The Beauty of Being Sporadic

Hello everyone! I can't believe (once again) it is already Sunday.  My weekends here at SMC always seem to go by so quickly!  This weekend was particularly packed and exciting, however.  As you may know from my previous post, I have been wanting to visit the Whale Tails on the side of I-89 that I always pass on my way up to Vermont.  My housemates helped make that little dream come true for me this weekend.

Thankfully, one of my housemates Cait (also known as Sharkbait), knew how to get to the Tails.  So yesterday afternoon, after we feasted on some monkey bread and decorated our house for Christmas (we know it's early, but we're really excited), we piled into my car and set out on our little adventure.  The Tails were actually really easy to find, and there just so happened to be some people there when we arrived who were kind enough to take a group picture for us.

Alex, Lauren, me, and Cait

Being the slightly crazy people we are, we of course had to take some silly photos:

Lauren, me, and Alex

Lauren and Cait

My signature victory/this is great/I'm finally here pose (which started while I was in Ireland last semester):

After we had our picture-taking fun and were walking back to the car, we noticed another silly picture opportunity:

Cait, me, and Lauren

Me, Lauren

I was so happy that my housemates were able to take some time out of their days to help me check off something on my SMC Bucket List.  We had been planning on going since last weekend, so it was nice to have our little adventure to look forward to throughout the week.

As much as I love making plans (and don't know what I would do without them), I also love to do things in the spur of the moment (sometimes).  On the way home from the Whale Tails, someone suggested we visit the Cabot Cheese store in Waterbury.  I immediately jumped at the opportunity, and though I could've used that time to be doing homework, I decided to continue the adventure.  This whole semester, I have been feeling like time has been flying by, so I've been working on trying to take some time to just breathe and enjoy life.  Plus, going to the Cabot store was another item on my bucket list, just waiting to be checked off.

We dropped Alex off because she had to study for the GMAT exam she'll be taking on Thursday (good luck Al!!), and then Lauren, Cait, and I headed to Waterbury.  The store was awesome - full of fun Vermont/cheese-themed gifts.  My favorite part was the endless amount of samples they had - I never knew there were so many kinds of cheese!

Once we had our fill of cheese, we headed back to SMC.  To go along with our Christmas theme from earlier that morning, we put on some Christmas tunes.  I already love driving, and driving with my housemates listening to music and being silly was exactly what I needed for the afternoon.  If you had asked me this past week if I thought I would have time to go to the Whale Tails and down to Waterbury, I would've said no.  But I decided to make the time to do it anyway.  And although I might stay up a little later than I should tonight, I don't regret it at all.  

During my Practicum class this week, my professor asked everyone to go around the room and share what we do to take care of ourselves, especially during this time when the end of the semester is so close and finals are approaching.  I couldn't help but think of him as I decided to take the day off yesterday.  I do have a decent amount of work I need to accomplish tonight, but I am in a much better place, mentally, to get a lot accomplished than I would've been if I hadn't taken that time for myself.  It took me a while to learn the importance of relaxation, and I still have to remind myself to do it sometimes (in all honesty, this post is partially to help me justify the way I spent my day yesterday!).  But at the end of the day, I get so much happiness from spending time with my housemates and friends, and wouldn't trade that time for the world.  I am so thankful every day that I chose to come to Saint Mike's and meet the people I have.  As I've said before, I couldn't ask for a better SMC family!

Very quickly before I get back to my work - special shout out to my friend and previous roommate Emma, who had a birthday yesterday!  Another shout out goes to all the prospective students and families that were here for the Open House today - I had a great time giving a tour and I hope you all enjoyed your time here!

Thanks so much for reading my blog, and feel free to email me with any questions you may have!

Merrill

PS I haven't included a "what I'm listening to now" feature in a while - sorry about that!  My song for the week is Take Your Time by Sam Hunt. Loving it!