November 30, 2004

CaucAsian316: wow...u must be so excited :-) this is a great stage for u to be in
CaucAsian316: being free and having a job...that inbetween time

today i got my credit card bill: $843. and you know what? i could PAY the whole goddamn thing. ALL OF IT. it felt incredible knowing that i could run a tab that high and still take care of it on my own. granted, i paid my own through undergrad, but this is completely different. my parents still helped me from time to time, slipping a $20 in my bag when i came home on weekends and paying for books when i couldn't make ends meet. but now, i buy them dinner and send my mother care packages... if not just to see them smile, then to feel like i can give something back, though i can and will never be able to repay them. "all we care about is your happiness," they say, like most parents would and do. still, it feels veeeeery good.

with this new perspective, i have finally started to make peace with law schools. when i turned down ucla last year because i couldn't afford it, i was, for lack of a better word, pissed - pissed at my life, my financial situation, my parents,... everything and everyone. i'd always been told it didn't matter how much money i had; i could do anything just as long as i worked hard. obviously that idea is somewhat misleading, but it really came crashing down on me last year. today i feel differently - not about whether i can pay for school, but about changing my attitude. you know, life has a way of surprising you in good ways and if there's anything i've inherited from my lovely brown ancestors, it's karma theory: everything happens for a reason. there is one caveat, of course, and that's that everything that does happen, happens because you directed it to.

tonight i'm getting dinner with jess, someone i never knew i'd be great friends with, but turned out to be because we made the effort (not much effort at all) to get to know each other. next year, wherever i am, no matter what kind of sacrifices i'll have made, i'm sure it'll be the right decision, the right place - a great stage for me to be in.

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