New beginnings

Finally, a beginning. After 8 months of preparing to go and a week of saying goodbye to my friends, family, home and cat, things are finally in motion. I am now at the US post where I will be spending the next couple of weeks in training for the sandbox. Today was an uneventful day of flying, doing a ton of paperwork inprocessing, and now I am waiting to meet up with a few fellow CSHers to head to dinner. I have to admit that I am actually excited to be here. Today was the start of something new- a new job, a new place, new faces, a new mission... and a new challenge to be met over the next 16 months or so. I am actually happy to be here- let's hope my optimism does not quickly fade away.