Changing times

No matter how much I try to forget, I am still in DC. I don't know how I am supposed to feel about that. I've been contemplating about this for the past month now. I'm back in the US. I keep on telling myself things are fine, and I just need to get settled in, but I find myself longing to fly away. I wish I had something heavy enough to keep me grounded sometimes.

I found myself looking up plane tickets while I was at my internship. I say I do it just to see how the prices are in the aviation market, but I am thinking deep down...perhaps if I find one just the right price, maybe I'll just buy it then and there, and really fly away.

But I've kept to my resolutions. I've been trying to smile a lot. I've been talking to random people and been quite interested in their different lives...I start wondering about other people. Trying to put myself into their shoes- what they do, what they see, what makes them the person they are. I'm not quite as successful there, but I try...maybe I am still too shallow and selfish. I am quite selfish...I live for my goals (as most people) and everyday I eat drink breathe study thinking about the months to come for my jam packed schedule.

Sometimes in class, I talk quite loudly, voicing my opinions...I wonder if it is because I want to be heard, not be one with everyone else. I think of the friends in my past study abroad programs, and sometimes wonder about their personalities and actions. Why people get drunk, get high, whatever. Perhaps it's a self confidence issue...to be under the influence. I mean I cannot say I am confident, as sometimes, I also wonder,

The tiger that roars, am I really just a kitten?

In my Nonviolent theories and methods class, there was a guest speaker, Jack Healey- who used to be Amnesty's director. To see a man of that age, and still have the stamina to fly around and have goals in which he fights for...I strongly admire that. His presence, though I never even knew him before (and since it was my first time in the class, I mistook him as the professor since he sat in the professor's desk), sent a wave a of hope and admiration with his amazing stories of how he helped change society with nonviolent means through music. There's more about him on this website: http://www.thefreedomcampaign.org/about_jack.php

Here I am, just a girl who imagined NGOs really had no effect. Yet this one man stand organized a couple people to make a difference.

As much as I say I will join the government to have things turned inside out, how will it be? How will it be? Will years later, when I am old, will I still be trying to make a difference in society, or just turn old and weary?