March Madness

Remember how excited I was for February?  Well, it did not pan out exactly how I thought it would.  All I want now is for it to be March.  I know that it sounds like I am just wishing time away, but this time I mean it!  By the end of March, I will FINALLY know ALL my college decisions.  Even though I know in my heart that almost all my decisions will be rejections, the unknown is honestly more painful than the rejection letters.  I received one rejection letter in November, and it was such a relief.  I was not upset.  It felt so wonderful to finally know the result of my application and to be able to finally stop thinking about it.  I was physically shaking each day the week before the decision came out, and I was so glad when it was all over.  I finally was able to move on.

The end of March will bring fifteen separate decisions, which seems surreal since I have not heard any news regarding college decisions for months.  Even if all but one are rejections, I will finally be able to relax.  The stress of not knowing has been getting worse and worse, making it so hard to focus on anything else.  I am trying to distract myself with school and activities and projects that need to get done, but I find myself constantly checking college portals for no reason, secretly hoping I will be able to glean something out of the mundane information contained such as my name and the college within the university that I applied to.  

Thirteen years of schooling has led to this moment.  March, typically the most boring month of the year, will actually be the most interesting/exciting/terrifying month of possibly my entire life up until this point.  I know I sound dramatic and that one day I will look back at all of this and laugh, but this is how it feels right now.  Hopefully I will be able to buy myself a college sweatshirt soon.

Iowa Caucuses

The Iowa Caucuses are over and the presidential candidates are now moving on to campaigning near our homes in New Hampshire for the New Hampshire primary.  The Iowa Caucuses were full of suspense and surprises from both the Republicans and Democrats.

On the Republican side, Ted Cruz emerged the victor leaving Donald Trump in second.  And as tweeted by Trump once “No one remembers who came in second”.  Marco Rubio came in third.  I predicted months ago, long before the Caucus, that Marco Rubio would surge ahead.  I still think he will eventually become the Republican nominee as I thought months ago.  Cruz winning Iowa is unsurprising considering his following and relationship with evangelical Christians there.  I also think Trump’s second place is just the beginning of his decline.  While Marco Rubio did well coming in third, he still did not win.  If you just watched his speech after the Caucuses, however; you would have thought he had won.  

On the Democrat side, I sat on the edge of my seat as the results from precinct after precinct trickled in.  The race in Iowa could not have been closer.  As more and more results came in, the race became tighter and tighter.  It went from 51% for Hillary Clinton and 49% for Bernie Sanders to 50% for Hillary Clinton and 50% for Bernie Sanders.  The closest they became was Hillary Clinton ahead by approximately 3 delegate equivalents (different than actual delegates) with a 0.2% lead.  The race was too close to call, and the final results were not called until the next day, but Hillary Clinton’s campaign decided to declare themselves the winners the night of when the race was too close to call which surprised everyone.  And then in the middle of Ted Cruz’s speech, Hillary Clinton began her speech.  The networks were as bewildered as I was by these choices.  Twitter meanwhile was abuzz that some precincts were deciding the winner by a coin flip; it was that close!  In the end Hillary Clinton eked out a win in Iowa by the smallest of margins, but both candidates will receive about the same number of delegates.  It is not a winner takes all situation so it is not extremely important who won when the margins are so close.  In the end, Hillary Clinton will receive 23 delegates and Bernie Sanders will receive 21 delegates.  

I am excited to see what happens next in the New Hampshire primaries, and then in our own primary on Super Tuesday.