Is it really a small world after all?

Dear Friends,

I don't know how much spam you get in your inbox, but did you hear about Jet Blue's latest promotional offer? October, the lonely month between summer vacations and winter holidays, is apparently not the airline's most profitable time of year. So, as an incentive to get people to stop watching t.v. in their homes and start watching it while flying, Jet Blue is offering a discount package not unlike the EuroPass offered by Eurorail. For a mere $599.00 you can buy a pass that allows you to fly an unlimited number of times throughout the month of October to any airport Jet Blue normally services. "That would be so AWESOME," I thought and immediately daydreaming began.

"Well, let's see. Where would I go? I could go somewhere I've never been before. Oooo...Chicago! That would be awesome! And I could see Shayla and Julie when I'm there. Maybe after that I'd go to Minneapolis to see Lydia...she spoke so highly of the Twin Cities that I'm dying to see what they're like. Well, by then I guess I'm getting pretty close to New York...."

And then, as a river of names and their associated locales flooded my memory, I realized how small the vastness of the United States was when I thought of it in terms of my friends and family. THINK ABOUT IT....WE ARE EVERYWHERE!

Then, of course, the flip side arrived and I remembered that this whole Jet Blue thing was, sadly, merely a daydream. Instead of grand travel, my month of October will be filled with lab courses, internships, thesis writing, etc, etc....basically, the well known hike toward graduation. I'm not saying that these things aren't exactly what I want to be doing in my month of October, I just wish that whenever a spare moment arrives, I could easily sit down to a cup of coffee with you and simply catch-up. Alas, the United States regained its vastness and distance became once again as inflexible as matter and mass and other things physicists lean on.

But you know me, I'm an optimist and a romantic. Although I appreciate physics in it's own right, I will not let it run my life in such a strict and heartless fashion. There is always something to be done. What am I doing? Well, blogging, I guess. There, I said it: I am going to blog about my life. I have always denounced it as an egocentric process, but I'm hoping this sort of blogging will be a bit more reciprocal...more akin to email. I will blog about my life and I am hoping you will blog about yours. Maybe this way we can make up for all the lost coffee dates (or at least prevent the next one from being an all day event). Anyhow, take it or leave it- it's up to you. For me, it's the most convenient way I can think of to unravel the laws of physics and shrink the distances between us.

Love,

Candace