Midnight Speculations

Lest I again indulge in my overwhelming excitement...

• This time next month I’ll be living in a country younger than I am.

• The plan: New York City to New Jersey to Philadelphia to Washington D.C. to Fairfax, VA to Vienna, Austria to Skopje to Veles, Macedonia.

• I’m living in a city of eight million, preparing to move to a country of two million. Six degrees of separation are about to be cut in a quarter (something that has always fascinated me...hearing about charming little countries where everyone somehow knows everyone...)

• There are apparently two hundred Jews in Macedonia…as of September, there will be two hundred and a half (sarcasm).

• Classes at Hunter College begin tomorrow…a few months ago I thought there was no chance that I would be graduating on time. If I hadn’t piled on credits and challenged the bureaucracy, I’d be half-heartedly preparing for an extra semester at college, rather than packing for a Peace Corps stint in Macedonia.

• This time next year, perhaps I’ll be speaking seven languages and writing in three alphabets: English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Macedonian, Bulgarian, Albanian.

• When I'm not working...here would be some ideal trip ideas for the next three years, outside of Macedonia of course:
• Istanbul, Turkey...at last!
• Un petit retrouvai parisien chez Kelsey
• A Croatian Christmas with my family in Dubrovnik
• A Romanian Halloween partying in Dracula’s Bran Castle
• A trans-Siberian railroad journey to Ugie’s 2009 Mongolian wedding
• A couple months’ Arabic refresher course in Fez, Morocco...in 2010

• Kyiv, Ukraine: my grandparents left Eastern Europe a century ago, and now, in a more enlightened time and place (knock on wood), I'm heading back!

…Despite all these bizarre midnight speculations, my goal is to keep my mind open, and have no concrete expectations! Once again, as Kerouac once put it:

"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."