Labor Day weekend 2016, I took a big step in my personal and professional development: I moved (temporarily) out of my parents’ house to pursue a master’s degree in marketing at Northwestern. It’s a huge adjustment!

Northwestern is located north of Chicago, Illinois, a city known for deep-dish pizza and the largest population of Polish people outside of Warsaw. For graduate school, I recognized that I had a hard time focusing at home on my personal projects, I can’t imagine the difficulty I would have on projects that have accountability. In addition, graduate school is a great opportunity to see a different place. I had never spent considerable time west of Pennsylvania, so I was pretty pumped.

I was excited, but not in that butterflies-in-your-tummy way. Anxious describes the feeling better. New city, new cohort, new everything. I went from living in a one bedroom apartment with my parents, to a studio by myself. The amount of accountability was a bit jarring, but I’ve adjusted. Having your own space that you set up provides a sense of pride. That’s not to say I didn’t contribute to my house back home, but it’s a different sense of responsibility for when you create something. I’ve spent too much time doing laundry and vacuuming, but streamlining those processes will happen eventually. The opportunity to reconnect with my love of cooking, however, has been so welcome and maybe I’ll start Instagramming my creations. Maybe.

At first, I was a brat about being alone. But I got used to it, I think. I did so much creative development and finished a whole bunch of reading. I’ve also taken time to explore Chicago. Millennium Park and The Cloud Gate were the touristy thing, but I took some time to make new friends and go out to Boystown. One of my favorite day excursions was to Andersonville. La Colombe coffee is there, some great clothing shopping, and even an indie bookshop called Women and Children First. I still have a lot of exploring to do in Evanston, but that can be saved for study groups during the school year.

That being said, I can’t promise many posts since classes start Monday and I heard this program at Northwestern is no joke. Wish me luck!

Happy moving,
Jo