Sisterly Paths

Sitting in Sustainability Research Methods we were talking about the importance of taking a step back to understand cultures. Its also just before Thanksgiving break and I joked that our professor was preparing us for the family holiday party conversations. It dawned on me, as it has a few times before, that my sister and I are very similar, but are moving towards opposite career paths. My sister is the right hand person for an oil tycoon, something like the son of the owner of Cumberland Farms. And I am about to get my bachelor’s degree in Sustainability Studies, for the environment, with a minor in Economics.

My hippie parents, a chemist and an antique dealer, brought two girls up, one to work for an oil tycoon another to work for protecting the environment. But we are also still very alike, and get along better now than ever before.

Four Leaf Clovers - A message from the universe

November 1, 2013

I have found four leaf clovers my whole life, for some reason I have been consistently finding a lot more this year. I’m pretty sure the 2 that I found today make it about 20 already in my life, and I’m only 21. Years ago when I had told my mom of how I find them, tape them, and put them in my wallet for good luck, she asked me how I knew to do this. I replied that I didn’t know, I just do it. My mother then told me how her father, my grandfather who was Irish, would do the exact same thing. He died before I was born, but I told myself that the next time I found one I was going to get a tattoo of one on my ankle. That way I’ll have it with me always and maybe the universe could start spreading the luck to others. Since I got the tattoo I’ve been finding them more and more, so I give them to friends or simply the woman walking by that saw my pick it out of the ground. I had a dream of finding a 5-leaf clover and about a week later I found one. Every time I find one I feel like its the universe telling me I’m on the right path and I have family watching over me, wishing me luck in my endeavors.

Before I find one, every time without exception, I happen to be thinking of finding one before hand, or who I will be giving my next one to. So far I’ve found four leaf clovers in my home town - Wingdale, Virginia, at my 1st house on Homestead Ave in Albany, on RPI’s campus… I have given the clovers I find to my parents, my sister, Elizabeth - my manager who I’m grateful for at the Country Club of Troy, Moe - a girl I work with at the Country Club who had always wanted one, Kim - who called dibbs on the next one for luck with her divorce and moving, to my ex Justin, to my current boyfriend Kevin, to my roommate Dan, the 1st I found in our backyard I pinned to the house’s corkboard on Homestead - our house is called “Woodbury”, to Emily whom I mailed to as thanks for giving me my tree of life necklace before she left the Country Club to go back to college, to Krista on our way back home from our North Carolina field trip the summer of 2013… I think that covers it so far.

Actually, the finding of the clovers really started this year right before leaving for that roadtrip to North Carolina with Krista. I found on in my parents’ driveway before leaving for her house, then I found one in Virginia, and another after coming back home. Then the 4th of July was coming and I was going to a Rondout Valley Resort Reunion with my bestfriend Amanda and others and I decided it was about time to get that tattoo. By this point I had found 3 before the end of the month in which I said that the next four leaf clover I find I’m getting a tattoo of one. So I got my four leaf clover on my ankle in New Paltz on July 3, 2013 with Amanda and her boyfriend Kamou. It just felt right, and every time I look at it, it still feels perfect.