Philothea
Life in the JVC

One month

April 20, 2005

In exactly one month it will be the last day of school. Good. Now that the weather is getting better, the kids don't want to be here, and I definitely don't want to be going to work all day either.

But I am a little nervous about the rest of my life. Leaving the JVC is like leaving the army-I've had all this camaraderie with a group of people who share the same core values with me, that are opposed to what most people in America live. Even my co-workers here think we're crazy to work for free. And I'm not quite sure how to adjust to civilian life.

It's the rest of my life, too! I have to start planning the rest of my life. Its not breaking down into one year chunks anymore. I did get into grad school at University of Maryland. I wanted to wait until I heard back from the other colleges, but I've waited a month now and nothing else has come, so I think I'm going to say yes. And I'm working for three weeks at a nerd camp in Baltimore, living on the kindness of my friends until I get that first paycheck and can afford an apartment. I'm lucky I have friends I can live with. And I hope that I'll find a good longterm job by the time camp's over. Or else I'll have to go back to living with my parents.

Matthew sent me a four page, single spaced letter on some of the things we need to understand and work on before we would feel comfortable getting engaged. I'm glad he's thought it out. I wrote him back, about three pages. That is one thing that makes me feel very comfortable about possible marrying Mathew one day. He is very open and willing to confront whatever is going wrong head-on. I need that, as I will never volunteer any information unless someone else goes first. I never understood before how people would "talk" about getting married before they actually got engaged, but now I do. We talk about it a lot, and I can definitely see myself married to Matthew. But I'm not ready to get hitched just yet. For one thing, we have only spent four months in the same city during our year of dating. I'd like to see him for one full year close by. I subcribe to the Catholic belief that marriage is for life, so I want to make sure that this will work out.

8:30 p.m.
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