Out of my element

I am beginning to feel silly for being here at all. At the moment it's not because I have no idea what I'm doing, because it's clear the rest of my fellow Fellows feel exactly the same. That is a big relief, by the way. And a Fellow spoke to us at Orientation and said that he'd felt that too, but by the end of the summer he was prepared; the staff and everyone else had taught him all he needed to know. There is hope.

No, I'm feeling silly because I am really out of the loop. The majority of my classmates already live here, have apartments and cars and ideas where they want to teach--like somewhere near their place. They looked at me funny, practically laughed, when I asked about recess. Apparently no one in the New York City area got recesses. I remember morning and afternoon recess, but they just get a lunch one here. Plus, not many people seem to have the big-ass commutes that I do. They're just going about their business. I'm going about it like AmeriCorps--that we're all in this new adventure together. But it's totally not like that. I feel like I'm working harder than I should, just in terms of logistics, not classwork. I don't know my way around the city, I don't even know the names of the areas that these people live in or are from. I know Williamsburg, but just my street, none of the cute or trendy or interesting parts of Williamsburg. My area is dirty. There's lots of kids around, which means it's not actually dangerous. I'm intimidated because I'm a lone white girl who doesn't speak Spanish. Tomorrow I hope to get out and explore so that I don't have to be so scaredy-cat.

I'm really excited for the weekend though. I've got plans to see friends. My packages are here; the big boxes will be delivered Friday morning, and after they arrive I'll go pick up my book box at the post office (which apparently is right around the corner--see what I mean about exploring?). That means I'll have all my stuff! Like my clothes and my sneakers and my blankie! Hurrah!

Also, the big certification tests are on Saturday. I keep almost forgetting about that. Which is dangerous, because I think I need to report to the Sheraton somewhere in Manhattan at like seven a.m. on Saturday morning. Ugh. This morning on the trains I reviewed the vocabulary so that it will start to become familiar so that I can use it on the CST. I can't wait to get all that over with. I'm totally not studying; if I don't pass one of them, I'll worry about that later.

Rrr. I should go because the afternoon boring class will start soon. I'm freaking hungry, I do not have enough food at my disposal. Plus it's super expensive to buy a snack on campus, so I'm all cleaned out. And guess what? I now have about two thousand dollars of debt on my credit cards. I HATE that.