Pre-Flight

In less than 10 hours I will be on my way to Sweden yet again. I probably should be trying to sleep, and I am a little tired, but I promised myself I'd write a blog entry before I left. There's a lot of stuff I should have done before now as far as contacting people, but obviously none of it is of extreme urgency. In fact, once I got my passport back from Migrationsverket, booked a flight to Sweden and made living arrangements in Stockholm, everything just became so unstressful. I did everything I *needed* to do and now the only things left are little things I ought to have done sooner. Oh well.
I'm surprised by how not nervous I am. I suppose it might have to do with the fact that I travel so frequently that the process of packing my bags becomes routine enough that I don't worry about it now. Of course, it might also be the fact that I rarely stress out until incredibly late in the game, at which point I'm too busy to be stressed. I'm not even all that hyped up about it. I mean, I am very happy and very proud of myself for all that I've done to get myself this far and I'm eagerly anticipating getting some answers to my important questions once I'm there. But when one thinks about how one should feel when the dream they've been working toward for a year is about to come true, my own internal state of mind is very calm. Is that being in "the zone"? Even the thought that given the relative scarcity of information on my topic I may very well be one of the names people cite on Swedish immigration doesn't give me quite the giddy thrill I feel it ought to. I will say though I am very much looking forward to saying for the first time in my life "Business" when asked if my reason for entering Sweden is business or pleasure (though I will definitely be aiming for both as long as I'm there).
I'll do my best to keep you folks up to date on the goings-on in Stockholm, but the real juicy ethnographic findings will be posted on a secret online journal that only my EFS class can see. It would be a breach of professional ethics to let anyone else in on the particulars, I'm afraid, so you'll have to make due with the tourist/student's account of things.

God natt, and see you on the other side!