Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Chapter 5: Under Pressure

Several people have emailed and called worried about my sanity. Thank you for the inquiries but I assure you I am fine. Really. All I needed after the unexpected Israel trip and subsequent quitting of my job was to get an apartment, register for classes, move to Dekalb, IL, and attend a birthday party in California. I needed to do all of that in 2 weeks. No problem.

Immediately after leaving my job on the 23rd I checked online for apartment listings and made some appointments to see places the following week. Unfortunately some of the craigslist offers were way off the mark. For example:

Master bedroom with private bath available in a shared house......

This was actually a 16 room boarding house with tenants between the ages of 19-65. When I asked if the older people worked at or attended the college the answer was no. The landlord made mention having to work on the noise problem and needing to let some tenants go this year, hence the availability of the "nicer unit." All 16 rooms had one kitchen to share. Oh my.

Then there was this one:

1 roommate needed to share a 3 bedroom townhouse. Current tenants are clean, quiet, respectful full time students.

This was actually written by a parent who bought a town home for her 19 year old son and didn't live near the area. He was sharing it with a friend and his mom said that I would have to be interviewed by them to see if I was a good fit. I told her that it probably wasn't the right situation for me since I was 31 and a law student. She just laughed and laughed. Oh my.

I received a letter from my school on that weekend explaining how orientation was a mandatory 4 day experience lasting from 9-4 each day. It was to start on August 9..........but I was scheduled to fly back to Chicago at night on the 10th. Oh no. No no no no no. You see what happens when you have a million things on your plate? The first day of school was going to be August 17 and I thought that I gave myself enough time to do all of this. I was not expecting another major obligation.

I talked to the dean of admissions and she asked if there was any way I could change my flight so I could make it back in time. She said most schools didn't do this but it was a series of necessary workshops to prepare you for legal writing and research. She said the letters went out very late for this and several students had complained. Well that's just great!

Panic attacks started.

3am full on I am freaking out and this hasn't happened in years oh my fucking god what have I done what should I do I don't think I want all this stress I should have been more prepared for all this why didn't they explain this shit earlier I can't believe I agreed to go to California so last minute I have to stop doing nice things for everyone else I am so tired from this trip and finally so happy to have left that job and now am a wreck what do I do and what if I lose another opportunity and what the fuck what the fuck have I done how am I going to fix it I can't believe I was in Israel last week at least I have a back up plan but still this was supposed to work and I don't really want to change the flight and what is wrong with me I should do everything possible to make this work I don't know if I can handle this and why didn't I quit earlier I must be the most pathetic person in the world and who on earth would give up law school and I did really want it several times this year but not all year and maybe I should just do the other but no I always talk myself out of everything there must be a way and I am just going to have to I should do this I should.........

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