My first day at ATC training began, after a short introduction by our trainer, with a brief quiz that nonetheless managed to have us all scared shitless that we'd chosen the wrong career path. I couldn't even answer half the questions at all... they sounded only vaguely familiar.

We spent a good forty-five minutes in collective fear before our "teacher" broke character, some other folks filed in, and we learned that we'd just been punked by the training class ahead of us, and hey, welcome!

Even the real instructors, once introduced, said "If anyone asks, we showed you org charts", and then spent the rest of the morning one-upping each other with stories from The Good Old Days of air traffic control.

My first day at ATC training ended with the other class taking us all out for drinks, marking what I'm pretty sure was the first occasion I've ever been tipsy at 2pm on a Monday.

So no, it's not going to be easy.

But it looks like it's going to be a lot of fun.

two equally strong but opposing forces have been building within me over the past couple of weeks, and their tandem appearance is somewhat confusing: on one side, a sudden and fierce feeling of independence, of wanting to strike out on my own, and talk to strangers, and go out at night with no accomplices...

and on the other, a growing inability or unwillingness to fall asleep alone.

this last is especially confusing given that i haven't had a regular sleeping partner in nearly a year.

both could probably be attributed to some kind of backlash from the holidays, or even all of last year, but i have figured out one thing, at least: there are some major changes ahead.