"Without new experiences, something inside of us sleeps. The sleeper must awaken." – Frank Herbert 

been sleeping, but feeling motivated today =)

In like a lion...can you believe it's March already?

Forgive me blog readers, I have sinned. It has been many many months since my last blog post. Believe me, there has been quite a lot going on but not much I can share right yet. Husband is still in El Salvador. Did I mention his waiver was denied? Yeah that kinda sucked. We're in the midst of refiling but it just seems hopeless. I really do try to think positively but, I don't know. I've been working a ton, trying to pay down debt. If anyone is out there, write to me in the comments! Tell me how you're doing, include a link to your blog if you have one. 

Hola!

I've been back in Maryland for just over a month now and I feel horrible for not blogging more. I have no immigration updates for anyone who's wondering, we're just still waiting. I've been camping out in my mom's basement for the last month and I'll be moving into an apartment at the end of July. I got a new job at my old job, so I'm working at the same place with the same people but just a different, better position. I also have some huge news that I can't share on the blog but if you're interested email or facebook me!

While I was in Spain, I had started jogging doing the C25k training program. I've been trying to keep up with it here but between the 104 degree temperatures and not being able to get a routine going, I've been really slacking. Hopefully once I'm in my own place I'll be able to get a better routine established. 

Honestly it feels so good to be home. I loved Spain but it was pretty lonely. I do however miss gazpacho and olives and sidra. 

concentra-te

Ok so on the one hand, I've been doing much better the last few months, but this is comparatively speaking with fall and winter. In reality, I've just been lazing around doing nothing. It's time to focus. I have five weeks left in Spain and yesterday I just laid around being depressed about how I wanna go home NOW and what am I doing here and why can't I just go home and blah blah blah and on and on. Well, julie, STFU. Five weeks is nothing. You've made it this far, it's been seven months. Only five weeks left to go. Five weeks left and we can add it to the list of things you completely finished and didn't quit even though you were kicking and screaming the whole way through.

Spain
4 months in El Salvador
year of AmeriCorps volunteering with the boss from hell
semester abroad in Mexico
university-only changed your major five time but the important thing is to finish.

I think it might be getting longer than the list of things I have quit. The thing that made most of these experiences bearable and got me through to the end was making at least one good friend at each step. I wouldn't have had nearly the great experience I did in Mexico if I hadn't become friends with Traci. Out of AmeriCorps, I got Elizabeth, through El Salvador I met Jen and a ton of facebook friends who've been exiled throughout Latin America. And from Spain I got Ryan and Joey. I can't think of any good friends I made in university except during study abroad. It's hard when you go to a commuter school though.

SO, five weeks left to get myself ready for Maryland. Things to do:

buy a car
find an apartment
find a job
apply for grad school
study for gre

I already spend hours looking at apartments on craigslist which is pointless since they'll be gone by the time I get home. So my goal for this weekend is to apply for three jobs. Maybe it's a little early still but it doesn't hurt to practice writing a few cover letters. I know, doesn't sound like a good time to me either.

feel better

I was cleaning out my drawer and found this "to do" list for my time here in Spain. It's from November 27, 2011 and while the only thing I can cross off the list is feel better, I can definitively say, I feel much better these days. 

feel better

Riguas

A couple months ago I picked up this package of sweet corn flour (or mezcla de maíz dulce). I thought it looked interesting and maybe it would taste like Cheesecake Factory's sweet corn tamale cakes. And then I never got around to trying it. Today I stopped being lazy and mixed up the batter according to the directions on the bag. Well it doesn't taste anything like sweet corn tamale cakes at all. But as I was eating these little semi-sweet corn cakes, I knew I'd eaten something really similar before and then it dawned on me that they taste exactly like riguas. I've only had riguas in El Salvador but they're kinda like corn pancakes. A quick google search brought up a picture of the flour I was using which said it was good for making, among other things, riguas from El Salvador.

I don't know if I have it in me to make tamales while I'm out here but that is on my list of things to attempt for the first time. I have corn husk wrappers to make tamales de elote but I don't have any banana leaves to make chicken tamales. Plus they just seem like a lot of work, so we'll see. 

holaaaaaaaaaaa

Enjoy the time you have left. Seriously this might end up being a little whiny, just a warning. I'm sooooooo ready to go home. I've been gone since June. I've been alone since October. Everything has gone wrong and yet everything is exactly as it's supposed to be. I have 6 and half weeks left and then I'm going HOME. I'm not going to make any declarations like I'll never do this again, cause you NEVER know, but I don't like living alone. It's boring. It's lonely. I've come to realize I'm a total homebody. I can only go out so much, it gets old quick.

 

I've started drinking here and I've realized some things about myself. I'm not an alcoholic but I have alcoholic tendencies. I'm drinking because I'm bored. I only want to drink to get drunk. One drink is a waste of calories. Sidra is the Asturian "nectar of the gods." Three bottles of sidra is happy, four bottles is sloppy. I'm a happy drunk. I just like to laugh and hug everyone. I don't like to get sick.

 

There was a period like after high school, early college where I was definitely a drinker and then it just kinda stopped at some point. The whole time I was with M, I almost never drank, probably cause he never drank. We'd go to family parties where all the men would be drinking and someone would hand him a drink and he'd just carry it around. All of a sudden, he gets to El Salvador and he starts going out and getting drunk. The first time he came home drunk I was livid. He had left earlier that day to go play soccer and I was home, at his family's house, cause I didn't venture out much by myself. His sister asked me if I was going to eat dinner and I said I was going to wait for him to eat. She gave me a derisive smile and told me he probably wouldn't be home for quite some time. I didn't know where he was but he finally stumbled home at 2am wasted. I had NEVER seen him like this. He would NEVER drink with me when we were in the US. To top it all off, he was a HAPPY drunk. He was so happy he couldn't understand why I was so upset. I have a really hard time staying mad at people. Especially ones that are giggling uncontrollably. But this night was definitely a turning point. I was pissed cause he left me alone for so long, pissed cause he went and got drunk, and super pissed cause I realized I'm pissed and have NOWHERE to go. There is no stomping off, going to another room, going to my mom's house, going to a friend's house, or just going anywhere else. I'm isolated in the campo of El Salvador and have no friends, nowhere to go, and no way to get there if I want to leave. There aren't exactly buses running 24 hours a day here. I don't know anyone with a car. I don't KNOW ANYONE. Independence was out the window.

 

So I don't know what made him start drinking in El Salvador but I've heard he's been drinking a lot more since I've been gone which I can relate to I guess since I've been drinking so much too and I chalk it up to being bored and not having anything else to focus on. It's probably worse for him since he doesn't have a job there. I have my job to get me through the week and I have a couple of friends I sometimes see on the weekends. We go drinking of course.

 

So June marks one year since we left. Our waiver was turned in December 27 and I guess right now we just wait. I don't even know if there's something we're supposed to be doing or if we just sit back and wait for them to contact us. If it takes a year from when we turned in the waiver then we're a third of the way through. Hopefully it takes less time!!!!!

I've been really bad about updating lately, probably cause I've been so out of it but I'm going to try to be better!!