Started out for the ends of the Earth today, but my mode of transportation proved incapable of meeting the challenge. It was a good day to leave here, and I wanted to keep going. Just as well I couldn't I guess; I have homework to do and other obligations now. But I think I will try again on Sunday in a different car.

I'm in school.

I have a job.

Much of last week was spent lobbying for entry into the introductory stats series for psychology graduate students. I wrote letters proclaiming myself genius and when the instructor expressed doubt regardless, I came back again more confident than ever. It felt like a bunch of lies. I was afraid of being found out and suffered much anxiety over it.

My wish was granted provided I could commit to the entire sequence, which ends in March. In a flash, I accepted: Of course I will commit. Even as he handed me the entry codes he said, "I'm concerned about your math skills...."

Time to put feet on the ground. Girl, stop spinning your wheels. Park the damn bike already. Paradise can only be reached if the plane lands. The crash has to be risked. Oh, the descent makes me feel ill. The water below looks so far away from this flexing thin plank of fiberglass. Gosh, the lights are so much brighter up here. All those people below, they're screaming at me: Jump! Come on Helen! It'll be over in a second! A row of them there on the side, standing in the gutter. All of them hairy, but none like that guy who must weigh well over 225 and whose mass over my body held me underwater for the full twenty-five yards I tugged him to safety. I saw through the clear plastic of leaky goggles the long hairs on his shoulders reaching toward the surface like kelp, straightening and slackening in cadence with the pull and slow of my scissor kick. There he is: You can do it Helen! I'll fail if I don't jump. I can only do it if I hold myself tight, close my eyes and scream. I hold him tight, close my eyes and scream as he pulls back on the accelerator: I think I'm going to fall.

Falling.

A door has closed.

Day before yesterday I hit bottom. I've hit bottom more than once in the last three years. The thing is, the journey covers diverse terrain and the varied topography hurts in different ways. I reached for a spoon in a drawer in this apartment but what I saw instead was an open drawer containing my silverware at home in Korea. Slippers. Pillows. Oil lamp. Towels. Clothes. I will not use that washer again. I won't wash out that rug. Tea cups. Dishes four nights a week. How long will I carry my passport in my backpack? 78-3. Air conditioned 46. Leaning into the curve, rocking to toes then back onto heels on 83-1. I'm using my subway pass, my chongekkwon, as a bookmark. As clear as day, my books on their shelves appear before me; I can feel the unique texture of each under my sweeping fingers.

Ohh, I didn't know it would be like this.

Sudden and uexpected fatigue the second day of lecture. I focused on gigantic projected graphs to ward off the tears. I did cry later. After that I choked down tears again with my dinner, sitting against a wall in a restaurant, staring out across families dining together. I had a job interview directly afterwards. I couldn't gain the necessary composure and I was lucky they had already decided to hire me.