27 Luni

As anyone likely to be reading this blog already knows, I will be shipping off for a twenty-seven month tour with the Peace Corps; serving in the Eastern European country of Romania. Many of you have expressed an interest in being kept abreast of this adventure; thus 27 Luni has been born (Thanks to Tim for your assistance in making this possible).

The intention of this initial post is to lay the ground work for this blog and to set some expectations. 1) I offer no guarantee of frequent posting, though I will endeavor to post, at minimum, monthly. 2) This blog is not intended to be a literary work of genius. Though I promise to run a quick spell check before publishing, I will inevitably have grammatical mistakes. Please shoot me a quick email if you see any egregiously bad English. After all, my Peace Corps charge will be teaching English as a second language. 3) The purpose of this blog, in my mind, is to chronicle the events of the next twenty-seven months (luni). Although I hope you find some value in the future content of this blog, I offer no promise of any true inspiration, just the facts and some analysis of the experience. 4) Please feel free to email, or post questions. If there are particular aspects of Romanian life or culture that you are interested in learning more about, let me know and I will do my best to accommodate your request in a future post.

Okay, on to some actual content. The best way I can think of to introduce this blog is by addressing one of the most commonly asked questions about this endeavor: “Why are you doing this?”

As Daniel Craig’s character, Mr. X, says in one of my favorite movies, Layer Cake: “That’s an expansive question.” There are many reasons that have commingled to influence this new path I’m taking. I won’t pretend that there is some singular, enormously selfless or altruistic drive influencing me to drop everything and volunteer my time to save the world. Though, I do believe in the Peace Corps’, first of three, missions; to “Help the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.” Having said that, there are a lot of events taking place that I find to be unsettling; Americas involvement in the wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Libya, the growing divide and ineptness among our politicians in the United States, the worsening reality of our education system and the sensationalism of today’s media, just to name a few. As Mahatma Ghandi said “Be the change you want to see in the world.” These contemporary challenges, though daunting, won’t change themselves. Only through education and action on the part of the populous can we hope to improve things. It’s my hope that through Peace Corps service, I can have a small positive impact on the less fortunate and to help improve America’s global image.

On another note, put simply, I needed a career change. In Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning, the author notes that the purpose of life is a life of purpose (Thanks Ashley for the lend). Although I’ve had a rewarding career as a Sales Professional and met a lot of great people, there is very little positive moral impact to the world in selling widgets. The thought of spending the rest of my life in a claustrophobic cubicle making cold calls was more than I could bear. So what better way to launch a new career than by starting on the ground level of foreign service in the Peace Corps.

Two weeks from today my plane will land in Bucharest and this new adventure will finally get started. I hope you’ll join me in spirit and through following this blog.