One year ago today

On April 27, 2012 I woke up in my parent's basement in a room without windows (I called it the "dungeon;" truth is, I prefer it over the adjoining room because I like to sleep in total darkness). I was in Colorado because I was finishing my last class for my master's degree; Scott was still in Ohio because we'd moved there in January. It was a Friday morning and the next day was my very last classroom session for my degree. I was headed back to Ohio on Sunday afternoon.

I grabbed my phone, as I do most mornings, and checked my email. And there was an email from the Department of State. I was invited to be in the July A-100 class for the Foreign Service. I was in shock. I had stopped paying attention to the Foreign Service message boards months ago and I knew I was going to expire off the register in July. In the back of my mind, I always thought it would be nice to hear from them, but I had honestly given up hope.

Here I am a year later. I live in Washington, D.C. and I am a few months away from finishing my first assignment (first tour DC positions are only one year tours). I've met former Secretary Clinton (on more than one occasion) and now Secretary Kerry. I've visited Timor-Leste and Indonesia as a representative of the United States, places I never thought I would see. I got to bid farewell the Ambassador from Timor-Leste at a reception at Blair House (its an awesome place - http://blairhouse.org). Soon I may be working on the credentials for a new Ambassador from Timor-Leste as well as preparing our Ambassador to Timor.

If you had asked me on April 26th how the next year was going to look, it would have included a lot of discussion about rural Ohio and looking into how to get a teaching job out there. Now, my coming year includes learning a language I know little about (Cantonese) and preparing to move to Asia.

It all just keeps getting better and better. I can't imagine what two years from now will look like.

Moving Sale!

Today is our first attempt to sell some items before I leave for D.C. in less than a month. We sat down a couple weeks ago and made 4 lists. There was a sell list, a storage list, a take-with-us list, and a Colorado list. The Colorado list is the shortest and contains the few things we cannot take overseas but would also not like to leave in a storage facility.

This being my first Saturday off since we found out about the Foreign Service I decided I would spend it trying to have a yard sale. I should have known this might not work because I have seen at least two of my neighbors have yard sales every weekend since spring began. If they are having sales that often they must not be selling anything. That only occurred to me now.

Now I've only been out here about 2 hours and we have made about 40+ dollars, but so far every single thing we've sold has been to the same crazy neighbor (and he is crazy, we will get to that another time). So far he has come three times and my guess is as the day goes on he will discover more things he needs.

And now the police just pulled up. But they might just be here to arrest our other neighbor again.

And crazy neighbor just came back. And left. Guess nothing appealed to him this time.

Now the cop who arrested my neighbor is listening to excuses from the guy's mother(?) as to why he committed the crime.

I am guessing I could live blog what is happening on my street today and it would be an interesting read. But I have yard sale-ing to get back to. And my new game on my phone is not going to play itself.