grandeur of ideas and the empty reality of action and the fault of memory.

What I do remember is the thunder song that I made up and sang for almost an hour straight in an effort to force the pool closing. Thunder did not come but they finally closed the pool.

To the tune of “Rain, Rain, Go Away”

Rain rain, please come back,

but only with a thunder clap

the lifeguards here are cold and bored

but if there’s lightning we can leave for sure.