Oakcrest: My Love :)

This past summer I worked at Oakcrest LDS Girls camp. You may be wondering why at the end of November I would be finally writing a blog about it, and honestly I don’t know what stirred me to this but I am stirred. I should be moving more stuff out of my apartment and into my car for my trip home this weekend but I am not. Instead I am sitting in the middle of my floor thinking about the single greatest experience I’ve have thus far in my life. This past summer has been truly miraculous.
Looking back at what led me to Oakcrest I can’t help but be grateful to the Lord for the blessings and guiding He so lovingly offered me. I truly was ready to jump on a plane and go somewhere exciting and new once again. And believe me I tried, but one plan after another fell though. I was frustrated and upset. One day while I was sitting in self pity trying to imagine myself working retail all summer when the idea of applying for Oakcrest struck me. It was a weird thought, I had gone to Oakcrest when I was 13 and 14 years old and really wasn’t a huge fan. I remember laughing to myself and thinking how desperate I must be feeling to get to such an idea. Then it came again and again and it hit me that this was no normal desperate "please don’t make me work retail all summer" thought. It was a prompting. I went through craziness to finally find out how to apply. "Scout" a counselor from past years who I had gotten in touch with gave me the information that I needed but warned me against getting my hopes up for they stopped taking applications over a month ago. But I decided I needed to try anyway. I called the woman in charge of hiring and she didn’t sound too happy about such a late applicant but decided to give me a chance anyway.
Over the next few weeks I accidently missed my interview, rescheduled three times and after an agonizingly embarrassing eight phone calls pleading for a chance and promising that I really am not a flake I got my interview. I was more nervous about this interview than I had ever been about anything before. I walked into the church and saw that I was to be interviewed by seven women. Just me and seven women. After getting attacked by seven hugs the interview began. It went well. But well enough to make up for my prior lameness? Two weeks later I got the call, I was in!
Now that I was officially "Big Red" my life would never be the same! Camp started with snow and ended with the craziest most freezing rain. I felt like the Lord showed us that camp would be one surprise after another with the snow, and then cried with us as it ended that last couple weeks. I had the most incredible experiences with my girls. I’ve never done anything so emotionally draining and spiritually fulfilling in my whole life.
My second week is one I will remember in detail forever. It was hard stuff. I cannot really remember a time in my life that I had ever been really homesick, so much so that it brought me to tears, so I feared homesick girls. I had heard the other counselors talk about having a homesick girl and I just knew I couldn’t handle it. The Lord thought otherwise. My second week I had five homesick girls. I have never been so overwhelmed in my life. I had never contemplated that one of my biggest challenges of the summer would be "simply" convincing girls to stay at camp for four and a half days. But it was. There was not a 15 minute period of time that someone wasn’t crying and wanted to go home for the first two and a half days. I am not a crier, my dad raised me better than that, but by the second night after consoling girls all the past two days I walked into my counselor room to take a breath, my dear roommate "Jahugafute" looked at me and could see the stress and asked if I was alright. That very question opened the flood gates. I cried non-stop for 48 minutes (yes they were timed). I had convinced myself that I was a terrible counselor, that this job was a mistake and that I would become that counselor that girls went home and ranted to their friends about. I had been broken (but I’ve learned you can’t have a broken heart and contrite spirit if you aren’t a bit broken). I bucked up pulled myself together and faced my girl again. On top of my begging my perfectly healthy homesick girls to stay a half an hour at a time I had my dear "Bubba". The most simply beautiful girl I had ever met, who unfortunately suffered from severe and debilitating anxiety. Mixed with her grandfather just passing away days before and her fear of the dark her mom felt that it would be best if she picked "Bubba" up every night and dropped her back off every morning. This didn’t settle well with me. Half the fun of girls camp in the sleepover every night aspect and also this meant she’d miss the overnighter (a hike up the mountain where we would sleep out under the stars). The overnighter I felt was critical, it offered a way of bonding that nothing else could and that is also where we had testimony meeting. My goal was to keep her there as much as possible which meant I had to watch her like a hawk (not easy to do with five crying girls, each one demanding huge amounts of my time). But to keep a long story short(er) after two severe anxiety attacks, diabetic shock and all the tears every girl stayed. I never worked for anything so hard! That week taught me what it really meant to always have a prayer in your heart. I was praying every minute to the Lord begging for His help and guidance.
I would love to talk about each week and each girl but I shouldn’t, this is far too long as it is. But I will sum it up with the testimony that I gained. I know that God is real, I know that He is our Heavenly Father and that He has boundless love for us. I know that when it comes to His children He will always come through. I know that for us He sent His Only Begotten. I know that Christ is This, and I know that because He loved us and understood His Father’s love for us He lived, atoned, died and was resurrected to make it possible for us to find our way back to the presence of His and our Father.

Tyra Banks Here I Come!

After currently losing my enthusiasm for upper education, thanks much to human physiology and the ever intimidating chemistry, I have come to the conclusion that it may be an easier route for me to bleach out my hair to a lovely "sun kissed" white, swear off bread and apples, spend my time at the local Bahama Bronze frying my lovely fair skin into some semblance of a tan. After losing all that pesky body fat I shall head off to the nearest America's Next Top Model audition. After sweeping Tyra Banks, Jay, and Nigel Barker off their feet I will end victorious! Sure I'll shed some tears, develop an eating disorder, become the worlds biggest "bih" and out diva Elton John, but it will be worth it; only having to worry about not having "angry fingers", keeping my eyes "fierce", and always being "commercial and high fashion" at the same time. But this is all a price I'm willing to pay to give up my constant concern of; if the definition of a sphincter is a ring of muscle guarding an opening in the body only allowing one way of passage, then why does the esophageal sphincter allow us to puke, or whether or not a baby should be introduced to solid foods with rice and mashed peas or avocados and salsa. Try not to hate me when I'm beautiful!

Possibility

I love possibility. Any kind really. I love the feeling when you first get to know someone, the chance of a new, amazing friend, the chance of a new interest. I love the moment when you first realize that you could really click with someone. I love the possibility of new experiences. I love the possibility that is created by new perspectives. I love it all.
I love the time just before a new semester, when everyone is willing to try new people on for size, when just about everyone is willing to try a new life. I love the feeling of not knowing if you are going to step back into the semester before or if this new one may lead to something better. Possibilities are endless after a summer of working and being away then coming back knowing that this could be the four months that will change the rest of your life.
I love new roommates, the awkwardness of not knowing each other that well and yet living every day in and out together, coming home to these people. Im an awkward person by nature who does, in reality, hates change, and yet there is a piece of me deep down behind my stomach that is grateful for it. I love not always knowing what Im getting myself into, its a time in my life that I feel daring, and believe me, that happens rarely.
I love the possibility of a relationship. I love overanalyzing, reading into, and agonizing over details that in the end, rarely become anything. I love the possibility of it all. Its exciting to me to know that the next love story in my life may be that guy I pass everyday on my way to institute, or that guy my friend has been meaning to set me up with, or that guy Ive known since forever. I love how ridiculous it all is. The wondering, the waiting, the possibility.
I love bran new classes that appear to have nothing to do with what I think I want, because maybe in that oh so useless class lies my future passion. I love the possibility that is created by taking those annoying breadth and depth classes. I think that this is what I want until I understand, and realize for the first time that I was all wrong and there is a better fit for me somewhere else.
I just wish I was better at meshing the old with the new. That there was a way to hold onto both. Change is my fear, but possibility is my love. I believe that everything happens for a reason, so there must be reason for the change. I love finding out why. Why did I meet who I met? Why did I go where I went? Why am I here with these people and not there with those? There is a reason. And so, I love the possibility of it all.

Man's Best Friend, But Not Woman's!

I do not understand why it is that dogs are referred to as "man's best friends". My dog, Boomer, is not my best friend, nor do I think he has any intention of ever being so. I'm not even entirely positive that he likes me all that much. After these ten years, all those walks I still get nothing. No cute, irresistable wagging of his great yellow tail, no purking up of thos velvety ears, not even a bark at the sound of my car pulling into the drive way or the sound of my key in the door. This past week is the last time I will ever bring him home sliced ham from school, or give him the sausages off my plate. Why, you might ask is the reason for such coldness? I'll tell you. I was home alone packing up to head back up to school for work, not happy at all about the circumstances that would take me to a lonely and cold Logan, (nope no sympathy head on my lap from Boomer) and I needed to carry a chair downstairs from my bedroom. I don't quite know what happened. Was it that I hit the topmost stair with te arch of my foot or did i step of the chair instead of the stair? I may never know but all I knew was that I was falling. And this was no slide down of your butt fall down the stair, this was cinema worthy. I'd like to think it almost poetically graceful, as far as tumbling down the stairs goes. Screaming all the way, I went head first slamming my sholder blades into the corner of a stair was the first blow. I smacked my knees, ankles, shins, back, neck and head into the infameous stairs. Not to mention the chair I was carrying fell into me a couple times before hitting the first level. finally the turn in the staircase came and I hit into the wall with powerful force with my lower back. Upside down with my legs jammed up against the wall sitting on the back of my neck I manuvored to a normal sitting position and looked across the room and there was Boomer, Just lying there. He hadn't even lifted his head, let alone come to me to check for broken bones or open wounds.Some dogs jump into icy waters, or cavernous mine shafts to see to their owners safety. Some dogs sniff out unforeseeable cancerous growths under their human's skin and bark and go crazy until they seek medical attention. Some dogs claw through walls to play dead in the street to get passing cars attention to their injured or endangered owners. Yes some dogs I suppose are great loving and courageous animals, but not mine. He, for all the screaming and the racket caused by my body falling down a flight of stairs couldn't find it in his heart to even lift his lazy head. Instead he just looked at me with those great brown eyes as if to say, "I cannot believe you just did that, and you are the great piece of work I belong to. How emberrassing. I hope Dottie and Tubby next door didn't see."

Just Something I've Learned: Living is a Verb

I love life. Period. And not because it has been easy or because I've been handed everything, I've worked hard to make my life the way it is. I make plans, goals, I dream and most important of all I DO. I love verbs, action words. People say they want to do this or that, but rarely do they actually do. If you want to travel work your butt off for that plane ticket. If you want to make a difference, decide what that difference is and work at it. If you want to understand, work towards understanding. This life will require work, dedication, patience, diligence, and that ever troublesome effort.
I don't mean to make myself sound all great, but hey I've worked to make my dreams reality. I don't pretend to be super successful or perfect. The Lord knows I have failed far more than I have succeeded, but I have done what I can to not waste time. I have learned that this life is just so brief, though we are given an eternity of existence, this life is so so short, and it will be what decides what we will get in that eternity. This is the time to work, learn, play, sing, dance, see, feel, hear, taste, and smell what this world is made of. Life is a verb.
I fear regret. I fear emptiness. I am twenty, twenty is so young but on my birthday I realized time is precious, days, weeks, months, years all pass alarmingly fast. One day I will be 27 then 39, and then 46, and before I know what even happened I will inevitably be 69 then 78 and so on. When I look back on the life I've lived will I know what I did or will I draw a blank? Will the next 58 years of my life be filled with love, service, adventure, and fulfilment? Or will it just be 58 years. We cannot control time. But we can control what it is that we do with it. Learn as much as possible, see as much as possible. BE as much as possible. Some of the world's lessons are best learned in a foreign place. There are oceans, mountains, rivers, lakes, clouds, trees, people, lives, opinions, cultures, and truths out there waiting for you to discover and to be made a part of the you that is there, but simply needs to be found.
The prophet Spencer W. Kimball said "Make no small plans; for they have no magic to stir men's souls." Isn't that such a beautiful statement, being small and living small does nothing for you or anyone else. This is the time to be what you are capable of.
Be BOLD, for it is ever so worth it.

Bride For Sale!

I decided that I hate dating. It requires too much effort, as if I don't have enough stuff to occupy all my available effort. Not only does it require effort but it also requires way too much thinking. Ah, the days of being 15 and not dating or worrying about dating or being pressured into dating. I don't like trying anymore, I think I might just put myself up for mail order bride. Someone can just buy me off the internet. I like this idea because not only will I not have to date and the end goal of dating will come much easier, but I'll make a little extra cash. Sweet.
Peace Out.
Bids will start at $200,000. (sad I would sell myself for such a price but I mean business)