Guatemala!

I am SO excited! I am going to Guatemala for spring break. We're doing a family-homestay language immersion thing for the first part of the week and then we're going to the jungle to see the Mayan ruins at Tikal.

I'm thrilled that I have an international trip to look forward to, especially since I had planned on doing the international program through school but recently decided against it. (They did not have the kind of thing I was looking for and it was not worth the cost, given that.)

To help pay for this trip, I recently got a job as a Research Assistant working with infectious diseases. And I LOVE infectious diseases.

YAY for my job and YAY for my travel plans.

Laugh!

If you don't laugh when you watch this, or at least smile, then you are a coldhearted unfeeling human being.

Cake Love

I just learned about this and it's very exciting because officially, I'm pro-cupcake (and cake).

That Kind of Week

It's that week....that week during the semester when you feel like there is no possible way to get everything done. The kind of week full of group projects resting entirely on your shoulders. The kind of week full of trying to forget someone you know you need to say good-bye to. The kind of week that you hope never happens again, though you know it probably will. Soon.

Yay, yay, school is fun.

If I survive, I get to go to NYC this weekend! It will be great but it also poses some challenges for the work looming ahead next week...but that is okay because I have my babysitting money all saved up, and I have a pretty shirt to wear. I am very easy to please.

My Baby Girl

This week I spent two days working with a very sick baby girl. In fact, I called her “Baby Girl” the entire time I was with her so that will be her nickname here too. I can’t go in to too many details (because of the law), but I will say that she is pretty sick, but it is likely that she will be okay. Despite her medical conditions, she is alert, responsive, and adorable. She’s been in the hospital since she was born. Her parents are young, not married, big smokers and not very involved in her life. They didn’t see her the entire two days I was there. She craves contact from people and seems hungry for attention. I got her to smile for me and after awhile she seemed to recognize me (I was probably the only constant thing in her life for 48 hours). And because of all the above, I completely fell in love with her. The problem with this situation is that I’m too connected. I keep thinking about her (and crying) and wanting to go see her. But I can’t. She’s not my baby girl. All I can do is hope a good life for her.

She might be the first patient I’ve had that is really going to stick with me. I wonder if I’ll remember her forever.

Mitch Albom’s book, The Five People You Meet in Heaven, is about the people you meet when you die, to help you process what your life was about. They aren’t necessarily the people you remember as important to you, or even people you remember at all. They are just 5 random people that influenced the shape of “you” in some way. I didn’t love the book or necessarily buy in to the concept, but it was an interesting idea that I’ve never forgotten.

If that is how life and death work, maybe, in some small way, I would be one of those people for this Baby Girl.