my blog

I've completed 3 weeks of graduate school! I finally moved into my place and I have my own bed and desk and sofa and rug and all the things in an apartment. My dad came and helped me get set up which was incredibly helpful and I could not have done it without him. I live super close to my school building which is great but I have also not ventured very far from my little area. I love my classes a lot. I love the schoolwork I'm assigned to do. I do not love the fact that I have to network though. My brain has a hard time getting past the initial and incredibly transactional small talk. But I need a job after this degree so. Here I am, attending networking workshops and happy hours and cold emailing head of schools. I actually did get some great connections though, so unfortunately it works. I'm going to my first conference! It's in NYC and it's for the Comparative and International Education Society so...right up my alley. I've been taking insanely good care of myself because I have nothing better to do. I work out almost every day, eat incredibly clean, do my skincare every night, go to bed (reasonably) early, and I don't drink (that will change when I make friends though. Working on it!).

The only thing is, I'm kinda BORED. I know I have an entire unexplored city in front of me but I got work to do!!! And I just got my internship placement and also a job interview for the school year so I'm about to be even busier. And a lot of weekends I will be in NYC visiting Owen so. I'll get around to seeing Baltimore. Don't worry. Something I really like about this city is that everyone is very community oriented and very friendly. It's a different community than Eugene. I don't know it feels very genuine. People at the supermarket or the pharmacy or even on the street make small talk with me. Tell me about their day. People say good morning to you on the street. That really caught me off guard the first time but I LOVE it. Back to my point. I'm bored. I don't really talk to a lot of people in my classes (like, at all). Everyone is from the same two cities in China so they all chat amongst themselves. Makes me wanna learn Chinese so I can eavesdrop. They are friendly and say hello to me, but they don't really make conversation, and that's not for my lack of trying (just putting it out there). Academically and personally I am locked in. Socially I'm the equivalent of umm...a tiny mouse living in a tiny hole in a tiny home...? Sure. Whatever. But it's slowly happening! I went to a Latina picnic meetup thing specifically for the School of Education and met some lovely girls who are also latina baddie grad students B)

I also noticed that if I don't keep myself busy with either work or self care or literally anything else, I will spiral into an uncontrollable ball of anxiety and insecurity, so I am keeping myself very busy (and also seeing a therapist, lol). I am sitting on an almost 50 page video essay script that I want to film SO badly!!!!!! One day I will. I have a lot to say about this topic and I think a very specific but large demographic of people would love to see a video about this secret special topic...mwahahaha...Anyway I have lot of things to think about for the future, which scares me so much but also excites me a lot!

Well. That's my update. I wonder if I'll ever share this website with someone. If you're not Rocio and you're reading this. Hi. :)

Owen and I drove from San Francisco to Baltimore in 6 days. It was so much driving and it was so much fun. My car was bursting at the seams. It looked like a fucked up tetris game. Our first day, we drove 9 hours from the Bay Area to Kingman, Arizona. It was so hot the entire day and we listened to the audiobook of The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green. I had a few chapters of this book assigned for an English class my freshman year of college and I had really liked it back then so I was very intrigued to hear more. In John Green fashion, I give TAR 4 stars. Our next stop was Sante Fe, New Mexico. On the way, we stopped at the town that inspired Cars. For some reason there were a lot of Italian tourists. Like so many. Do your thing though! We arrived to Santa Fe pretty late and there was a thunderstorm so we went straight to bed. The next day we drove from Santa Fe all the way to Pilot Point, Texas, our longest driving day. We were on the road by 6am (though I always took the first shift) and we stopped at Buc-ee's for my first experience. It seriously was a magical wonderful place. Very jarring for my Californian mind to comprehend. I still have some snacks from our Buc-ee's haul.

Up until Texas we had been staying in hotels, but thankfully we were kindly invited to stay with Owens family at their house. We had great barbecue, met all of their wonderful pets, and drove around their neighborhood in some sort of buggy? Not really sure how to describe it. It was 96 degrees at 8pm. Very jarring but honestly it reminded me a lot of summers in Argentina so I was strangely nostalgic. We drove past gorgeous ranches with beautiful horses. It made me think of where I would want to live when I'm truly older. Much to think about. Out next stop was Little Rock, Arkansas. We arrived as the sun was setting so we had some time to walk around. Naturally, we found ourselves at an Argentinian restaurant. The empanadas were good and the milanesa was great. Little Rock was an interesting city because as we walked around on a Friday night it was pretty dead. Maybe 10 people out drinking. Not like we had heard raving tales of the Little Rock nightlife, but I was expecting something else for a summer Friday night. Our next stop was Nashville, arguably our favorite. On the way though, we had to stop at the Bass Pro Shop pyramid in Memphis. Duh. Anyway. We went out to the tourist strip expecting to be upcharged on drinks and wait in long lines, but we were very pleasently surprised. Every bar on the strip had live music, cheap beer, and a true authentic feeling that you would really have to scavenge for in any other city. The amount of people flooding the street was crazy! People of all ages were blackout drunk in the street. Definetly a top people watching spot for sure.

As we started finishing out the trip, we drove through all of Tennessee and into North Carolina to stay in Asheville. East Tennessee was insanely beautiful. The gorgeous mountains and hilly, green roads were a much needed change after being highway demons for the past few days. There was something very peaceful about this part of the trip. Asheville was a really cute town too. It reminded me a little bit of Eugene. Probably becuase it was surrounded by nature and had a high percentage of white hippies, but still. We listened to a 4 hour podcast about the conflict of the West Virginia mining strike of 1912. Did you know that it was the largest armed class conflict in American history? Really interesting stuff. The next morning was our last drive! Unfortunately, it was also the worst day. Ever.

Let me set the scene: We have 2 hours until I get the keys to my apartment. I've just inhaled my first ever hoagie from Wawa and I'm sipping on my raspberry iced tea. Spirits are high. All of a sudden, I get a text from my landlord, vebatim: "Hey Rocio, slight situation that we're troubleshooting at the property. Don't think the bathroom tub will be useable for the next 48 hours or so." Great. Yes, I'm annoyed that I'll have to be stinky for 2 days. But you know what? Whatever. We've made it. It's fine! We stop for gas, and I get an incoming call from the landlord. Not good. After 20 minutes of deliberation I come to the conclusion that it was NOT a slight problem. I was informed that the bathtub caved in on itself because the handyman had discovered that there was no support beam underneath. Cool. WHY WOULD YOU SEND YOUR HANDYMAN TO CHECK THE APARTMENT THE DAY YOU GIVE YOUR TENANT THEIR KEY? Beyond me. I start getting anxious and annoyed. Our plan was to get a blow up mattress until we could buy one the next day. So we book a hotel room for the night. After another call with the landlord, he tells me I cannot move in for a week. SCHOOL STARTS IN A WEEK. Plus, Owen was leaving in a few days for New York. I would be alone moving in! But alas, these things happen. Onto the hotel!

But a great story can't end like that! 20 minutes away from the hotel and pulling out of a gas station. Owen turns to me, panicked. "...The brakes feel weird." I snap my head at him, bleary eyed because I had already been crying about my apartment mishap. "What the fuck does that mean." We we turn a corner going 20 miler per hour, I watch him slam on the brakes, and watch in horror as the car slows to a stop. We eventually had to pull over, wait an hour for a tow truck, get the car towed to the hotel and promptly take the car to the mechanic the next day. Not to mention the part where I violently sobbed in the car as we waited for the tow truck.

Isn't it crazy how a perfect trip went sour so fast? In the span of 2 hours, I had no apartment and no car. In a new city where I don't know anyone.

But such is life, and life works out. I'm currently writing this from the AirBnb I've been staying at for almost 2 weeks as my apartment gets fixed. School has started, Owen already has a job as a chef in a fancy restaurant in New York, and my car is fixed. I'm lucky that my dad is coming in a few days to help me move in, and in a few weeks everything will be as it should have been. Sometimes life has delays. And I think I was absolutely allowed to be very upset after the events happened. But there's no point in being upset right now. Slightly annoyed? Yes. But terribly upset? Maybe not so much.

As many people have told me, this is only a trip that you think of doing when you're 22 years old. And I'm so glad I did.