heading to boston

I love having external reference points. I love keeping this blog as a way of tracking those reference points.

Tomorrow I leave for Boston to visit the BFF (ya know, best friend FOREVER). Last May, I went to Nashville for the BFF's graduation from medical school and blogged about my ritualized pre-travel freakout which includes cleaning, shopping, and running other errands that don't really need to happen right before I leave town when I have other things to do.

And, I realized that as I've been patting myself on the back for doing such a good job of NOT having a pre-travel freakout, I've been doing all the pre-travel freakout stuff. This morning, I went to the mall to return a pair of pants I bought a month ago. I could have waited 5 more days until after my trip to do this, but I didn't. And while I was at the mall, there was a sale at Victoria's Secret, and well, I need new underwear, right? and they only have a sale every 6 months, and well, I was able to get 3 bras for $50, when they normally cost $34 each! Ok, fine, I could have gone shopping with the BFF in Boston, but it felt like I needed to take care of this stuff NOW.

And I cleaned out almost all the stuff from the trunk of the car that has been sitting in there for months. And I started to organize my closet...sigh.

In some way, it is comforting to have this ritual, to have this thing that I can count on, an internal crazy clock that says "now it is time to clean and shop".

I'm looking forward to the trip, to seeing the BFF. I haven't seen her since last May, and we don't do a good job of staying in touch via phone or email between visits. But we've got that connection going back years and years that whenever we get together things just fall into place. She's doing her residency now at Mass General Hospital. Crazy to think that she's a PhD and MD and this was her dream going way, way back, and she's DOING IT. I just hope she's happy. I guess I'll find out :) I'm so excited to see her!

Boston could be interesting to explore, as I've only been there once before the spring break my junior year (or maybe senior year) in high school to check out Boston University. That trip was just me and Dad. It was the first time I felt like an adult. I was looking at college and my Dad wasn't treating me like a kid. We ate clam chowder, I drank coffee for the first time, I got a nosebleed on the T (public transit). I remember walking around on Harvard's campus and seeing some of the historical stuff in Boston, and thinking that there was a real chance that I could move to this old, American city and live there for several years. It will be interesting to go back and be in that city 12-13 years later.