The Next Step

So I've been getting increasingly frequent requests for my take on my next steps in life from family members. After a week of deliberating and researching, here is my best guess as to what the next few years will look like...

This year will be a scrap year. Few grandiose actions-- just work. That is if I can pull the combination of getting myself off my butt and getting my contacts to mail in their recommendations for me. I hope to procure a part-time job as a substitute teacher at one or more of the local school districts as well as do here-and-there jobs on top of that wherever I can find them. If the viewer has any leads as to where a bright, young, recent college grad with an aversion to food service can find a decent short term (6-9 months) job, I would appreciate any and all advice.

My goal is to make enough money to move, with confidence, out of the parents' house and into the city of my choice for my next step-- grad school. I'm currently looking at schools within middle-American region. Most notably, I'm stuck on University of Wisconsin-- Madison and Vanderbilt (in Nashville). I've been given very good recommendations from people that have gone to or lived near these schools, they both have very good biochemistry departments, and they are both still within easy reach of home for visits and outings. I'm starting the application process now, so wish me luck. In the case that my marginal Grade-point-average cancels out that luck, I do have a plan 'B'. I hope to put a little of my AmeriCorps Education award to good use and retake some undergrad classes at whichever school I am leaning toward. Either way, I will be out of the old homestead by this time next year.

In the meantime, I do have a few major goals to keep me occupied. The foremost is to apply for the Bike and Build program, an avenue that will allow me to go back to this past year's joys of both travel and service. Bike and Build is a nonprofit that raises money and awareness for programs like Habitat for Humanity that try to eliminate substandard housing. If I get in, I will spend much of the year fund raising and making presentations about the subject. The most visible and exciting part will happen a little less than a year from now, May-August, which is a cycling trip across the US. The trip goes from east coast to west coast, stopping once a week to work at a Habitat or similar nonprofit to help build houses. I enjoyed my time at Habitat in Lafayette, and a cycling trip across the US is a goal I've had for a while now. I'm only a novice when it comes to tour biking, but I've been told that all skill ranges are on a team (about 20-30 people), so I'll have plenty of experienced people to help me and inexperienced to not feel so bad about myself.

My second goal for the meantime is a little conditional, but it could be a lot of fun. I'm looking into some short AmeriCorps projects in the Southwest with some conservation corps from January to May. Conservation work (trail repair, brush clearing, invasive species removal, planting of native species) is something that I wanted to do all through NCCC. Lo and behold, I ended up getting 4 inside/desk jobs out of 5 projects. This idea too would let me explore a little more and do some good service. My only worry is that it might interefere with the first goal of doing Bike and Build. I'm going to apply no matter what, but if I haven't raised enough for Bike and Build or I will suffer from not being able to train then B & B will probably win out.

Well that's all that I've been able to figure out thus far. I've been calming down since my initial worries of being home and being a fish-out-of water. My biggest worries about the year have moved to being able to pull everything off and not being a burden to the parents who have graciously offered me food and shelter until I can take off on my own. We've talked about it, and they've been accomidating, but it's really up to me to be a good guest. I suppose I can start by moving that brush pile that Mom asked me to do today. Well, I'm off.