It’s been a long time since my last post, and to be honest, I didn’t intend on writing again. A lot has happened in the past few months. And my life seemed to be heading in a direction that wasn’t exactly consistent with the mood and message of this blog. So I abandoned it.

Two things happened that lead me to that decision: 1 – For reasons I honestly don’t have the time or patience to explain here, my Peace Corp acceptance fell through. Ask me about it in person for the long, sad story. It’s too tedious to write out the whole thing. And 2 – I accepted a job offer at a PR firm I was interning at in Boston. It was what made sense at the time, and it was with a heavy heart that I watched my time for exploration fade away. Even though I was still set up to spend my summer at Canyonlands, it didn’t feel right to talk about travel and quote Frost poems while I counted down the days to a desk and four walls.

So off I went to Utah, expecting a sort of last little fling before heading into the corporate jungle. I wasn’t bummed about my decisions. In fact, I was feeling really good. I thought this summer out west would be exactly what I needed to rest up and cool off before I jumped back into the grind. It was supposed to be a transition.

And it has been. But rather than act as a happy, somewhat irrelevant link between my college days and career as I originally intended, this experience has catapulted me into a world I couldn’t have conjured up in my wildest dreams.

It has been more than a month since I came to Utah, and if there’s one thing I’ve realized, it’s that this is not just one piece of an existing puzzle – it’s the start of something completely new altogether, and it’s the most excited I’ve been for anything in my entire life.

I’ve made no decisions regarding what I’ll do with myself come September. But my mindset and outlook have completely changed. I no longer feel like a hypocrite writing on this page. What I do feel is a need to document these incredible experiences. So for now, single reader, it looks like I’m back.

Mariana