After a weekend in Athens saying some goodbyes, I came home to an email telling me to book my flight for staging in DC. It suddenly feels so real that this journey is about to begin. When the departure date is just out there, looming in the distant future, it is really easy to say I'm ready for it to happen. But now with it only (gasp) 1 month away, I feel overwhelmed and not prepared with no real way to prepare or feel underwhelmed. After a year of the application process, answering the same questions over and over and enduring the awkward silence of meaning-well strangers after they have asked what my post grad plan is and I tell them I'm moving to Africa, I am having a Carrie Bradshaw moment. I can't help but wonder, am I really ready for this? I see sleepless nights and nausea in my future.
So now the tickets are ordered and another reassurance is here reminding me that yes, this is actually happening. March 7 I leave for DC for staging, which is like orientation. Then it is off to Senegal two days later to actually really and truly start the most exciting adventure in my life. I will be in training for the first 3 months, then move to a permanent site to begin work as a preventative health and environmental education volunteer. WOW.
