Hooray for being back online! Our internet connection decided to quit working about a week ago. Sad day. But now I am back. I know you missed me. I'm finally starting to feel like maybe I'll be a nurse soon. I started orientation with my preceptor on Monday. She's awesome. She's been a pediatric nurse for like 29 years, and I think she might know everything. All the nurses I've worked with on the floor so far are great too. And funny. And since there's not much I enjoy more than laughing out loud, it works out rather nicely. I still haven't quite grasped the fact that this is my actual job. I still feel a bit like I'm in clinicals or something. But I think the more comfortable I get with my environment and the more confident I become in my skills as a nurse, the more I will start to feel at home. I claimed a locker yesterday, so I guess that's a step. The first day I went in the charge nurse told me to just find an empty locker to put my stuff in, so that's what I've been doing. But yesterday I put my name on it. I feel like being allowed to put my name on a locker is like some kind of sign that I'm "in." So that's exciting. Or maybe I'm just weird. Today, as Megan and I were enjoying one of our in-car sing-a-longs, we marveled at the fact that either one of us had ever found anyone willing to date us. I think we came to the conclusion that everyone is secretly weird. We're just not so afraid of parading our weirdness to the world. It really does make life much more entertaining. Besides, what fun is it to make friends with people when you're pretending to be normal, only to have them find out later that you're weird and then wonder why they befriended you? I think it saves much time and energy to just be real from the beginning... In all seriousness though, I've been thinking a lot lately about the importance of "being real." This is actually fairly new territory for me. I know I've said this before, but I believe it enough that I'm going to say it again: I am happier and feel like I have more friends now that I'm not so afraid of what people will think of me than I was before, when I was always trying to be what I thought everyone wanted me to be. Interesting... Another subject that's been the topic of much thought and conversation lately is the difficulty of letting go and letting God control my life. Megan and I had a good conversation about this last night. Currently, we are in situations that seem to be very opposite, but in reality are very similar. We are both in situations in which there is something we want very much to turn out a certain way, yet we have no power over whether they will or not. We are both realizing the incredible power emotions have over us, while realizing that it is unhealthy to always let emotions dictate actions. As much as I hate to admit it, I want to be in control of every aspect of my life. I want things to go the way I want them to go, when I want them to. But the fact of the matter is, I have no control of 99% of the things that I stress out about. It is all but killing me right now to not know what my life will be like 1 or 2 or 10 years from now. But I know that God has a plan, and He is in control. All I have to do is keep my eyes on Him, and He will lead me where He wants me to go.