Getting Started

Well, here we go again, Blogger. We had a torrid love affair 2 years ago at the beginning of my grad program which lead to a nastygram from the Army and subsequently them shutting us down. But now with just 5 weeks left of grad school and 4 weeks left at our internship it feels like a good time to start up the ol' blog wheels again. That, and one of my best friends, has started a blog about her life's journey and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery so I'm blogging my journey too.  We're just not going to talk any sort of specifics about our internship because we don't want another nastygram.

So when you're on a journey or at least just starting out its best to start at the beginning. I'm Sarah. I'm 25 (oh look a girl telling her real age!). I am about to graduate from a Masters of Social Work program in mere 32 days (cue panic at finishing my thesis, 2 final papers, 8 journals, 1 process recording and 1 presentation). I graduated in 2007 from Juniata College in Huntingdon, Pa with a BA in Religion and Social Change. Remind me to tell you about Juniata some day and why my major doesn't look like yours did. After graduation I spent time working for congress, a union, and finally landed a dream job using that strange undergraduate degree for a Christian organization (despite being Jewish) that did hunger and poverty advocacy and lobbying. And there I remained for 18 months before leaving to head to graduate school.

When not working for money, I spent (and still do) a lot of time as a volunteer (and eventually as a paid employee) with a civilian organization that provides fun things like massage nights, brunches, picnics, dvds etc at a military hospital here in the DC area. Its through this volunteer opportunity I learned about the issues facing our wounded warriors and fell in love with the military. This was all very strange for a pacifist who has more peace signs in her wardrobe then any other symbol. Eventually I'll tell you why I can be a pacifist and do the work that I do but regardless I soon realized that I needed to figure out how to do this for money. Enter MSW program.

The program itself has been a challenge, not academically, but just major lessons in time management, frustration tolerance and dealing with "the man." I have also dealt with personal struggles regarding my health during this which have been trying. The program in the end I hope will get me where I want to be in life--as a social worker for the US Army either civilian or uniformed.

I am happy school is coming to an end (I want my weekends back!) but I'm a little scared about the future. So far I am not employed and have no real prospects which is a little scary. I'm grateful to have lived at home the last two years (for better or worse) and that my parents won't be kicking me out anytime soon but I'm ready to be a grown up.

So this is where the journey begins, 5 weeks before graduation, looking for employment, preparing for the future me!