Archive Blog of Tomás L. Monzón 2008-2013

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Greyhound Bus Lines, Inc.

My mom and my sister looking on as my bus departs.

In good-old fashioned American spirit, I am not only on a trip hundreds of miles away from home (Miami to Tallahassee, the capital of the Sunshine State), I am also about to write a blog post (complete with pictures) on the experience it was getting here in the first place.

For several reasons, bringing my own, or being delivered in a, motor vehicle was not an option for this week-long trip, during which I am residing, free of cost, at Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University for a journalism workshop sponsored and funded by the Dow Jones Industrial Fund and NBC Universal. Talk about a hookup.

The bus ride over was ... substandard. Cramped seating and awkwardness with the person seated next to me were characteristic of the voyage, but besides that, it would've been OK had it not been for my post-scriptural discovery that I could've made an express reservation for only $5 more, which would've landed me a seat aboard one of Greyhound's new buses equipped with extra legroom, Wi-Fi, and power outlets! And I thought I'd done my research.

The trajectory.

The one thing that I did feel throughout the entire trip was an unmatched sense of independence closely tied to the premises of the spirit of the American traveler. I finally felt like one of the kids in those movies about runaways that scrape up thirty or forty bucks and take the next bus to the next state with their only luggage being an oversize carry-on.

Not that I'm running away, though, of course.

I'll update the blog with the results of the workshop - which promises to be much more rewarding than the bus ride to and fro - at the end of the week!

Friday, June 22, 2012

Research, Journalist v. Writer, and Staying

30 Rock (Photo credit: Arbron)

Andy Rooney (Photo credit: billypalooza)

Big news! I was planning to leave the United States to continue studying to my immigration status, but thanks to Obama's newly announced executive order, where in those who entered the country under the age of 16, are presently under 30, and have distinguished themselves through military or academic excellence (and who have no criminal record) will be given a two-year deportation deferral (i.e. temporary protected status, IMHO) and work permits in the coming weeks.

Sounds great! But what my family and friends will never understand is the psychological toll this news had on me when I first heard of it. Imagine how much of a system shock it is to go from having to leave the country to continue pursuing an education - essentially, to be exiled, if you want to put it in dramatic terms - to simply being told, "no, you should stay here". I mean, yeah, it's a good thing, but it's not easy to chow down. Also, the fact that I'm staying here means I'm no longer doing something different from everyone else, which gave me a sense of uniqueness and achievement in and of itself.

Official photographic portrait of US President Barack Obama (born 4 August 1961; assumed office 20 January 2009) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

On top of all this, I've been having career choice troubles! For long, I've been deadset on becoming an investigative journalist. But as I've grown up and fallen in love with things as disparate from one another as the hit NBC comedy 30 Rock versus the idea of driving a city bus, the stubbornness has faded and given way to contemplation. Yes that's right, I'm stuck between being a journalist and being a writer and being a bus driver. Imagine that.

I spend a lot of time on the computer, as I'm sure many people do. But every person does something different in that time. Most kids my age watch Youtube videos, play MMORPGs, etc. Well, in an attempt to seem more intellectual than I really am, I spend my time doing research on a wide variety of subjects, from deciphering based rapper Lil B The Based God's lyrics to understanding why Andy Rooney was so popular in the first place (RIP, Rooney).

In the meantime, summer has been very busy. In difference to other summers, this one has proven to be an interesting poutpourri of wanting to be independent, wanting to get laid, wanting to find a job, and wanting to live everyday like it's the last day of summer.

'Til next time!