The beginning...

There are 311 days until I become a real person. 311 days until the one-lane Main Street turns into a multi-lane intersection, and I have to choose a direction for my future. For the past 21 years, I have followed the typical life path of an upper class suburbanite. Girl Scouts, soccer team, manners school, dance classes, AP classes, SAT Prep, Varsity sports, good GPA = early decision to a top school, join a sorority, intern every summer since high school. And, on June 17, 2011, I will graduate from Northwestern University. My friends and classmates will head to NYC/Chicago/LA, find a professional job and a small studio apartment, and work their way up the ladder. Soon enough, they will marry, have children, and move to the suburbs. This is a perfectly acceptable and wonderful plan. My parents followed that path and they are both incredible, successful people. But it is not me.

See, I have this unquenchable desire to see the world and experience every culture, language, natural wonder, and morsel of food I can. To me it is not enough to just experience the world through TV or books (although travel books are my favorite). I want to be immersed in it from head to toe. I want a life of living out of backpacks and racking up frequent flier miles. I want to be out there. I'm not really sure where this wanderlust came from, although my parents should have known when as an 8 year old I wrote my free writes on wanting to visit Australia. But it is this wanderlust that, in the past several years, has shaped my life. From my major/minors to my book list and even to my food preferences, my love for travel and the world has manifested itself.

So now, as I head into my senior year of college, I must start to forge my own path. It may be rough and winding, and without a clear destination. All I know for sure is that it will be full of adventures. Stay tuned.