little RAnt

My younger sister leaves today for Italy because she'll be studying abroad this semester. She called me last night to say goodbye, and I just called her now to say goodbye again. (I wanted to hear her voice again, since our only communication between now and my Spring Break will be by email.) I haven't seen her or the rest of my family since I returned to MySchool two weeks ago, and for some reason, I'm feeling incredibly homesick right now.

One of the downsides to being an RA is that we only get one weekend away from campus per month. With rehearsals last Sunday and this weekend for my performances next weekend, I have not had the opportunity to go home this month. I hadn't thought that I'd need/want to because of the lovely 2 weeks of Christmas break. But- there's the [small] possibility that I won't be able to go home until after graduation.

My weekend away in March is over Spring Break because my flight is on Friday but RAs aren't permitted to leave until Saturday. My weekend away in April is for the state conference in my field (which happens to be the same weekend as BestFriend's bridal shower too). We have a few days off for Easter, but I have a church job so unless I get someone to sub for me for Good Friday, I'll have to stay in CoolCity. February is the only month in which I might go home, but the only weekend which works out is the weekend directly before my March weekend. Two weekends away from campus in a row, even if each is within a different month, is not permitted.

Needless to say, I'm getting a little tired of the RA obligations. I love my residents- I'm very fortunate that I have nice girls- but I'm getting more and more annoyed with the other aspects of the job: 6 mandatory 24-hour duty on weekend nights, 1 duty night per week (only 16 hours then), programming requirements, daily curfew (which is at 11pm during the week and a half of finals!), bulletin boards. I shouldn't complain -- the cost of living on campus rose nearly $2000 this year (over $10,000 now), and I don't have to pay a penny. This job is worth it, in the long run, but when I think about what I have to deal with on the job (i.e. the duty call I got at 2:30am this morning which lasted for 2 hours) ... I don't always feel as grateful as maybe I should.