We're getting a new dishwasher!

The full story: We were having some issues getting the thermostat to work, so my roommate called in the maintenance guy. He fixed the thermostat temporarily, and will replace it completely when he comes to replace the dishwasher. He said they're both just very old, and need to be updated (which we fully agreed with like springy little bobble heads). He also got the heat working; the pilot light just needed to be lit. So now we have heat... you know, now that winter is basically over...

And just for laughs, I think you guys should know that when the maintenance man investigated why our dishwasher, or The Beast, as we like to call it, was making that god awful noise when it ran, he retrieved a tupperware that looked like a dinosaur had gnawed on it, and a porcelain teacup handle out of the main component where the washer spins. I'm pretty sure at that point he thought he had fixed it because he smiled, and said, "Well, that might be the problem..." He closed the mouth of The Beast once more, set it to run, and sure enough, it continued to make that wretched scraping noise. The smile came clean off his face and landed on ours. "That's a problem," he said. "This'll need to be replaced." I could have hugged him.

Other than the sparkling clean dishes now shining into our future, life has been all buttercups and dandelions again. Winter quarter is officially in full swing. I cut my hours drastically at work after learning my lesson that working full-time on top of full-time school is a death wish, so I'm only working two days (averaging about 15 hours). I'm in two higher level graphic design courses and Speech and Public Speaking online. Yes, you read that correctly: online. I'd always planned on putting the stupid class off until senior year in hopes that I'd be so dazzled by the light at the end of the tunnel that it would lighten the pain of taking the wretched, horrible, no good, really bad class. But scheduling made things difficult, and one way or another, the universe forced me into taking it this quarter. I only have to give two public speeches. I think I can handle that.


Under eighty days until I'm living in France. I still can't believe that sentence is fact, and not fantasy.

Sometimes, when I get really down, I get on the computer and watch old videos of all my friends together, or read e-Mails we sent back and forth while apart for long periods of time. It never fails to make me laugh, or at the very least, smile.

I want to share a little (and archive it in the process). Under the cut is summer 'letters' between my roommate (who was a few hundred miles away at camp at the time) and me (writing from a myriad of places, but mostly stuck in the SAV working). Enjoy. More importantly, laugh (because, yes, we really are that silly at twenty years old).

( NEW DISHWASHER, ANYONE? )

I hope that when we're eighty, we look back on these days and smile. That we remember the happiness we shared, the moments we swapped over coffee cups and burnt out cigarettes, the way she looked dripping from the rain and the sheer joy I felt that first second the mountains came into view. I want to remember the stupid inside jokes, the crazy homeless guy, the buildings that grew on and on forever into the distance, the sound of the seagulls and the smell of the ocean lingering in the air. I want to remember you, and me, and how just for those few moments, our friendship was the most solid thing in the world. I want to remember living, breathing, seeing, being.





( I THINK I'LL GO TO BOSTON, WHERE NO ONE KNOWS MY NAME )

Being on vacation has given me time to do exactly what a Kades does best: think.

The future has really been stressing me out this month; the drive to be successful has settled like a strand of thorns somewhere just underneath my shoulder-blades. I don't want to screw this thing called my life up. And I know if I walk into it confidently, start this year off the right way, and really give everything my full one hundred and ten percent, I'll be fine. Better than fine, probably. But I worry about stretching myself too thin. I think I might be trying to accomplish too much too fast---like I'm speeding my life up faster than it should be going---but I'm terrified of being left behind. I want (need) those internships. I want to get my feet wet in this career and make sure I'm really in this for the long run. And more than anything, I want to make sure I'm at the top of the competition. I don't even have to be winning---but I better as hell be at the top. There's no reason not to be, because I've got this. I've so, so, so got this.

I need to make sure I spend more time putting effort into my portfolio and less time putting effort into my night-soon-to-be-day job. When I send out the applications for these internships (and future job opportunities), I want my portfolio to say everything about me. I want my typography to speak for itself, my feminine charms to be hidden in the photography, my creative juices to leak out of my hand made elements. I want that portfolio to be a superstar. It's going to be a lot of work. A lot of work.

Going into this summer, I had pretty low hopes. I thought it was going to suck ass. But it didn't defeat me (at least, it hasn't yet). Living alone? I've thoroughly enjoyed it. Working the entire summer? Paid off the rest of my trip, a few gifts to myself, and a good start for my Lacoste fund---not to mention some great memories with some great people. Not getting a trip? If I want to do something, I'm gonna do it, no matter who tries to stand in my way; Maine, I cannot wait to meet you. Missing my friends? Only means more love-notes and can't-wait-to-see-you's which can never be bad, truthfully.

My chest is sunburned, my hair's too short and my bangs too choppy, my skin smells like chlorine, and there are still little grains of sand stuck to the inside of my knees, but I can't complain---I love it. Everything works out, little by little. And my life? It's going to work out... little by little, just the way I like it.