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So, right now, I feel stressed out. But I know that I have barely seen the tip of this glacier. I have five courses this summer, three of which are over in six weeks and will be replaced by three more (for eight total). Class is three hours, split into two lectures, and the three accompanying labs are two and a half hours long.

I have two workshops- in one, myself and 11 classmates will be analyzing the New York Solar Industry Development and Jobs Act. For the summer and fall, this group will work with our advisor, who has been the director of the ESP MPA (get with the acronyms, people. You have no idea how many I'm facing...) program since its conception. He is also the Executive Director of The Earth Institute (the people who brought you the idea of plate tectonics. And the Millenium Development Goals). These are the big dogs.

Then there's me. Not to be the powerful and smart professional woman who deprecates herself, but on my first day, I dried off after my shower with a new pink towel from Target which left my completely enrobed in super-fine pink fuzz. Don't buy "color-safe" towels on sale from Target, because apparently the only way the color stays on is by coming off WITH the lint. ...I don't think anyone noticed. Some people were late to our first class, so I was far from the object of ridicule. (It kind of makes me feel affinity with one of my heroines, Elle Woods.)

I don't really have time to be writing this post. I don't have time to do anything. This is when it is most important to go to yoga. I went out into the (incredibly! wonderfully!) cooler air tonight, took the 1 to 66th Street, and went to my new yoga studio. And had a wonderful class that reminded me to breathe and have the courage to be gentle and the tenacity to let go. I came out and the city was dark and sparkling and I had a voicemail moving up a deadline .....breathe!!

My orientation on Tuesday was great- I teared up a few times because I was so struck by how this is so what I want to do...I DO want to become a problem-solving environmental professional who makes problems less bad (because you can never completely solve these problems) without creating worse ones, and I DO want to be able to explain science to non-scientists. I know I want to know this. It helps me to remember this when I am facing Avogadro's number again.

Also, what helps me would be your understanding. I at times am feeling so not-there for the people who I am used to being more-there for. I tell myself that this program demands an unprecedented level of effort from me...but does this excuse me from being present in the lives of the people I care most for?