Another Year, New Goals

Each year I set a number of goals in the same spirit that so many set New Year’s Resolutions. Occasionally, I’m lucky enough fulfill some of these goals after putting in some hard work. 

Goal #1: Complete my PhD in Civil Engineering. It’s been a good ride. In fact, I’ve spent more years at Penn State than any other school (I transferred to Chatham at the end of my freshman year). But now the desire to see what’s outside is growing ever so strongly. I’d like to fully enter the working world or even, heck, try my hand at medicine. But I can’t do any of these things until I wrap up the program that I’m in.

Goal #2: Continue to make better choices about what I eat. Trading a soda for a glass of water or packing a lighter lunch from what I’ve got at home instead of being tempted by the deep fried goodness at the hospital cafeteria. This serves two life-long goals: health and financial stewardship. 

Goal #3: Make plans to get out and see more of the area I live in. It’s difficult to know what the future holds and while we’re happy in West Virginia, life’s a long, strange road. Some folks that I know seem content to write off entire swaths of land or genres of activities if they’ve seen or done something like it once, doing less of that is a good thing for me. 

Goal #4: Learn about ways to improve my financial health long-term. Nearly being out from under the burden of student loans, I can anticipate having an extra few hundred dollars each month in the near future. Sure, that can buy me some clothes or nice dinners, but there are simple, low-risk ways to start putting that money to work. It would be nice to have a down-payment on a new home in the bank or even begin preparing for the time when I’m not going to want to have to work anymore.

Goal #5: Spend more of my time with friends doing things we enjoy. We don’t spend our time like we did in college, we’ve got spouses, kids, jobs, and other obligations that mean fewer opportunities to congregate in one place, in our pajamas, to binge watch Arrested Development. But going out to a nice restaurant, a weekend camping trip, or even taking a pizza over to a friend’s house for an hour or so of fellowship are feasible despite these changes.

Life, Downstream

It is said that the birthplace of rivers is in Pocahontas County, West Virginia because eight rivers flow out of the county and none flow in. One of those is the Greenbrier River. If you find yourself along this river you will come across signs that say “we all live downstream.” For this river, that is quite literal. The Greenbrier River is a tributary of the New River, which is a tributary of the Kanawha River, which is a tributary of the Ohio River, which is a tributary of the Mississippi River, which flows into the Gulf of Mexico.

I have always had a passion for transportation and movement. When asked what I wanted to be when I was a little girl I would confidently tell people I wanted to be an airplane pilot. It never failed to catch people by surprise. After a family road trip when I was about five and my dad handed me a road atlas, I was hooked for life. The lines on the map all spoke to me: there were stories, experiences, and knowledge there. The lines on the map linked everything together.

I have spent my life on the road or immersing myself in the field of transportation. It is endlessly interesting to me how stuff gets on store shelves and how states manage their road networks. Of particular interest to me is road safety. Roadway fatalities and injuries perhaps move me the most. Unlike any disease, measures can be taken to entirely prevent roadway fatalities and injuries. It can be done and I look up to the people who make this their mission.

In pursuit of the dream of a better and safer transportation network life has presented me with opportunities, challenges, and experiences that I will share using this medium. Some with be fundamentally linked to transportation, others not so much.

We all live downstream, and this is Life Downstream.

New River at Fayette Station Road (Fayette County, WV), February 2009