my wild

ok, one confession: if there is ice cream here, i will eat it. i blame it on my insane sweet tooth and pitiful lack of sugar-free desserts at calvin college. yes, i only eat the sugar-free kind, but it still isn't very good for my body, i know.

...

that aside,

you know, i had always had high hopes for college. especially towards the end of high school, given my home situation, and bolstered by the security of my good grades, i really looked foward to it. but if any of you really know me, you know the year has not been good to me. and, yes, it could always be worse, and i am grateful for what i have. but i wanted it all. the mental stimulation, going to athletic games, the rich tradition, standing in the hallowed halls of old, the camaraderie of floors and dorms, the going out and mixing on the weekends. i guess i got a bit of that in small doses, but generally i felt like the campus was...i don't know, passing me by? and i only got the scraps, when, by all rights, wasn't i entitled to reach out and grab everything i wanted to satisfy my expectations for what was supposed to be "the best years of my life"? (it is costing me upwards of $30,000 a year for this "experience", you know) i don't want to sound like a whiny spoiled brat, but the thought has occured to me

maybe i'm just not cut out for this college thing

or maybe just not at the campus i was at last year

it's a great school. with amazing people and intentions. this i know. i also know that many times in life, you have to make the most of it, and really strive to actively create the life you dream for yourself. but i was exhausted with the effort of banging against my glass ceiling, day after day, week after week.

i say all of this to say

i think in our day and age we have lost sight of the charm and natural appeal of living naturally, off of the land, not collecting things to excess, but practicing the discipline of continually paring down our lives so we may even more fully appreciate God's glory, evident here on earth. today i have been inspired yet again to just go. see the world, and don't worry about tomorrow. unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), i have quite a few many anchors to life as i know it- anchors not easily let go. and anyway, i do not think i could go at it alone. though i am experiencing, in leaps and bounds, the simple pleasure of being able to delight in oneself's own company, i do not in any way intend for that to be permanent. more the opposite, Lord-willing. but anyway. i'm not stupid. i know the cruciality of a rigorous college education, and connections, and structure, and church family, and neighborhood, and financial planning, and all of that. i guess there are two amys. and i really, really wanted to be that first one i spoke of earlier, and just enjoy travel as a leisure perk of my great career. but now, the second amy seduces me. some might feel i just want to run from my responsibilities, or live as a bum and cover it with hippie-talk rubbish. but i really don't feel that way at all.

and what is a real hippie, anyway? the word has such negative connotations (at least, in my local area) i think it's more of a mindset, just like punk and goth, and even lolita and jetsetter and gangster. they are characterized by a certain movement and maybe some vivid stereotypes, but really it's all in the mind. it's all in the mind.