What am I doing here, and who am I?

Just for a couple minutes, please imagine yourself at your age waking up at 5:30am (mind you, it has been daylight all night long) in your dorm room. Ohhh, just wait...I've only just begun! After reminding yourself where you are, you undress, wrap a towel around you, put flip flops on (because you have no idea when the floor was cleaned last, if ever) and "lightly step" (because there are signs EVERYWHERE reminding you of this) down the dark dorm hall. To the community bathroom. You're probably thinking, "Geez, Sarah, you forgot your toiletries". Sure didn't, they are stored in my little toiletry tote in the bathroom in a wall of cubby holes. You grab your toiletry tote and head to the community showers, where there are handy hooks to hang your towels and cute little toiletry tote. You're only allowed a 5 minute shower (since, remember, you're in Antarctica, there aren't your typical luxuries like water treatment plants). Welcome to something similar to college dorm life.

After your speedy shower and brushing your teeth with three other people while others shower and use the toilets, you get dressed in 5 layers of cold weather clothes. You then walk across the "street" to the Galley where many, many, many others are also walking from their respective dorms. Then the process begins: take off parka-gloves-hat-gator and drop off in the coat room. Wash hands, because there are signs EVERYWHERE reminding you to do so. With your freshly clean (and very dry) hands, walk upstairs to the dining hall. Grab yourself a blue tray, plate, and cup. Forget a Starbucks venti chai latte and a bowl of strawberry frosted mini-wheats cereal. Lots of casseroles, bread, and....casseroles. Try to find your appetite, put it on your plate, fill up your cup with juice, water, or coffee. Then walk into the room full of partially occupied tables and chairs. Some know each other, some don't. Some sit alone, some squeeze as many as they can onto one table. Then comes the fun part, you'll remember this for sure. Holding your casserole and apple juice, standing there all alone, start frantically scanning the tables for a familiar face. But you have to act totally natural, God forbid you look like you don't have any friends (because you don't, really, they're all thousands of miles away). Welcome to your high school cafeteria on your first day at a new school.

Then, after eating breakfast quickly and alone, you bundle back up, and walk up the hill to your office. Now you're a professional adult going to your job where you have to think and act quickly, learn complicated things, and contribute to smooth scientific research station operations every day at the bottom of Earth. But you live in a college dorm and you eat meals in your high school cafeteria.

By day 4 of my experience in Antarctica, I began to have a minor identity crisis. Who am I? What in the hell am I doing here? I have a home and a bed and a life thousands of miles away. Where are the penguins? On top of an identity crisis, I started getting sick. Flu-like sick. Apparently, like feeling lost and confused, getting something like the flu is also completely expected. I had to miss most of my co-worker's much anticipated birthday party Saturday night and I laid in bed, drunk on Nyquil for the majority of today. So today, I thought A LOT about my identity crisis.

And before I end this, to enter the FREEZING, WINDY, CRISP ANTARCTIC AIR, I must thank my Academic Advisor at DU for sharing this experience and my blog with my fellow graduate community in Denver. I know some of you are reading this and most I don't know. I hope you enjoy it. I really do thank Paula for her encouragement, and her support in me to work here for my career's sake, definitely not my education's sake!

This week, I will take pictures of cool things for you all - when I start feeling better and can make it around station to explore :)

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