First Day of School! First Day of School!

It's 5 a.m... I haven't woken up at 5 a.m. for a "day's work" since I quit the O.J (office job, not the juice)
Woke up this morning with visions of this guy... and his voice prompting me to wake up...



Saw him in concert right before I made the move to Chicago. This is Brian Aubert of Silversun Pickups... and The Royal We was running through my dreams ALL night for some reason.

SO- point being- I was so giddy excited last night I couldn't sleep. My stomach was in knots of anticipation. FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL! I was like a child the night before Disneyland, anxiously looking at the clock every few minutes during the night not wanting to sleep through my alarm. Like "memo" in Finding Nemo (Moochie can't say Nemo for some reason) who wakes up his father screaming "FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL! FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!" I was giddy to get up and get going this morning...
and proceeded to forget everything I kept telling myself not to forget (um, can you say notebook and pen?? water? COFFEE??)

School didn't disappoint. There are about 70 of us starting this 6 month adventure together and I think everyone was a little nervous, giddy, scared and was probably not their 'true' self. Truthfully I didn't meet that many people. I was trying to diligently pay attention and not call attention to the fact that I wasn't prepared. But all morning I was anxiously waiting a phone call interview for a scholarship. Once that was out of the way, my mind was a little more at ease. And then I got my Chefs Uniform.

OK... stop the train here. I haven't been this excited to get an article of clothing before. No, it wasn't designer and it wasn't a new Marc Jacobs purse. But I felt like a med student in a coat ceremony. This was (excuse me mom when you read this next line) more exciting than putting on my 4k wedding dress... This plain cotton coat represented so much to me. It was like a vow I was making to myself, and my kids too. A vow to pursue this dream with all that I have. To make me, my kids and my school proud. It represented all of the work I had been doing up to this point to get HERE. All the sacrifice I will be making the next six months and the battle armor I will be wearing day in and out to get me through the 'stages', volunteer jobs and hopefully amazing meet and greets w/ a ton of chefs in this wonderful city of Chicago.

enough sap. The hands down truth is I had a kick ass day. So many people were wishing me well yesterday, I was bursting with love. I was walking on a high and to top today off- I found out I DID get that scholarship. :) Um, can you say THREE FOR THREE! It just legitimizes what I'm doing here and I'm happy other people are able to see my passion and drive and are putting money behind MY dream. Thank you THANK you to the Hiller Scholarship program and the French Pastry school for making today as amazing as could be.

and to end it all, took a long run on the lake shore listening to Fall Out Boy and Skyped the kiddo's. I miss them so much I ache. So I look at my too long chefs pants (going to get hemmed TOMORROW!) and Chefs Jacket and know I'm doing this for us. My boot camp for the rest of my life.