one whirlwind week

if i could sum up my life in one word, it would be "magical". there are a lot of reasons for this, but i think primarily it's because i've been blessed with a kick ass pair of permanent rose-colored glasses.

yeah, shitty stuff happens. i hit big snags in relationships (not sure why the boys seem to be so scared of me and my ginormous heart). i have trouble getting along with people who have a different political philosophy (sorry, dad). my rent is too high for a place without parking (but worth every penny). i'm worth more dead than i am alive. my family lives way too far away, and when i go visit them i spend half the flight home bawling my eyes out. i walk with a cane and sometimes it sucks (most of the time it sucks). it costs me almost $400 to replace a tire on my car (something i feel i have to do far more often than seems reasonable). i can't wear sexy, strappy, 4" shoes, and sometimes that bums the shit outta me. i don't yet have a ticket for obama's inaugural speech (but i'll be there anyway). sometimes i think i'm in over my head at the day job, i'm responsible for way more than i should be, and i have to go to three office holiday parties, in three cities, in one week. traffic pisses me off. being disappointed by my friends weighs heavily in my heart. and i'm 34, single, childless, and don't see that changing anytime soon.

thank god i'm hot!

all joking aside, i really do suffer the same woes of any one who lives a life. there are days i'm sad, lonely, feel sorry for myself, and want to crawl into a hole and die. there are days i pick up the newspaper and wonder if things are ever going to get better. and don't tell anyone, but some days i wonder if those nutbag christian folks are right and the world is going to end any day now.

but then i have weeks like i've had this week (and it's only wednesday), and i remember why it is that i can sum up my life in that one "magical" word.

on monday, i got a call from obama (not personally, but someone on the team). i have to pick one position that i want, out of the 3,300 listed in the plum book, write the best cover letter of my entire life, attach my resume and a list of the reasons i'm the right gal for the gig, and someone who has been asked to make 36 recommendations is going to recommend me for the appointee position of my choice. this doesn't mean i'll get the position i've chosen as my number one (in case you're wondering, it's _special assistant to the president for presidential personnel_), but it does mean that someone high up in the obama team thinks highly enough of me and my contributions that i'm one of their 36.

on tuesday, i got a call from the director of a fellowship program to which i applied. we scheduled an interview for today.

today i found out i'm a finalist for that fellowship. i also found out this was the year of the most number and most amazingly qualified of applicants. and i'm a finalist. and she is going to recommend to the board that i get the los angeles fellowship (http://www.trumanproject.org/programs/fellowship). it doesn't mean i'll get it. but it does mean that in a year when the number of applicants was highest and the calibre of applicants astounding, i'm a finalist.

i guess (and not that i ever really doubted it) that the sum of all things in my life is that hard work and believing in myself pays off. it's nice for me to wake up every day and think i'm awesome, it's even better when my friends and family (and boys breaking up with me) tell me how wonderful and amazing i am, but it's even better when my awesomeness is recognized on a much grander scale than my own delusions of grandeur. and that's what's happened this week.

it reinforces my belief that anything is possible, and tightens the screws on those rose-colored glasses i refuse to stop wearing. and if i don't get the obama job, yay, i don't have to pack up my life and move to the east coast. if i don't get the fellowship, i can reapply next year. either way or not at all, i already have an incredible life i wouldn't trade in for a dump truck full of gold bricks. a life that's, in a word, magical...

~k