The Test

Since as far as I can go back they have always been present.  Whether we can dot our i's and cross our t's or multiply without a calculator.  Later on the IOWA basics become a once year deal.  These mundane tests are then replaced with every highschooler's favorite bubble sheet, the SAT.  The test that comes with so much built in anxiety.  Burger flipper or College, determined by shaded in A's, B's, C's, and D's.  I was able to go to the former, where the word test is erased from our vocabulary and replaced with the much more threatening exam term.  Senior year rolls around and there are two main options to choose from: more education (grad, law, medical) or real world.  Now the more education comes with tests that make sure we know where the hypotenuse lies on a triangle and to make sure our vocabulary is up to the Scrabble dominating level.  These tests go by the name of GMAT, GRE, LSAT, MCAT.... 

I chose the other route, the Real World.  No lavish 3 story house in exciting cities or on the beach with roommates that become horny with the sight of a camera.  Basement, Detroit, 80 hour work weeks.  In retrospect it's good that I started there.  I can only move up and I did.  One bedroom apartment in Connecticut.  From the outside things look better, but my life is more like a Monet than a Rembrandt.  Get close to the painting and you soon realize my life isn't so clear. 

I propose there should be a federal mandate making sure all college graduates are prepared for the real world. 
Question 1: Are you willing to work for the next 40 years.....Hmmm that’s a tough one

Question 2: True or false, at the young age of 23 should you plan for retirement?  Sadly enough this is true and I'm starting to learn more about Roth IRA's and 401k's (I diversified in 5 mutual funds I researched on my own).  5 Mutual funds that the Ipod I want will have to wait another day.  Day, no more like a few months from now.

Question 3: Can you really cook?  Now this is a trick question.  Yes we all can cook, some better than others (I'm an other). But after working from 8-6, do we want to.  Hell no, we want to sit on that couch and watch reruns of Ross and Rachel, even though we know the outcome of those Friends.

Question 4: Are you sure you are ready to live alone?  Cleaning up after roommates, having to wait for washers, showers, and stovetops the answer would seem obvious.  Setting down the laptop bag on the counter and looking at my empty surrounding I wouldn't mind the hassle.

This and many more questions should have been asked upon graduation.  Still even if it was laid out in front of us on 8x11 paper with a staple in the upper left hand corner we wouldn't know what to write.  The experience is where the learning comes from.

Here I am with feelings much like in February.  Yearning for friends, family, and a job I liked.  It's not all gloomy.  I've learned things take time and that happiness doesn't come in a Fed Ex envelope.  It goes the oversea route aboard a ship.  It can be rough and take time, but thats when you grab life by the horns and hold on.

The great Red Wings

1900 Brockton, better known as home

Michigan Ave

Street shot

View from Canada

Detroit In the Rear View Mirror

What can I say? Quite a bit. My six month stint here has taught me so much about myself and what I want in life. I've learned about sacrifices to never forget your gloves in February. I lived like a person in The Real World without the extravagant house. The cast composed of roommates with differences in gender, race, sexual preferences, and backgrounds (none in which involved keeping a house clean). I want to keep this post short. Detroit was an experience and one I learned from.

It was real. It was fun. But it wasn't real fun

Bennett

Emma

Today I started packing. Where you get to try and find boxes all over town just to realize that they aren't large enough. Where you go through a roll of tape about every minute. Not necessarily because of closing up boxes but more importantly because it keeps sticking to itself or you. In college we learn the art of moving. We can fit a whole room into a four door car and still find room for food from a pick up window. Who needs to see through the rear view mirrors anyways? We move from home to dorm, back to home, to a different dorm, to apartment, to place of internship, and the list goes on. We become professionals and have a better understanding how to fit shirts, CDs, towels, and DVDs in a box more than what we learned in class the previous sememster.

Graduation rolls around and we grab our lambskins, say our goodbyes, and pack up a U-haul one more time. When packing we realize there will be times in the future where we will move again, but it is our hopes that it is now kept to a minimal. Next week I pack one more time, this time it will be longer. I've actually signed a 15 month lease and am more committed by acquiring such state documents like driver’s license and tags. I have setup utilities under my name and will be a customer to a new bank. Connecticut for life is not the likely outcome, but then again who knows where I'll end up. My mindset now is the one I wish I had back in December. I have wondered if I was to go back in time would this outcome have been different. I can say the result would have been the same. It's through these trials and tribulations that we discover our path and gain some insight in the process.

After tub after tub of clothes (while having too many I'm too reluctant to let any go) I came across the drawer. The photo drawer. It’s filled with envelopes, but not the one with a stamp on the upper right hand corner of a duck or American flag. They are yellow, green, white, and blue and are from friends such as Eckerds, Walgreens, and Wal-Mart. Inside these envelopes is a key to a time machine that takes me back a few months to several years. Surprisingly the thought of modern travel came across my mind.

Before 1900 you lived close or with your family. Mass transportation was just beginning to take shape with the locomotive and decades later concrete snakes would span across this great nation due to the automobile. You might have wanted to leave town and establish roots elsewhere, but you would never have been too far from home. At 23 I am now about to live in my fifth state. I am thousands of miles away from the people who have given me guidance and helped shape the person I am today. A century ago I would have been a horse ride away.

I received an email from my sister out in Idaho. Attached were my photos of my niece Emma and nephew Bennett. Emma is darling or so I hear. I've seen her only a few times and while she was a beautiful baby I haven't seen her walk or seen her bubbly personality that I hear about. Bennett the newest addition is a child I haven't even seen and can only wonder when. I can only wish the best and for now I will see them through pictures.

"There was nothing in the world
that I ever wanted more
than to never feel the breaking apart.
All my pictures of you." ~ The Cure