Nun or None

After meeting with a skeptical academic advisor who was not well informed of the details of my program or of my level of pride, I am sticking to the 18 credit semester I registered for. It is the last thing I have with which I can prove her wrong. She half-jokingly told me that I'll just be a nun this semester with my workload, and I gave a polite laugh through lips that should have either been unamusedly pursed or blatantly demanding that she just answer my questions I came to her with.

After discovering that Italy is not a likelihood next May and everything that I thought was falling right into place was only a "Just kidding!" in a pretty mask, I am trying to find a way to make my schedule work out according to Plan G. Mulling through options is not my favorite pastime, but it is how I have been figuring out how paying for housing, tuition, and lipstick is going to be a possibility. On top of that, my beautiful lack of finances is deciding once more to hop onto the stage to sing an ugly song about how taking classes next summer is likely not a possibility, either, pushing back my possible graduation to the Spring of 2015.

2015 represents the beginning of unknown. I have only planned out my life to the end of 2014. After that is a stark emptiness that scares and repulses me and makes my stomach tie into confusing knots that I don't want to think about. But 2013 is churning on, almost as frightening as its younger sister of two years. I am working on daunting plans, like getting back into my photography business and getting all of my homework turned in on time. But between walking between 3 and 34 miles every day and climbing a ridiculous number of stairs to get from this class to that class, coming home completely exhausted with little to no motivation, and being ready to turn in for the night at 6PM, I am going to do it. All 18 credits will total a beaming 4.0 at the end of the semester, and my computer speed will slow down 89% from all of the photos I take by the end of my second-to-last planned year. I demand it. And I will anxiously pull up my grades in December, remember the confidence my academic advisor graced my time with, and say, "Well, I guess nuns get pretty good grades."