It’s useless for me to figure out why I’m so damn exhausted when I’ve just had three days off, but I can’t help wondering. I feel as though I haven’t had a full night of sleep in weeks. To top it off, my cell phone disappeared from my bag on the subway tonight. I was nodding off a litte, and had my book out, and my big zippered pouch was opened, which is where my phone lives. I don’t know how it happened but it did, and I got home with that sick feeling that something was wrong. It was.

I cannot not have a cell phone. It is the only number anyone has, including my agent, my Peace Corps recruiter, and my Dad, for god’s sake, and I cannot be unreachable. I am loving my double negatives. Anyway, I got right back on the train to drop a precious $130 on a new phone- the cheapest one they had- and came back home to program it. It is uglier, heavier, and larger. My old phone has been with me since my first week in New York, and I must have dropped it twenty times without it even noticing. Now I have this big, ugly, red thing that cost me two weeks of groceries. But what’s a girl to do.

I have to work in the morning. And then hopefully go to bed by about eight tomorrow night.

Here I am writing twice in the same day. But I have big news: my recruiter just called and said that he had been speaking with the placement office in D.C. He was telling a woman there about me, and she said that I didn’t have to show proof for my French class but that it would be a good idea to go ahead and do a refresher. She also said that the program in September looked fine, but that it was a really basic assignment, no different than what they had been doing in that area since the 60’s. However, she suggested another program, one with only a couple of slots, still in French-speaking Africa but rather than working with a farming community, I would be working with women’s groups, teaching them about nutrition, organic farming, soil conservation, and forestry. He said, “I don’t want to pressure you, but this sounded so perfect, and I just thought I’d let you know-” and I cut him off and said, “Yes, yes, a resounding yes!” So he said that I was officially nominated for this position. I wouldn’t leave until the 9th of December, which is longer than I’d like to wait, but this seems too wonderful to pass up.

All that is left is the health exam. The forms will not be mailed to me for a couple of weeks, so I need to sit back and relax on the whole process as it is mostly out of my hands now. When the forms come, I’ll have my dentist and doctor fill them out and then it will truly be no longer up to me. I’ll mail the forms and wait to be officially “invited”. But it looks pretty good, and they know where they want me. I need to find a way to see “The Return of the King” before I go. That’s all I will want for Christmas.

Well. It has certainly been a full twenty-four hours. Suffice to say that I left my house at noon yesterday, and only just got home. And that I lost a few articles of worth on the way (haven’t seen my watch in several hours).

It started at the huge government office at Houston and Varrick. I had been to the Peace Corps office only once before, where the security checkpoint in the front of the building kept me for about five minutes to discuss why there were metal clips in my shoes, why I carried an Allen wrench, and various other bike-related inquiries. This time I was without my bike gear, and one of the security guys said, “I recognize you. You can go,” (after I had already been through the metal machine and swiped all over by a detector). So I made my way upstairs and only waited for about thirty seconds before my recruiter, a big, balding, sweet man, led me straight to the fingerpriting machine. I joked about never having done this before. He said, “Well, that’s good. When people come in and say ‘I have to do this again?’ I’m always a little worried.” After that we sat in a room and chatted. He asked me many good questions, but some of them were difficult to answer. He asked me about the last time I had a conflict with someone, and what I did to resolve it. I sat there for about two minutes trying to think of a conflict I’d had recently and couldn’t come up with one. So I talked about maintaining my friendship with one of my good friends, about how we had gone through some difficult times in our friendship but that now all was well. He asked me if my family was supportive, what I thought my biggest challenge would be, if there was anyone in particular that would be difficult to leave. As we were nearing the end, I asked him how long the whole process would take. He looked at me and said, “Ask anyone here. I don’t usually do this, I usually wait until after a second meeting to nominate anyone, but I think you are ready, and I am going to nominate you now.” Which was great. I had told him that I wanted to do something agricultural/environmental, rather than AIDS-related or medical, because anywhere I go I will be an AIDS activist and a medic. I can do these things while also working with farmers or in forests. He agreed that that was a great idea, and he pulled out a huge book that listed, in very general terms, the types of jobs coming up, where they would be, and when they would begin. There happened to be an agricultural/forestry job, starting in October in French-speaking Africa. Perfect. I can leave in October, since the AIDSRide is in September, I speak some French, and I want to go to Africa.

He said he was calling the office in D.C. and that I should check back with him tomorrow to find out if I have to be enrolled in a refresher French course before I can be officially nominated. I’ve already done the homework on that. There is a class starting in three weeks that would be over in August. If he can nominate me, the next step is the health exam and backround check, both which could be completed quickly. And as soon as I’ve sent them the health exam forms, I could be invited. Crazy, right? I mostly just want to know. I just want to know if I’m going so I can plan the next few months accordingly.

After my meeting, I met Hayley at a new Mexican restaurant on 6th Ave. We had our first margarita at about 3 PM, and, well, the rest is a ridiculously fun blur. I do recall making it McSorley’s where we met all sorts of people. There was a TV crew filming the reactions of smokers to the smoking ban, which created a hot debate throughout the bar. We started talking to an Australian guy who had only been here for a couple of weeks, and he ended up going to Ryan’s Irish Pub with us. Hayley and I tend to make a lot of new friends when we go out, and this night was no exception.

Anyway, I’m feeling it a bit this morning, and the dreary weather is not helping at all. But it is a glorious day off, and I hope to make the most of it. Or perhaps I’ll just go back to bed.

So it needs to be pointed out that although the weather might make you think it is February, it is actually the 1st of June. And for those of you folks who haven’t been on the ride my entire life, that means one thing, and one thing only: Birthday Month. That’s right, only twenty-five more shopping days until the climax, June 26th, the day I turn 31 years old.

I also need to point out that I thought I’d have kids by 30, and also that I once said that anyone over 18 was dead. And really, who I am is definitely dead when I think of who I was at fourteen. Fourteen year old me would not have liked thirty year old me. And I can’t say that if I met fourteen year old me now that I would like her very much. I’m just not sure.

Anyway, back to my birthday. In years past, it was a week of celebration, and then weeks, and finally just a whole month. My last birthday was actually rather subdued, only one dinner party two days after the Northeast AIDSRide. No festivities, no silliness. (Other than the night before my birthday at McSorley’s in the East Village, but we don’t need to talk about that.) This year, well, I like to think I’ve grown up a bit, like to think that I don’t need to self-promote to the degree that I have in years past. But I just might be in Africa this time next year, so why not do it up. I don’t have any major plans yet, other than having just bought a ticket to California leaving right after my birthday, but I’m sure things will pop up.

As for what I want for my birthday, which is always an issue to discuss in a family the size of mine, that I’m not clear on either. What I do know is that I don’t want stuff. I hope to be packing my life sooner than later, if not for the Peace Corps then for something else, so stuff that I will have to pack will not serve me well. On the other hand, books are good. A wireless cyclocomputer for my road bike would be good. A day at Magic Mountain would be good. The best thing? Laser surgery for my eyeballs. I haven’t quite been able to talk myself into going to the hospital to start the egg donation thing because frankly I’m terrified. I hate needles and I hate pain and you have to give yourself a shot ten days in a row. And then get a nice big needle stuck into your ovaries to suck out your eggs. Do you see my hesitation?

Anyway. I’m just getting home from work, and guess what I do tomorrow!?!? Work a double!!! Huzzah!!! I’ve never known anyone to work so much and yet be so broke. I’m not just broke, I’m broken. But at least when I work I don’t spend gobs of money.

My mom is back in town, briefly, and right after work she took me to see WInged Migration and Saving Neno. I think it was Neno. Nemo? Finding? Saving? Meno? I dunno. Both of them, in their own way, made me cry like a baby.