ontheroadtohope

Buen viaje

When I watched (500) Days of Summer, I saw myself on the screen too, or at least a version of me from a time when I was too shy/nervous/scared to express myself and share my feelings. That time has passed, but so much of the quirk remains. Cheers!

Thanks for the rep!

Same to you, OTRTH. If / when you visit Poland or come across any particularly interesting bits of culture from there, share it with me. And I will keep you in mind on my end as well.

Thanks for liking my pictures! =D

At least you can recognize that you aren't ready for a child yet, that is a good thing.

Yea, living fully in the present (reality) has been extremely difficult for me. I have a really hard time giving my full attention to reality in general, my head is always in the future or in an alternate reality. I can't remember the last time I truly took something at face value.

I have found meditation to be an excellent method of pulling yourself into reality and also calming the mind/body. I have found myself very lacking in patience in certain aspects of life. Meditation helps to build that patience. Maybe worth a try sometime. Vipassana is a very interesting method in that it trains you to recognize insight as well, it sort of puts your mind into a debug mode.

Have a great day.

I wouldn't say I've learned it in any substantial way as I pretty much need immersion for that. But just to get some basic learning done, I've been "reading" texts written in Polish, watching videos, etc. Pretty soon I'd like to get Rosetta Stone.

Yes - Poland is in one of the top three countries I'd like to visit. I've actually studied some of the language; it's very attractive and angular sounding. But, really, any of the countries in that region are of interest to me. Romania, Bulgaria, Estonia...I'd like to do a whole tour.

I think my ambition to experience everything in life was never truly something I believed was possible. However, I think everyone in life runs through a gamut of different things. Ironically, I have isolated myself for a large part of my life to actually avoid uncomfortable situations and things that might result in rejection. I have spent a lot of my life in fear, I think, which is an experience in itself.

Overall though, the idea is to experience a certain situation and learn from it, and while I don't learn the full lesson on the first try every time, I think I have at least been making an effort to improve myself.

As for the family, I am not a traditionalist, I think it is the close human companionship that I really want. The idea of kids (dependents) kind of gets a mixed reaction from me. When I was younger, I knew I was too selfish to deal with others who would be so dependent, but I think I am starting to develop a desire to raise a child. Easy to say that though, I would not do a good job if I couldn't shake my tendency to isolate myself.

One of my resolutions for this year is to force myself out of my comfort levels, which means interacting with new people, putting myself out there, and doing things that make me vulnerable.

What is one of your resolutions for the year?

You're a smart girl! Yes indeed, that is the area I will be doing research for, more specifically, what indoor pollutants can affect your hormones! I've been sort of interested in endocrine disruptors since I learned about fish developing another pair of reproductive organs by contamination, so it's interesting .

To be quite honest though, this wasn't my first choice. I've been meaning to focus myself more on international water resources. Basically, I want to become a professor that does research to help undeveloped countries with their water needs. Make water drinkable, help with drainage issues, develop plans to reduce the impact of storms and/or flooding... basically to spread out the knowledge among the world for a resource that is needed regardless of age, race or culture. When I enrolled in this plan I had all intentions of doing this, but there wasn't any positions available for research, and I didn't want to put off grad school longer.

And you are right about the epidemiology stuff! I guess things have changed since I read about it. I originally read these things around 2007. I was at my university's career office and I browsed around a career report. Since I was doing engineering, epidemiology was right there true... and it seemed like it was the ONLY career they mentioned that wasn't recommendable to study and it was quickly declining. Now that I checked the 2008 report on BLS, it seems like it has changed. I guess the avian/swine flu had a major impact on this career and the demand has increased significantly! That's great! I will say that I felt a bit annoyed that this career was losing popularity!

And regarding that masters hmmm... I guess the reason it'd benefit you its because it makes you more versatile? I can see how a masters in epidemiology can only narrow you down to epi jobs, while a MPH you can get those, PLUS MORE! That's the first thing I can think of, but I am not exactly sure either.

And another thing... I like that you still do MPH better. I have a bit of a bias against studying medicine if your goal is to help people. I think that prevention plays a bigger role against remediation, so you obtaining a job where you are able to identify the source of the problem and try to attack it from its root is more beneficial than just helping patients on a one-by-one basis. Your target audience is significantly more primordial too (as you will help babies as well as parents)... I really respect your choice! This is why I like the whole public health thing... it's similar to what I want to do, but instead of focusing on water, it is on health!

(Cute new profile pic by the way . I approve. )

Thanks

Lol. A lot of people love the concept of snow but hate the actuality. It's hilarious. I personally love the snow. And yep, I saw some snow men around the streets. It was adorable. Sadly the snow now is starting to melt but we're going to be hit with a second wave later this week which is awesome-ish. How about you? See any snowmen?

When I was a teenager my strongest ambition was to experience everything in life. Being loved, hated, beautiful, ugly, genius, incompetent, rich, poor, unknown, renowned, etc. I wanted to be the wisest person in the world, and I believed empirical experience to be a good source of learning. I think there are some concepts/situations that just cannot be understood without experiencing it personally, and being completely consumed by that circumstance.

I think one of my strongest ambitions currently is to have a family.

Hmmm that's interesting that you mention Epidemiology. Mind if I bring in my two cents?

It seems like this field does not have a very positive outlook. I've always considered the field of Epidemiology to be an interesting one (I was made aware of that because of someone I dated), and so I started researching the history of it. I consider it to be a fascinating field, because it involves a lot of environmental issues, urban planning, cartography and other issues which I am very interested in.

When researching it, I noticed a trend into a lot of career sites. "Declining salary and availability". I guess this has become a field which technology has great surpassed? I don't know. I really respect the field, and I find it kinda sad that in the future, not many jobs will be available (and the ones that will be will barely make you able to make a living).

I do like the idea of you getting a MPH though! I guess it is sort of related, but I think this field still has a very good chance. The way I see it, if you want to do some epidemiology you can always do it with a public health degree, but maybe you won't be able to do public health if you have an epidemiology degree? *shrugs*

Heh sorry to horn in. I guess it caught my eye that you want to study these two things because I find them both fascinating .

The snowman sounds magnificent! Did he have a carrot nose?

Out of the ordinary? Hmm...

I got a call not 30 minutes ago from a wrong number. I answered saying my name was John, and the guy thought I said "Papa John's" and he said he had the wrong number. Then he said to have a good night and added "Pepperoni on that pizza." He was drunk.

What is one of your primary ambitions in life?

Yea, it's argyle. I am in an argyle phase.

What happened that was good for you yesterday? (anything)

Aw, that sucks. It's pretty much the same here, we never get snow and if we do it's only about a inch or two at most. There's maybe 3 inches of snow outside and people are going crazy and bringing out their slides. It's fun. Ah, I see. Ouch. XD. I love that about places that don't ever get snow. They never have any snow so they don't plan for it. I was born in Maryland so we know a thing or two about snow and it's always funny coming down to the south to see people basically plan to hibernate when snow comes about. It's a very occasional phenomenon but when it happens it's usually a perfect storm of conditions. So, epic snow storms and ice storms, and the such.

Hey, you wanted to know about Seattle? Well to start off, i am actually from edmonds, wa which is about 10 miles north of Seattle (30 minutes from my house to downtown) and i am currrently going to college at western washington university in bellingham. I'm not sure exactly where you are thinking of going to school but i can tell you that it is a great place to live pretty much anywhere. It is wet and somewhat windy with a lot of liberals (which i like), great concert venues, famous dick's hamburgers and a ton of hills. I'm not really sure what you want to know specifically about the area but i can tell you that it is kinda like 10 things i hate about you on a sunny day, but it is usually grittier. A good movie that shows what some of seattle is like is Sleepless in Seattle with tom hanks (one of my favs). I guess if you have any other questions just shoot me another post.

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Thanks! I will be doing indoor air pollution stuff... Yeah, I'm drawn to environmental stuff hahaha.

I REALLY like what you are doing. What are you studying as your bachelors? and what kidn of grad programs are you looking into? And heck... I wouldn't even pressure myself into having to do a grad/joint program if its not exactly what you want... just do it for the experience and for the sake of enjoying yourself in another country! Learn another language, get familiarized with another culture, discover things that you would never discover where you're at, embrace firmer what you have and what you never thought you'd miss...

Now I want to do Peace Corps!