Staying Positive

I am not actually going to write about a quote. Instead, I want to write about the Giving Tree, by Shel Silverstein. There are two people in this world. Those who give, and those who take.  I AM THE GIVING TREE. Why do we, the givers, allow this to be? Because if we take a stand for ourselves, we become the takers. This quote is one of the most powerful quotes that I've read because it's true.

I want one thing.

HOPE.

Another List!!

A quick prelude to my official bucket list.

1. Cook and eat a meal with a professional chef

2. Cliff dive somewhere warm and tropical

3. Spend a year away from home in a country that I love

4. Zip line
5. Have/Adopt kids
6. See the Inca old civilization
7. Go alone to a festival!
8. Adopt an old dog
9. Visit my "homeland"
10. Throw a sophisticated kick back

5 Goals, 2 Weeks

1. Hoop again. Learn 1 new trick or go over everything I've already done
2. Work out. AT LEAST 3 TIMES the week of 4/21-4/28
3. Reconnect with Amanda
4. Meet and get in contact with new people from Cal Poly
5. Get pictures done from my internship

Word Cloud

Hmm. Word Clouds. We did these once upon a time. Uh, honesty? Since honesty's a big one. I really dislike them. I thought Myer Briggs was pretty awesome when I did it for the first time, I thought it was cool that there were people just like me who probably went "OH THAT'S SO ME!" when they read the paragraphs. I don't know, maybe other people thought it was cool, but you spend a lot of time looking at the type of person you are and these "tests" just reaffirm your own thoughts. It's in fact, a little embarrassing to read it. For me, it's a mixture of embarrassment and the old replay of what I've been doing my whole life. Sorry if that's a bad answer. I liked how we could shape it into a whale though.

Second Semester Goals

At the beginning of my second semester switch to S2S ERM I made a few goals for myself with my mentor:

1. Conceptualize the mission statement/what role the company has in our community
2. Take away something every week

I want to take the second goal I made with my mentor and twist it into my iQuest goal. I want to be able to learn as much as I can about the field I'm working on. So far I've been able to carve a good chunk of time when I'm with my mentor to talk about the environment and problems I see in the world. My mentor's really amazing, she's very patient and gives the best explanation she can while introducing new ideas that could help solve the situations.

Actions? I need pull together all the documents I've been recreating and see how they all connect. I want to be able to talk about something new with my mentor every time I see her. I don't see a real interruption besides myself not wanting to learn anymore, and I would need to do a little bit of my own research in order to answer questions left unanswered.

LED HOOPS

Last Saturday I went to a rave and met a girl with an LED hoop. She let me play around with it and when I ran into her again in the middle of the dance floor she got everyone to make a circle so I could hoop right there! The feeling was absolutely wonderful. The energy I got from everyone cheering me was indescribable. I even matched the tempo of my dancing to the music. :). Short shorts beware.

Reflection

This final semester I spent four hours on Fridays at Tassajara Vet with my mentor Dr. Dowd.

I would typically come in to see a surgery or dental work or wait around for Dr. Dowd to get off of break before going into individual appointments. In the individual appointments I learned many different ailments that happen to dogs and cats. I witnessed euthanasia of pets and a feral cat and helped hold animals upside down while an ultrasound took place. Dr. Dowd allowed me to look at skin scrapings and earwax and pustules under an immersion microscope. She told me about the normal problems that occur with certain breeds and the negatives of breeding. When I wasn't with Dr. Dowd I was working with the awesome vet techs holding animals for blood tests and listening to abnormal heartbeats. Twice, a cat came in for a good grooming and I got to brush out the mats out of fur. Other times I would chill out with the sick animals and pet them while I waited for an appointment to come in.

The greatest thing about the internship was being around the animals, for sure there was always something I could pet and look at. I liked the whole "behind the scenes" feel. I know Dr. Dowd cares for her patients and doesn't hurry or try to milk money out of her customer's pockets. All the vet techs were nice and helped me learn as much as I could and I was able to see the surgery my own cat went through and was told everything I needed to know about any possible relapse in her condition.

Don't get me wrong, I love animals. I am an animal lover to the max. I just couldn't see myself working all my days here. There weren't too many frustrations, but the ones that I had really took over my mind. Because I was under 18 when I shadowed Dr. Dowd, I was unable to do almost all procedures including animals because of liability. I could not hold a mask onto a sedated cat or retrieve medicine or give shots of vaccine or saline. I messed up bringing in a dog once and was never fully trusted to help bring an animal to the back again. One thing that really made me sad was coming in after a good 2-3 months and having three of the prime vet techs not know my name.

I learned about my patience threshold. I can stand for 4 hours just observing without racking my brains out. 

From this iQuest subject I learned that most dogs and cats are overweight in a vet's perspective and that when you cut into animal flesh it doesn't bleed as much as one would expect. 

I expect my learning curve to either jump or sink this next semester. Now that I'm in Environmental Resource Management with an emphasis on storm water and construction, I have a whole new subject to learn. From my APES class I knew a little about the subject but this job delves deeper and incorporates all the concepts into one. My tasks these past two weeks have been recreating documents and I've been told the importance of the documents, but it's so much to sink in at once. My mentor has not yet unleashed her full knowledge upon me, and to be honest, I'm glad. The amount I've tried to soak in the past 6 hours of interning time has been a lot. 

Mrs. Sekera, I would like to warn you that I may seem frustrated and overwhelmed in the upcoming weeks, but I'm trying my best to put the pieces together. I hope it all makes sense soon, but I'm proud to say my excel AND word skills at making worksheets are now up to par. 

I would like to say as an after thought that I believe I've done so much this past year. I learned how to hoop and knit and I've saved up enough money to go to a festival in Southern California. I know I dreaded Fridays but I think I walked away with more knowledge than I really know.