Vienna, Virginia

I started law school three weeks after returning from the Peace Corps in a remote village in Burkina Faso, and I thought that nothing - no course of study, no group of people in Boston (no matter how nice), no comfortable house with electricity and running water - could possibly be as rewarding. Worse, I pictured lawyers as people who make deals while playing golf. I knew I did not want to be that kind of lawyer, but I thought the skills I would learn would help me to advance my longstanding commitment to social change.

Contrary to my bleak predictions, law school was an unparalleled experience. For the first time, I felt I was learning a practical tool that could make a real difference in peoples' lives. As I completed courses and internships, I connected with lawyers whose values mirrored my own and whose lives were spent fighting for justice. I was privileged to be at Northeastern, which has a strong public interest focus, because law school only added to my passion and excitement about social justice work. The support I felt at every step was invaluable.

Food Politics by Marion Nestle is a well-researched reminder about why government accountability is so crucial; Pedagogy of the Oppressed by Paolo Friere prevents feeling that the world can never change; Nine Hills to Nambonkaha by Sarah Erdman is the Peace Corps memoir I wish I had written.

www.alternet.org and www.commondreams.org - progressive news and political commentary
www.theppk.com - vegan recipes that rock (particularly the cupcakes)
http://www.bikeblog.blogspot.com/ - a great blog about urban bicycling

I never managed to get my heart out of Africa. Youssou N’Dour, Angelique Kidjo and Salif Keita have made it to the U.S., and I love them and their success, but the lesser knowns too— Magic System, Ayano, Extra Musica, Brenda, Meiway, Yeleen and, most of all, the drummers in my village.

“I would like to leave behind me the conviction that if we maintain a certain amount of caution and organization we deserve victory…You cannot carry out fundamental change without a certain amount of madness. In this case, it comes from nonconformity, the courage to turn your back on the old formulas, the courage to invent the future. It took the madmen of yesterday for us to be able to act with extreme clarity today. I want to be one of those madmen. . . . We must dare to invent the future.” - Thomas Sankara, former president of Burkina Faso, August 21, 1983.