Doc Hop

Ding dang dong — I’m blogging live from Chicago! Well, not live. This still won’t be up for a few days, but I had some downtime in the Windy City so I thought I’d go ahead and start my update.

For those of you who do not remember, this week was the Medill Solutions Journalism Educators Academy, so I was back at my alma mater for the first time in 15 years! I sure hope it’s not another 15 before I make it back. (Spoiler alert, it definitely won’t be that long. Promise.) So, what did I learn?

To quote the website, because I’m feeling lazy: “This intensive, two-day residency is designed for university journalism and communications faculty ready to integrate rigorous solutions-based reporting into their classrooms. The Academy provides educators with a deep dive into reporting on democracy, the Asset-Framing methodology, and the Complicating the Narrative framework through the lens of youth mental health.” And any fool who knows me, knows how much I love to talk democracy! (You actually might not know if you haven’t taken a class with me. If my students made a drinking game out of how often I discussed the First Amendment, the semester would stay LIT.)

Y’all might also remember that I completed an online Asset course through CSULB last summer. That program was from an general educational standpoint and this one had a journalistic focus, but both courses emphasized the importance of defining people and communities by their aspirations, abilities, and contributions, rather than solely focusing on their struggles. By the same token, solutions journalism investigates how people and institutions respond to social problems, not just the problems themselves. Strong solutions stories are rigorously reported and evidence-based, showing what is working, why it works, what others can learn from it, and where the approach falls short.

I learned a ton while I was there, and I’m excited to see how it may help me improve my approach to journalism both in and outside of the classroom. I’m teaching a Data and Democracy class and will begin advising The Long Beach Current this fall, so I will have plenty of opportunities to put my knowledge to work. A whole career of it!

But anyway. Let’s get to the fun stuff.

Tuesday, June 23: LB to Chicago

My flight out was at the butt crack of dawn, and I might as well have stayed up all night, with all the sleep I got. I was too excited! My Uber arrived at my place around 5 a.m., and we were at LAX shortly after 5:30. My flight started boarding at 7 a.m., so after making sure that my gate existed, I had plenty of time to grab an iced horchata from Starbucks before setting myself up in a corner with a book. (The Grapes of Wrath. Girl — I panicked. I wanted a fun vacation read and somehow it came down to this or Demons by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Both are great. Neither is “fun.”)

Bad news, first, always: I was sat in the middle seat. UGH! I know.

Good news, there was a babe to my left and a babe to my right, BABY! I felt like a pansexual menace.

I listened to The Last Podcast on the Left for the entire flight, as I had them downloaded to my phone, and made it to O’Hare around 1:40 p.m. (Alaska was on last week, everyone should check it out!) Mass transportation is a dream in Chicago, so I didn’t even consider an Uber. I bought week pass for the CTA, so it was unlimited rides for me this trip. (It’s truly the only way to go, and I’ve missed it so much.) The blue line dropped me about two blocks from my hotel — citizenM Chicago Downtown — and I checked in right at 3 p.m.

My hotel room was super small, but also super smart. An iPad controlled the lighting, the air, the blinds, the TV, and pretty much everything else in the room. (I practically needed it to start my shower and flush my toilet!) The lights were pretty dang cool though. They operated on a color wheel, so I could change the hue to fit my vibe. And the bed was pushed right up against the floor to ceiling window, which provided a killer view of the city from the eighth floor. What the room lacked in square feet, it more than made up for in personality and pizzaz. Think “cyber space hostel.”

After I settled in I realized I was starving, so I decided to grab something quick from the hotel bar before I got hangry. I ordered some rosemary fries with aioli and an old fashioned, and I had a good ol’ time talking to the two people tending bar. (I’m hardly ever at a bar these days, but when I do go I am a delight.) After 12 hours of travel, the food and drink gave me the much-needed boost I needed to step back out into the city I once loved calling home.

At this point, I obviously needed some herbal refreshment, so I stopped by Sunnyside Cannibas Dispensary for a pen and some edibles to help me sleep. It was fine. I had to order from a screen and the workers filled orders from a room in the back. It’s no LA, but what is? Either way — remember when weed wasn’t legal? That was such a bitch.

Back at my hotel I set off the fire alarm, because WHAT THE HELL FIRE ALARM GOES OFF FROM A VAPE PEN?! and received a brief verbal lashing. My anxiety was through the roof and I was going to spend a long time worrying about it, but Larry — an old friend from my days at Miami Today — lives in the city and invited me to meet up for drinks.

After some confusion on the green/pink line, we met up at the Morgan station and walked over to The Izakaya in the Fulton Market District. It was a pretty cool place, dimly lit with speakeasy vibes, modeled after the “Yokocho Street Scene of Tokyo” but the company was even better! It’s been dang near 13 years since I’ve seen him face to face, but since we talk fairly regularly via the socials it felt like no time has passed at all. The universe has a weird way of keeping certain people in our lives when so many other friendships slip away, so I’m always grateful for the people who span time with me.

Larry was staying downtown to root for Columbia in the World Cup, but I was BEAT, so I headed back to my hotel for some much needed R and R. After grabbing some snacks from 7-11, I ate an edible, looked over the itinerary for day one of the Academy, and fell asleep to House of the Dragon.

Wednesday, June 24: Academy, Day 1

And girl — with those black out curtains I was about to stay sleeping! Oof! It’s always hard for me to fall asleep in a strange bed, but I sure didn’t want to roll out of it once I did! After hitting snooze five times I was up and soaking in a hot shower around 7:30 a.m. The Academy was in Medill’s downtown office, which was only about two or three blocks from the hotel. I had plenty of time to adjust to Central time and grab a coffee in the lobby on the way in.

I’m always a little nervous about these professional networking type things, but everyone was incredibly friendly and (unlike my first day at Northwestern proper), I felt like I fit right in! Breakfast was from 8:30 a.m. until 9, and we had breakfast bagels with avocado and eggie (mine was sans bacon), yogurt with granola, and fruit. But I only had the sandwich. And also — look at the fun gift bags they had waiting for everyone! I just LOVE that mug and cannot wait to think about Chicago while I drink my morning coffee.

Introductions spanned from 9 a.m. until about 9:45, and they had us interview and introduce each other, which I might start having my J-school students do on day one. I was sat next to Julie — a professor from Cal State, LA — and they knew just about every one in my department! (Small world, much?!) We took a photo together to send to Barb and Teresa, which was so fun for me! They also lives in Long Beach, so here’s hoping I’m one step closer to making a local friend! 🤞 ✊ 🪵

With introductions out of the way we started going over the foundations of solution journalism, its framework, and how to teach it. The program was centered around hands-on, group activities, which helped to drive home the lessons, but also made the sessions go by much quicker than they would have during a straight lecture. We broke for lunch around noon, which was a whole Mediterranean buffet! I was still pretty good from breakfast, but I couldn’t resist a small bowl of rice and falafel with some spicy sauce.

After lunch we discussed how to arm our students with interviewing techniques that would allow them to “complicate the narrative.” Complicating the narrative is a journalism approach that pushes stories beyond simple conflict, villains, and two-sided debates. Instead of framing an issue as Group A versus Group B, it asks reporters to show the deeper tensions, contradictions, motivations, and lived experiences that shape how people understand a problem. We also practiced an interview technique called “looping,” or active listening, during which I made another friend, Dominic, a professor at Howard University.

The next session addressed curriculum development, and required that we split into two information sessions — one on elections and one on crisis reporting. I normally would have went for elections, but the crisis reporting group was set to discuss the current state of immigration enforcement, so I went there instead. California and CSULB has a large immigrant population, and I hope to expand my research into that topic area, so it seemed like a strong fit.

After a quick wrap up, that was it for day one. I headed back to my hotel for a quick break, before meeting the group in the hotel lobby for a “family dinner’ at Beatrix. And it was literally family style! They brought out all of our appetizers and entrées and we just passed the plates right around the table! I don’t get to go out to eat with too many people these days, so it really means a lot to me when I can, even with new friends. We had a green goddess vegetable salad, whipped feta with seeded crackers, and spicy rigatoni al la vodka, and “tall, dark and handsome” chocolate cake! (Which was neither tall or dark. It was handsome though!) The rest of the group also got chicken, but who cares about that?

The Academy was super informative, but the dinner allowed us the time to connect and get to know each other in a real way. In a particularly meaningful moment for me, one of the moderators asked me about my necklace, and I got to share a bit about my momma. It meant a lot to me because it happened to be the anniversary of her passing. I know it was just coincidence, but it really helped me feel like she was sharing a spot with us at the table. On a day when I really wished I could talk to her, talking about her was the most I could ask for, and I was so grateful that I was able to, even with new friends.

I was feeling rather restless back at the hotel, so I brought my laptop down to the bar to have a glass of wine, unwind, and blog about my trip so far. But tomorrow is another long day and early morning, so this is where I will leave you until then. ❤️

Thursday, June 25: Academy, Day 2

I am home again, home again, and ready to finish my update on a trip that only got better with time! The whole trip was incredible, but Thursday and Friday were top tier.

After getting back to my hotel room on Wednesday night, I discovered that my transfer flight out of Denver on Friday had been delayed — by 22.5 HOURS! So while Thursday started with some stress, I was able to get everything (mostly) sorted out. Rather than leaving Chicago on Friday evening, I’d leave on Saturday morning, allowing me to get home on Saturday afternoon, rather than midnight. While I wasn’t happy that I had to book a hotel for an extra night, I was grateful. Spending a full 24 hours at an airport would have been absolutely dreadful. And I’d much rather spend my extra time in Chicago than the Denver airport. (I do want to visit Denver, but not like that.)

Thursday was definitely the highlight of the program for me. I Ubered over from the hotel that morning with a couple of other solutions fellows, grabbed a coffee from the breakfast table, and soon we were gathering as a group to hear from Clare Kirwan, a solutions editor for The Daily Northwestern. Clare talked about how the newsroom’s participation in Solution Journalism Network’s Student Media Challenge reshaped its coverage and strengthened reporters’ relationships with both the campus and the surrounding community. We got to ask her questions, and since I’ll be advising the Long Beach Current‘s editorial team next year I found this session particularly enlightening and informative. It definitely got me ticking about aspects of solutions journalism that I might be able to incorporate into Current coverage.

After chatting with Clare, the fellows split into groups for the “Solutions Pitch Challenge.” The goal was to work together to develop a project, syllabus, story, program, series, or other idea that we could incorporate into our classrooms or curriculum.

I worked with Julie and a professor from Southeast Missouri State University, and together we refined Julie’s idea for a project that could connect journalism classes across all CSU campuses. The idea was that one journalism class on each campus would contribute to a statewide “neighborhood database.” Students would interview five to 10 residents in their neighborhood beats to learn more about the issues currently facing Californians and what residents would like to see done about them. In a way, we imagined creating an “emotional index” of the state. From there, students would use those interviews to report stories about what is being done to address those issues. Eventually, those stories could be incorporated into an interactive map of California. And while California would serve as the model, the system could easily be adapted for other state university systems as well.

We didn’t win, but our project was super well received, and it’s something I’d really like to work with Julie to actually implement in the future. So in a way, I suppose we did win! (The winning team received two one-hour coaching sessions with Sharon Bloyd-Peshkin, training and curriculum manager for the Solutions Journalism Network, and one of the co-leaders of the Academy. Deborah Douglas, a clinical associate professor with Media, Integrated Marketing Communications at Medill’s Northwestern University, also led.)

After the pitch challenge we broke for lunch, which was Mexican — YUM! Black beans and rice didn’t miss me!

Next up was my favorite part of the entire program — a tour of Bronzeville via Mahogany Tours, led by Shermann “Dilla” Thomas. Dilla was funny, passionate, wildly knowledgeable, and devoted to telling real stories about the city — especially the South Side, where he’s from. The tour emphasized how Chicago has shaped way more of American culture than people realize. Or, as he says it:” everything dope about America comes from Chicago.” I knew that part before the tour, but I learned a ton during the two-ish hours we spent with him. (Like how he was in the dog house with his wife after buying $800 Jay Z tickets. That made me feel better about the money I was spending this trip, for sure!)

Our first stop, and my favorite stop, was Quinn Chapel, “the emancipation congregation.” It began in 1844 as a small prayer group of seven people and later became Chicago’s first Black congregation. Over the years, it was more than a church — it was a gathering place, an abolitionist space, and a stop connected to the Underground Railroad. The original church was destroyed in the Great Chicago Fire, but the congregation kept going. Since the 1890s, Quinn Chapel has stood at 24th and Wabash in Bronzeville, making it one of the most important Black-owned historic spaces in the city. And even though it was a bus tour, we got to stop and go inside.

Other highlights of the tour included driving by Ida B. Wells house, as well as the new Obama Presidential Center. We even got to stop by Hyde Park to check out Obama’s digs, which was kind of cool for me, since I often reported on his trips in and out of the city when I was covering politics for Medill Reports Chicago. We got to get out here for some pictures, and as you can see it’s still all gated up, even when he’s not in town.

Back at the Academy, we wrapped things up by brainstorming the people, places, and institutions we would want to highlight on our own local tours. The entire experience made me excited to learn more about Long Beach and Los Angeles. When I fell in love with Chicago, I fell in love with its history, which I was constantly learning more about through Medill. I’d like to learn just as much about LA, so I can take that same kind of pride in my city and hopefully inspire it in my students as well.

I walked back to the hotel with Julie, and after calling Frontier and booking a hotel near the airport for the next night, I headed back down to the hotel bar in the hopes of running into some people from the program. (They all met there before dinner the evening prior and I missed out, so I suppose I had some FOMO.) No one ever came down, but I did meet a local named D, whose birthday is two days apart from mine and who bought me a birthday drink, even though it’s still June. At this point I was also starting to make friends with the staff, which I always do when traveling. This group was super cool, so even though I didn’t see any journalism faculty, I still had a great time unwinding a bit after a busy day.

But I was in Chicago, BABY, and you know I had to get out and into that city! I let my legs carry me all around Millennium Park. Because are you even in Chicago if you don’t take a selfie at the Bean? I told myself I wasn’t going to act like a tourist this trip, but there I was. There was a concert going on at the time, so I had such a time just walking around and vibing in the city that I love and have missed so much.

After picking up a charger for my vape from Target (the disposable ones never last through the full thing), I was HUNGRY, and there was one place on the top of my list.

I hopped on the red line and made my way to the The Chicago Diner in Lakeview, where I ordered chicken fried steak with veggies, mashed potatoes and gravy. I know what you’re thinking. “WHAT?! But you’re a vegetarian?” And yes — I still am! The Chicago Diner is 100 percent vegan and vegetarian! I had LOADS to choose from and had a hard time deciding on just one thing. I was tempted to go back the next day, but there are so many good places in Chicago to explore that I talked myself out of it.

I also loved that The Chicago Diner was in the heart of Boystown, so I got to walk through some very queer safe spaces, which made the evening all the more perfect for me. (Did you know that Boystown is the oldest officially recognized gay neighborhood in the United States? If not, you do now.)

Back at the hotel I passed Dominic having a drink and working at the bar, so I immediately brought my laptop down to work right along aside him. I wasn’t really working, but I was distracting, so we made some pretty good friendship! We were really chatting it up, and I just love that! Dominic is also in his third year, and I hope to see/work with him in the future. (I’ve already connected with several Academy fellows on LinkedIn, and I’m hopeful those connections will continue beyond the week. I usually hate networking, but this whole experience was only positive!)

Thursday was the final day of the program, so back in my hotel room I made plans for how I was going to spend my bonus evening in Chicago. Life handed me a lemon, and I was gonna make some dang lemonade!

Friday, June 26: Shameless in Chicago

It was the first morning I got to sleep in, but I also had to check out of my hotel room at 11 a.m. Since I had a full day planned and did not want to cart around my suitcase the entire time, I ended up leaving it at the hotel, to pick up at the end of the day, before I headed to the airport.

I bought tickets for the Art Institute of Chicago before I even left LA, and that was first on my agenda for Friday. I knew I could spend my entire day there, so I made sure to get there as soon as they opened. Luckily they also opened at 11, so everything timed up perfectly. I even ran into Julie on the elevator out! It was very, “See ya in Long Beach!”

The Art Institute was just a short walk from my hotel, and even though I arrived shortly after 11 a.m. it was already pretty crowded. I started in the basement with the photography and miniatures and worked my way up to the modern wing on the third floor. I did my best to see everything, but I quickly found that to be impossible, as the institute is MASSIVE. It’s definitely a place you could go to again and again and always discover something new. But I had a list of things I knew I wanted to see, and I checked every single one off my list. Well, sans one. I somehow missed The Great Wave by Katsushika Hokusai (1830–33). Next time! An extremely brief list of the things I did catch:

• Nighthawks — Edward Hopper, 1942
• American Gothic — Grant Wood, 1930
• A Sunday on La Grande Jatte — Georges Seurat, 1884–86
• Self-Portrait — Vincent van Gogh, 1887
• The Bedroom — Vincent van Gogh, 1889 (and others)
• Haystacks (Effect of Snow and Sun) — Claude Monet, 1891
• Water Lilies — Claude Monet, 1906 (and others)
• The Old Guitarist — Pablo Picasso, 1903–04 (and others)
• Nightlife — Archibald John Motley Jr., 1943
• Liz #3 — Andy Warhol, 1963 (and others)
• Inventions of Monsters — Salvador Dali, 1937
• A Chemist Lifting with Extreme Precaution the Cuticle of a Grand Piano — Salvador Dali, 1936 (and others)
• The Willem de Kooning exhibit
• The Thorne Miniature Rooms

I took a ton of photos, so check out the slideshow. Note — my little iPhone cannot compare to seeing any of this in person. It kept bringing me back to the art history classes I took at JMU.

I spent three hours touring the galleries, but I very easily could have spent three days there. I think I was most surprised by how much I enjoyed the miniatures. They were a collection of tiny, incredibly detailed interiors created by Narcissa Niblack Thorne in the 1930s. Built at a 1:12 scale, the rooms trace European and American design history, but they also feel like little story worlds, with no people inside so visitors can imagine who might live there and what just happened before they walked in. At least I did.

By the time I left the Art Institute I was pretty dang hungry, so I ended up stopping by a spot called Hot Wok, Cool Sushi on Michigan Avenue on the way to the L. I ordered a MegaVega roll — tempura sweet potato and broccoli, red beets and sliced cucumbers, topped with sliced avocado, drizzled with wasabi mayo and sweet soy sauce. And it was absolutely DELICIOUS! It’s fun to discover new places on a whim like that, and I am very rarely disappointed when I just go where my feet lead me.

My next stop was the Lincoln Park Zoo, which I used to visit all the time when I was a local. It’s completely free to the public and has a pretty diverse collection of animals. I’ve always had a great time there, and this trip was no different.

I got there via the brown line and my own two feet. Unfortunately, the park was closing early that day for an event, so I only had about 45 minutes to take in as much as I could. The primate houses were already closed, which was a bummer, but I still got to check out some pretty cool critters, including a snow leopard, flamingos, zebras, Japanese macaques, and a lynx. And probably some other stuff too that I am forgetting.

My dogs were a barking at this point in the day, so I grabbed horchata from Starbucks, sat and enjoyed the scenery for a few minutes before jumping back onto the brown line for my last big stop before collecting my things and heading to dinner. I try to sit outside and enjoy a coffee everywhere I go, so I’m glad that I found time to do that this trip as well, even if they day was a bit overcast.

I was super excited about my next stop, so before I knew it I was back on the brown line, and then the pink line, which brought me to Chicago West Side. Aka — the filming location for the hit Showtime show Shameless. LET’S GOOOOO!!

Shameless didn’t really pick up until I was out of Chicago, and I didn’t watch it until I was in Athens, but DANG did I fall in love once I did! I binged it during the Pandemic, and I’ve been dying to go and check out the shooting locations ever since. And on Friday, I made it happen!

It was a short walk from the train to the Gallagher house, and I was lucky enough to catch the owner right on his front porch. He had a little sign up asking for $5 to take a photo on the porch, and I was obviously more than happy to take him up on the offer! He was super friendly, and even told me about other nearby shooting locations that I could easily walk to on the way back to my train — including V and Kevin’s house, which was two doors down, and Sheila’s, which was just a couple of blocks away! Dang, do I love Chicagoans! I took loads of photos, so make sure to check out the full slideshow below! (Side note — the owner said that he’s owned this property since the 1980s. I told him that I hoped the show gave him some good money and he said it wasn’t bad.)

I made it back to my hotel around 6:30 p.m. to grab my stuff and charge my phone, which was very nearly spent. I had a glass of wine and said my goodbyes to the hotel staff while I waited for Larry to get back into town, as we had agreed to meet up for some Indian food near the airport. He picked me up at the Grand station at 7:45 p.m. and drove us over to Thalaiva’s Indian Kitchen for dinner.

And this food was banging, y’all! Sierra and Becca told me that they always get Indian food when they are in Chicago, and now I am see why! I’m going to start doing the same, because this was some of the best Indian food I’ve ever had! I ordered the mushroom masala and garlic naan, Larry let me have one of his veggie samosas, and all of it was SO GOOD!! And the company wasn’t so bad either! As I said earlier, I very rarely get the opportunity to share a meal these days, so I’m always grateful when I have an opportunity to break bread with a friend. Or in this case, naan.

After dinner Larry dropped me off at my hotel — the Red Lion Inn and Suites near O’Hare International. I checked in around 9:30 p.m. and promptly rolled into bed with this week’s episode of Drag Race All Stars. My flight out the next morning was early, so I wanted to try to get as much sleep as possible. And I was super grateful that I would not be spending the night (and all the next day) in the Denver airport.

Saturday, June 27: Home again, home again!

I did not get a lick of sleep, but I did get some solid rest in before catching an Uber to O’Hare at 5 a.m. (I have a terrible time sleeping in any bed that is not my own, and hotels are always hard for me, especially on day one. The hotel was clean and comfortable, the problem was entirely on me. I laid in bed and listened to House of the Dragon for six hours.)

My flight left O’Hare around 7 a.m. and I arrived in Las Vegas shortly after 9:00 a.m., with the time travel and all that. I had a 3.5 hour lay over, which was annoying, but not nearly as annoying as 22.5 hours. Whenever I started to get grumpy I just reminded myself and instantly felt better about where I was at. Luckily the airport wasn’t too busy at that hour, so I was able to find an open desk/table. I just sat up with my computer the whole time, drifting around on Reddit and eating leftover Indian. (Becca — if you are reading this, do not judge me! It was FINE.)

My flight from Vegas to LAX was only about 45 minutes and there was no one in the middle seat, so that was just about perfect. (I got the aisle for both flights back.) I was nervous for a moment though, because before we took off one of the flight attendants said that she “hoped we would not have to abort the flight, like yesterday.” I guess there was excessively high heat and heavy winds, which made flying over the mountains particularly difficulty. Luckily our flight went off without a hitch, because I was going to lose my mind if I had ANOTHER unexpected delay. (The power of positive thinking only gets me so far! Unless that plane was “aborting” to a time traveling island, get me home! LOST, anyone? “We have to go back!” I think of it every time I fly.)

LAX is huge, so getting out of it is always a multi-step process, but after busing to terminal one, and then busing from there to the LAX Metro Center, I was able to board a train to downtown LA, where I transferred to a train to Long Beach, where I called an Uber to take me to my apartment. I landed in LAX around 2:30 p.m., and I was home just before 5. I probably could have made it home quicker if I Ubered straight from the airport, but I could not justify paying $65-$75 plus a tip when I could get home on $1.75, plus a $20 Uber. (Because you can’t Uber anywhere for less than $20 in Los Angeles County.) I could have parked at the airport, but that’s about as expensive as Ubering anyway. And I really don’t mind a train.

My favorite part of this day was getting home to my sweet Lemon! I booked a sitter on Rover again, so she was well taken care of and I received tons of updates throughout my trip, but I still missed her so dang much, especially at night and in the mornings. She covered me in kisses, and after I took a (cold) shower, we we took a nice long walk together. (And yep. I came home after a day of travel stinky and to NO HOT WATER. They were in the process of fixing it, but I couldn’t wait. What a kick in the head!)

In other life updates — Jeremy and I secured another publication with Electronic News! (Go us!) This one is titled Reddit in the Bay Area: How Two Journalism Organizations Use Reddit, and we actually presented this one at at AEJMC last year. And speaking of AEJMC — we’ll be back in August, BABY!! Jeremy and I had a paper and a poster accepted, and our paper won a second-place faculty award! NOLA, BABY!! I’ve never won a real award before, so I’m super excited and super proud of us.

And I’m even more excited, because in just 18 days Yontz, Adami, and Meg will be in Cali for our friends trip!! Yontz, Jess, and I all have July birthdays, so we’re going to have a party at Joshua Tree and then swing back to LB/LA for five days of friendship! We have so much fun stuff planned, but I’m most excited to just span some time with three of my truest friends. ❤️❤️❤️ To quote RuPaul in To Wong Foo, “I’m so excited I could just spit!”

That’s all for now, but expect to hear a lot more from me this summer! I’m sure grateful for all the great things and people in my life. Someone pinch me! I’m living a dream!