Ah 90 degree weather. Welcome. Atlanta has settled into the full heat of summer and, as I have not received this month’s electric bill yet, I am blissfully enjoying it by sitting in my air conditioned apartment with cold tea and and some good books. I am currently making my way through The Next American Essay, Tuesdays With Morrie, and Joseph Campbell in Conversation with Michael Toms. I’m loving them all so far. My sister recomended Tuesdays with Morrie, and it is great. Speaking of the little sister, she is in Kosovo right now, much to my envy and despair. I do hope she’s having the best time, but I wish I could be there with her, because what are sisters for if not travelling the world together.

Classes began on Tuesday with much indifference from me. Being a student is my identity at the present, which is mostly bearable and occasionally wonderful.  I’m taking a poetry writing class which is already challenging me in a lot of ways. I’m also taking an Urban Education class where the teacher asks questions like, “what does your gender mean to you?” and “how has your ethnicity shaped you as a person?” I appreciate both these classes for allowing me to just sit and learn from the experience of my teachers and soak up the atmosphere of this university that I have come to love so much. I’m almost exactly six months away from graduation, so I’m having bits of nostalgia intermingled with bits of exaustion and restlessness. But in six months I will be free as a gazelle (the bird is an overused metaphor). Until then, I will study and work and read and write and feel sad and feel happy and try to live in this moment here, in the 90 degree weather.