27 March 2010

foreign service

this post is akin to a drunk text, one of those i might wish i never would've hit "publish", but to hell with it...

i've always believed i'm meant to change the world. whether it be delusions of grandeur or perchance a curse, it's been one of the biggest driving forces of my life. i chose law school, eons ago, because i believed it the path of least resistance toward that end. it wasn't. or maybe it was. i dunno.

but i do know that wednesday brought the news that i passed the foreign service exam. and that less than 30% of takers pass it. that most of the people i personally know who've taken it are as happy for me as they are jealous that i passed it and they didn't. and i feel like it's right.

when i turned down the afhanistan job, it was because it wasn't right. the timing wasn't right. it didn't feel right. and paris guy was newly in the picture...

but now it's different. it's all different. i think about my bucket list, and how it all fits: a year with no address, six months in paris, sipping turkish coffee in the shadow of the hagia sofia. it's like i've always known, without knowing, that mine's a life meant to live without roots. that as much as i love my country and will eternally belong to the USA, i belong really to the world. that i'm here to make the world a better place by bringing what's best about america to the rest of the world. and i want to go wherever they want to send me. i don't care the where, not even a little bit. i just want to go. and be.

and the best part about it is simply knowing. i've been so bloody stressed these past few months, probably because i've felt change in my life happening without knowing where it's going, and where i really wanted it to go (afghanistan? washington, dc? denver? politics? government? more big law?) i know i want to represent my country abroad. and though i'm not yet there, as i have three more hurdles to jump, i know it's what i want. more than anything.

foreign service offers the adventure of a lifetime. all the better that it comes with opportunities abound to make a real difference in the world.

~k

2 comments:

  1. Funny, but I have always had the same sense for myself - that I was meant to do something important and make the world a better place. I wonder how many have that sense about themselves? I suspect even fewer actively manipulate their lives to accomplish it.
    Though the foreign service is far from where I met you - and it makes me think of how hellish that time must have been for you w/this percolating in your soul - I am glad that we did meet, and that I will be able to say, "I knew you when!" Best of luck to you and keep following your dream!

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  2. Congrats on passing the test and good luck with the next steps.

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