I'm Back!

Goodbye Auburn, hello Portland! I had a lovely winter break (though it didn't feel much like winter). I returned home to California to spend a month with my family, and although it was a lot of fun, I was bummed that I didn't get to go skiing. I live about an hour away from some good ski places in the Sierra Nevada mountains (and about an hour and a half away from Lake Tahoe!), but since California is going through a serious drought, there wasn’t enough snow. I did get to go hiking a lot though. The weather was very warm back home – so warm, in fact, that I was actually looking forward to coming back up here where it’s cooler. Running when it's forty degrees warmer than you're used to is no fun. When I arrived here, I was not disappointed. Right now, the sun is shining, the wind is crisp and chilly, and I can wear leggings and scarves again!
The landscape near my home in Auburn

Annoyingly hot weather aside, my break was packed with everything I love about home. I caught up on sleep, non-academic reading, and Doctor Who, and saw a lot of my high school friends. I celebrated Christmas with my parents, brother, and grandparents. 

Christmas dinner

Gingerbread Tardis, anyone?

Later I visited those same grandparents as well as my aunt, uncle, and three cousins for a second Christmas in the Bay Area. Seeing my extended family always involves playing lots and lots of games: card games, board games, games like Charades, and storytelling games where we sit in a circle and each person adds another word to the increasingly-crazy sentence. Later, my family went to San Francisco to eat clam chowder, try on kooky hats, and see the sea lions on Pier 39.

I arrived back at Lewis and Clark yesterday afternoon. Transportation from the airport to the school is very easy as long as you schedule your flight on a day the shuttle is running. I flew in from Sacramento, took the shuttle bus, and was back at in the dorm chatting with friends and unpacking suitcases in no time. That night, we reserved an auditorium in one of the academic buildings to watch the first episode of the new season of Sherlock. I won’t spoil anything, but it was so good.

I’ve ordered all of my textbooks from various sources (both the bookstore and Amazon) and they will be steadily trickling in over the next few days. I am incredibly excited to start my new set of classes. They will be very different from last term’s lineup, I think. I am taking Ancient Greece via the history department, The Art of the Novel in the English department, Logic in the Philosophy department (which can be used to satisfy one of the General Education math requirements!), a second semester of Exploration and Discovery called The Ancient City with a religious studies professor, and Taekwondo for PE credit (which I am taking with a bunch of people from my dorm). I will also be continuing to host prospective students overnight. I hope all of you considering Lewis and Clark will come and visit sometime this spring! An overnight visit is important in making your college decision, though it is by no means always the factor on which you should solely base your decision.

Have an excellent start to the semester, everyone!


Jess