love: graduation

I think I’ve been avoiding blogging because so much has happened in the past month. It literally has been crazy. My whole family came to Fort Worth, graduation happened, my friends are leaving, and I am moving to Houston in less than a week. Seriously, so much is going on right now.

Graduation was really good. Even though I technically finished my bachelor’s degree a year ago, I never got to walk because I was in Spain last May, I had one more summer class to finish, and TCU doesn’t have August graduation. So because I didn’t want to walk in the December graduation, I got special permission to walk in May 2010 with all my friends! So I finally got to walk across stage & get my degree!! It was so worth it.

AND my whole family was in Fort Worth at the same time for the first time ever. They came for graduation but it was also nice reminder of home because I won’t be in California until August, so it was really good to spend time with them. It was lots of fun showing them Fort Worth and I even took them to Cracker Barrel & out to eat for Texas BBQ. -- (My dad loved it!)

May has gone by so quickly. I have been hanging out with friends a lot and working on my thesis in my free time. I am still doing therapy in Grand Prarie schools with bilingual kids so that has kept me busy too.

Summer school has come and gone. It was a quick May-mester and we only had one class so that was really nice. The rest of my grad class has classes for 5 more weeks but I got out of it because I am doing a thesis. So I am officially done with classes until August --- sooooo exciting!! For the rest of the summer, I will be externing but also working on my thesis via email & skype sessions with Dr. Morrison. Our meetings have been going well and I think I will be ready to have my prospectus meeting done in the early Fall.

I always love to be the exception, so instead of externing in Fort Worth this summer like a normal TCU grad; I am moving to Houston and working there. I will be living with sharlarose this summer in Pearland, while externing at The Center for Hearing & Speech in downtown Houston.

The Center for Hearing and Speech is like Texas’ version of the John Tracy Clinic. It has an amazing auditory oral preschool program & also has individual auditory verbal therapy going on at the clinic. It is one of the best places to be in Texas for deaf children learning to listen and speak, if not the best place in all of Texas. Oh and did I mention they are doing oral bilingual language intervention with children with hearing loss?!? Could it be a more perfect place for me to do my externship at?!?

It’s kind of been a stressful week because lots of my friends are packing up & leaving Fort Worth. I am also trying to get my life together before I move this weekend and so I am a little stressed out. But I am so excited for the rest of the summer!! I can’t wait to spend time with sharlarose, have my dream externship, and enjoy the sunshine.

"For what it’s worth, it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit… start whenever you want… you can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that stop you. I hope you feel things that you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life that you’re proud of and if you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again." - Benjamin Button