Could this possibly work?

IJM finally gave the go-ahead to proceed with their CIDA proposal. I am so relieved to hear this that this morning after getting a call from my boss, I practically told the entire CSJ office, including the chair and board. Seriously, this is such a relief to me b/c I was beginning to think that the whole thing was a waste of my time and was never going to work. I am uncertain if this proposal contract will proceed smoothly but right now there is great potential for experience. To be honest, I don't understand why God would provide me with the connections and opportunity and then have it all fall apart. I mean, I guess he has purpose in everything, even if I don't quite understand it, but I just find that really odd. I guess we'll see what He does.

I also got to attend a fun working session this morning on the campaign. It was interesting but a bit too heavy for 9:30am. We discussed the idea of redefining the way average people talk about political issues. For example: tax cuts. Tax cuts are always considered to be a positive thing b/c they save the working person money every year. But taxation is very important to social programming and if we weren't taxed than we wouldn't have the programs we have. So tax cuts are really a decrease in the investment in education, healthcare, the environment etc... Then we talked about persuasive narrative and communication strategies. All very interesting except it was so full of academic and ideological vocabulary I almost wanted to scream. I can't blame these guys. They're professors and scholars and so to expect them to speak everyday (colloquial) language is probably unrealistic. Anywho, the meeting was good and actually quite productive considering we basically narrowed down our strategies and have begun to focus on our strengths.

During the conversation, the topic of hiring new staff came up. It seems that if all goes well, I am going to get hired on here. This is good news b/c up to this point I have been working to make it clear to my boss that I am an asset. My boss also told me that for the course of my internship he has planned to give me an honorarium. This is so sweet b/c I was not expecting to get paid any money at all. Apparently they're offering to pay for my travel costs, my lunch plus give me $1000. Not bad eh?

In other news, AWID gave me a FANTASTIC assignment on women's human rights in Sri Lanka. I get to create questions for an interview with a women who runs a feminist NGO in Sri Lanka called INFORM. It's pretty snazzy. The cool part about the whole thing is that this interview will be published and maybe my name will be on it. That would look good on my CV. I hate to say it, but right now, everything I do has to be relevant for my CV. It sucks and seems underhanded but it's just the reality of my life. If I want to go to law school, I need to have the best fricken CV on the planet.

Did I also mention that I got birthday money and bought a pair of rockin winter boots and some really snazzy pants. Oh yes, I'm gonna look really hot this fall.

Well, gotta go.