maybe all my years of travelling have quenched what I've thirsted

Here's to a crisp autumn. The weather is cold and after a hard week of homesickness I'm feeling myself on the mend. Homesickness isn't something I've ever really dealt with, but it came in full force this week. I suppose it's only natural. But I'm glad that it's passed and I can move on to other more exciting things. This post is probably more about promise than anything else, promise and plans for the future.

My grant is officially written. I closed myself in my house today finishing the grant and working on some other projects I've been putting off during my down and out feelings. I feel like I'm getting back on track and that it'll be soon enough where the project will be on its feet. Then, oh then, this week I got a lot of information about the future. This Wednesday I'm heading to Nosivka, my host village, to visit my host family and act as the adopt-a-cluster person. Can't wait to meet the new trainees and hopefully my presentation will go alright. I'm going to be doing a presentation on young learners and I hope my plans will be ok. Americans can be a bit more touchy and judgemental than Ukrainians and so I hope they're not expecting fireworks. At the very least I hope that my excitement can make up for that. I'm also giving some information on rubrics. Thanks to help from Joe who sent me some of his and then I am going to give information on how I grade my little kids. After that I'll be back home and then in two weeks I'm headed to Poland with Linnea and meeting up with Ama. I really cannot wait! I get home and head down to Uzhgorod for Halloween!!! Still have some costume stuff to do ! But that can wait til next week. And then warden training! Ah life is crazy.

We finally got the plans and price quotes for Egypt so that's definitely a go for new years! Seven days in the warmth of teh desert I'll take it!

feeling good and I figure after last week I should post when feeling good and happy. These posts are more important than the others anyway! There's still a lot on my plate, but I'm feeling more happy about getting things finished and I'm starting to feel like I can do it. I'm looking forward to possibilities.

loveandhugs

put your body next to mine and dream on

Sometimes I think that being busier is better. I think a lot about the amount of times in the states I was working two jobs in order to keep myself busy because I thought I needed to. Being in Peace Corps has oddly enough changed a lot of that. Granted I do work; 18 hours a week in school and I have something planned for about an hour or so a day after school. And on weekends, there's lots of meetings and travel normally. What really scares me is that I've become accustomed to waking up at 8am and taking my time to get ready for work. I enjoy an amount of free time (even when i have events) that isn't really possible in the states. I hope that when I go back to America, I'll still be able to read and to experience. . . but sometimes I worry.

School is going along at a lightning pace and I can't believe it's already October and fall break is rapidly approaching and I'll be heading to Poland. In all honesty, the trip to Poland is keeping me sane at this point. I've been having harder hits of homesickness; though I don't know why. In talking to Joe, he mentioned that everyone of my cluster mates that I am close with have had a chance to see their parents making being away from home easier to deal with. While I'm the only one who has gone cold turkey from my parents for a year. Worse, not exactly knowing how much longer I'm going to have to go without them. Homesickness is tough and it's taken me a really long time to be affected by it. I'm hoping that it will ebb and flow and that it won't always be so ever present in my daily life. I think that as things move along my mind will drift to other things and other plans.

I haven't been getting much reading done, instead I've found myself doing a lot of lesson planning and a lot of phone conversation. I'm hoping to get back to that too. Perhaps, this will just be a blog entry of hopes, the hopes that I want to happen before Poland maybe or just in general.

Well, everything else is going fine. My place is really cold. really cold and I'm trying not to think about what winter is going to be like. I forgot how cold my place really gets. I'm trying to avoid plugging in my space heater until November. But I might have to make it a temperature decision rather than a month decision.

that's all for now. perhaps a more substantial post in the weeks to come after some big events.
hugsandlove