Kim Priore

I am DONE, people!  Well, almost.  Done with the paper writing, let’s put it that way.  All that stands between me and the International Incident 07 is one measly Old Testament exam.  Also I would like to point out that the paper I submitted tonight is not *technically* due until Friday, making this the record, counting high school, college, and grad school thus far, for the earliest I have EVER turned in a paper before its due date.  As NG points out, only my brother could motivate that kind of insane behavior in me.

So that’s it – the next two days are all about shopping and packing and I’m sure at some point the inevitable pre-trip freakout (awwww freakOUT) – sorry it called for an 80’s music interlude.  If you’re around Tuesday and Wednesday, give yer girl a holla, and remember if anyone wants to send stuff on the Midnight Train to Bethlehem, get it to me by Wednesday night. 

Peace!

So much going on people…it’s a little ridiculous.  I’m 20 pages away from the end of the semester.  Well that and an exam in a class that I didn’t really attend or do the reading for the whole 2nd half of the semester.  But I’m not really worried about that too much.  I mean it’s Old Testament, how bad can it be, right?  Some battles, some kings, a spy-hiding prostitute thrown in there somewhere, a few words you never knew were a euphemism for genitalia…and some more battles.  That’s pretty much it.  You heard it here first, folks, the Hebrew Scriptures in 30 seconds or less, by KP.   But at the moment it’s the paper that’s tripping me up, I just have total writers’ block.  I know I’ll pull it off, because I always do, but the question is more can I pull it off sooner and have some breathing room, aka time to pack, before my trip to Israel?

Which leads us to…my trip to Israel!!!  I cannot even BEGIN to comprehend that I’ll be seeing Doug and Mandy in less than a week!  Not to mention Little Shanny!  Oh yeah, and the HOLY LAND!!!!  So that’s exciting.

But I’m kind of freaking out at how fast January has gone by.  I don’t know why, I thought I’d have way more time to get stuff done and see people.  It’s a little freaky to me that I start classes like the DAY after I get back, and then, aside from Spring Break, the next chunk of free time I have will be….after graduation.  So I’ll either be unemployed, or starting some yet to be determined new job.  And said job might not be here.  And that is really sad to me.  Things that are freaking me out, in no particular order: that I might have to move to DC, or elsewhere; that my parents will be (barring a miracle) eventually selling this house and moving out of Natick – what?!? No Priores in the Home of Champions?  That’s like, a crime!…That even when my brother does move back to this side of the globe, it may not be to this state, and even if he does, I might not be here! And even if I stay, Nan might go!  It’s just too much, people, too much change.  Too many unknowns.  Change is not my strong suit.  That’s putting it mildly, lemme ’splain, no, there is too much, lemme sum up…change scares the ever-lovin’ crap outta me.

So I’m trying to just take things one day at a time, and not freak out too much about things that are out of my control.  But that’s sooo much easier said than done.  Much like 24, I feel like I can hear the giant ticking clock in my head, and it’s the countdown to who knows what.  And in reality, there’s no Jack Bauer to save me and solve the un-solveable problems.  So I guess we’ll just have to wait and see how this season, of life and of 24, plays out.

So school is off and running with a bang!  I started my Development course at Tufts last week, and this week started the rest of my courses at the good ol’ H-bomb.  So far I like them, I’m taking one on the theological and ethical issues raised by Hurricane Katrina and other catastrophes, and one on the struggle within Islam between moderates and extremists.  And I have to take an Old Testament class, to fulfill a requirement.  Because apparently 9 years of Christian school and 4 years as a religion major at Wellesley does not give me enough of a grasp of Scripture.  But whatever, it will be good to brush up, and obviously from a much different perspective than like, Mr. Schaaf’s junior high Bible class.  All of this in addition to my 2 jobs, which combine for a total of 20 hours a week.

Then I get an email from my work study boss, offering me a position as a teaching fellow in one of her courses, it’s on religion and international politics.  It’s an amazing opportunity – TFs are by and large PhD students, not lowly Masters’ candidates.  It would look good on a resume.  And the money’s good.  But Kim, you say, don’t you already have 2 jobs and a full course load, and isn’t this basically like taking a 5th course, since you’d have to do all the reading so as to be able to lead a discussion section?  Why yes, I say.  So Kim, you say, clearly you would be insane to take on this additional responsibility.  Well, I say, you clearly did not go to Wellesley.  You don’t share this pathological (yes that’s the correct use of the term) need to overachieve.  You believe in things like free time, a social life, having fun on the weekends, getting 8 hours of sleep a night.  I am very envious of you.

The thing is, this is very 21-year-old Kim of me.   Very Wellesley Kim.  A lot of you did not know Wellesley Kim, you have come into my life since.  You probably wouldn’t recognize her.  She was lean, hungry, ambitious, motivated.  She survived on like 4 hours of sleep a night.  29-year-old Kim, by comparison, has grown fat, lazy, complacent, and her goal is to marry rich.  I feel like I’ve suddenly traveled back in time.

Ultimately, what it comes down to is that in addition to wanting to feel *slightly* better about myself when I read the Class Notes section of the Alum Magazine and read about classmates who have like gone to law school, hiked Everest, started their own nonprofit, gotten married, and had kids, it really is an amazing opportunity and too good to pass up.  This is IF it all works out, and I hope I’m not jinxing it, I feel like someone in the administration is going to get the paperwork and realize this prof has overlooked the fact that I’m a total moron.  And besides, if the Sox made the playoffs this fall, I wouldn’t be getting much sleep anyway.  So really I figure I’m just using my allotted playoff sleeplessness for a slightly less noble cause. 

At any rate, if you don’t see much of me over the next few months it’s because I’m passed out drooling on a book somewhere.  I’ll pencil you in for some time in January.  Feel free to stop by the house, please bring coffee.  Thanks.

For the Will Ferrell fans out there, that subject heading should be read like, “Presidenting is haaard.”  But seriously, I’m up to my eyeballs in papers and take-home finals and the like, and it’s easy to lose perspective.  I’m like, I signed UP for this gig?  And I’m PAYING it for it?  Like, A LOT??? 

I guess because I wanted to go back to school for so long, we have a tendency to idealize things…ok well I do anyway…and I do love it and I’m really really grateful for the opportunity, but I think part of what made my undergrad experience so phenomenal was the amazing women I went through it with.  And I made a conscious choice this time around that I wasn’t up for being a joiner in the HDS world…I have my friends, my family, my church etc, and that doesn’t need to change.  But in the middle of the night it’s still kind of lonely here with just my books and nobody to make IHOP runs with. 

So anyways – by way of reminding myself where I’ve come from, a verse from Maya Angelou (look up the whole poem, it’s amazing) that we read at my Wellesley baccalaureate:

Now you understand
Just why my head’s not bowed.
I don’t shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It’s in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
the palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
‘Cause I’m a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That’s me.