Twenty~Five

So, Mike notified us at dinner that we are most likely going to Florida to help with Hurricane Irma instead of Texas. He said this is still subject to change, and we won't know for sure where we are going until we actually end up there and unpack our stuff because that's the nature of this program and we must learn adaptability and all that jazz. I'm cool with it. I've never been to Florida, and I'm sure there will be some interesting stuff there, and lots of people that need lots of helpin'. So, on Monday we will start our six day journey towards Florida, I guess? Or somewhere entirely different, who knows! Six days in Geraldine, that big smelly clunky dark green van, with the 13 of us squished side by side should be very interesting... Pray we still like each other by the end :)))) Here's to the unpredictable, ~~DEedra

Happy Monday! I've barely had a moment to myself in almost a week now and am incredibly sleep deprived, but things are starting to wind down a bit. Saturday was "Make a Difference Day," so Green 5 went on over to a local community garden that was run by the kindest people on earth. The moment we got there, a friendly old man offered us fresh pomegranates that he picked right off the tree. We snacked on strawberries and raspberries in the shade of the palm trees before we began weeding. As we worked, the owners kept encouraging us to take breaks to eat the donuts and fresh fruit they set out for us (obviously I didn't hesitate). It was such a pleasant, easy-going morning. My biggest stress was trying to figure out answers to the riddles Roy was giving us. I have a feeling I'll be solving a lot of riddles in the next ten months. After lunch, our team was transferred at another community garden that was nothing like the first. There had to be about 100 corps membe...

Wednesday : We all packed our stuff in the van and headed to Camp Lodestar, a Methodist Camp in middle of nowhere California.We shoved all our stuff in the van and I faced my anxieties by driving us the 2 hours there. The last 30 minutes of the drive were spent on a thin, winding, mountainous road with no shoulder, just cliffs on the side (my teammates constantly reminded me not to look at the drop off, but i coudn't resist). I went no faster than 10 mph for the latter part of the drive, and after what seemed like forever we made it to the camp. It was beautiful and isolated, surrounded by towering pine and oak trees. There were little wooden cabins and a main lodge. We weren't allowed to stay in the cabins our first night because another group was there, so we had to walk to this big meadow where we all got tents to set up. The entire Green Unit was staying there, which consists of about 100 people. I have never seen so many of the same exact te...

Yesterday was a strange but fantastic day and I feel like I lived three lifetimes in the span of 24 hours. I laughed so hard all day I'm surprised my abs aren't sore. We started the morning off with an "Individual Service Project" or ISP, which, as the name implies, is a project we have to plan on our own. We need 80 hours of ISP by the end of the year, on top of the 1700 regular service hours we have to do. So, we went to Camp Pollock and helped rake a bunch of mulch over some dirt and stained their front deck. It was a beautiful day, the ground at the camp was covered in leaves and the air had that crisp fall smell. After the ISP, we went to a corn maze nearby. We wandered through the maze, ate some root beer snow cones, and eventually ubered back home. Grant and Ian made a humongous pot of mac and cheese and a pan of brownies and we all stuffed our faces. Grant accidentally poured half the container of pepper into his bowl of mac and cheese, and we blackmailed ...

It's Thursday! I'm sitting in my bed right now thinking about how different this very same Thursday would have been a year ago. I would have been at 303 with Lizzy and Leah and my favorite College Street boys and we'd be getting ready to go to Ale's for our typical endeavors. Sean would be blasting "Brandy," and we'd all be sitting around that big brown couch telling each other funny stories about our day and drinking our Natty Daddies. I miss these nights often although I know they could not last. I sometimes think about that quiet, genuine love and wildness we all captured when we were together and my heart begins to ache. I think about little things like what the cracks on the ceiling of 303 looked like. It's so lovely and scary how quickly these old memories fade, to get replaced with the new. Instead of dollar beers at Ale's, I'm writing in a blog and getting ready for bed at 10. I don't know if the wild fire within me is totally gone,...

I watched the Little Prince the night before I left for Sacramento and I'm so glad I did. That movie hits some emotional soft spots in me that I didn't even know I had. Basically, it's a story about a little girl with a controlling mother who tries to rush her through childhood and make her into a successful adult ASAP. The girl meets a nice old man, they become friends, and she learns the importance and beauty of human connection. I love this movie for many reasons, two being the important life lessons/reminder it has to offer, reminders that are easy to forget (especially once we grow up). One of my favorite quotes from the film is "it is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." I know this is some Helen-Keller-esque, super cliche phraseology, but I still think they're onto something. I am my clearest, happiest self when I am able to look at things with love. I'm guilty of forgetting this all the time. I...

 Roy's beautiful collage from the team meeting this morning Slurpeeeees This place doesn't always look like a prison!

Today was the first day of PT! We got up at 5 am and did all kinds of squats and push-ups and crunches under the stars. Then, we spent two hours learning about extremely basic tools, like shovels, hammers and rakes. Each group had to give had to give a mini presentation on the tools, which were primarily based on sarcasm and very entertaining to watch. One group referred to a shovel as a "spade" the entire time, which I thought was hilarious in the moment. Now, I'm realizing it was more something you had to be there for. Gotta make the most out of those little things am I right? After lunch, we all piled in the van and drove into what seemed like the middle of nowhere even though it was less than five minutes away. It looked like we got transplanted into a Breaking Bad scene in the desert, and all we had was a few huge storage sheds and some tents filled with old Ameri-Clothes. We sat outside the van in the burning sun for hours, waiting to receive our winter/snow gea...

It's Sunday night and I'm listening to Landslide because I'm a basic a$$ bitch and I can't stand the thought of my life passing me by without really feeling every every minute. It's hard for me to remain connected to everything while surrounded by semi-strangers in this brand new place. It's only natural that there is still a tangible distance between me and all that is around me. The distance is definitely breaking down quickly, though. I actually have a feeling there will be no such thing as distance very soon, at the rate life is going. I've been here for five days and it feels like at least two weeks. I do everything with my teammates, and I mean literally everything. I was with them from 7am to 8pm today, until finally dipped because I needed to defend some of my personal space, somehow. Yesterday I was with them from 8am to midnight. We eat breakfast together, go to trainings together, eat lunch together, spend breaks together, eat dinner together, han...

Today has been wonderful. We did a "Hands of Peace" activity all day where we learned strategies to be more active listeners, to resolve conflicts, and open up to one another without judgment. It was as cheesy as one would expect, but I got to learn about my teammates and let them into my world a bit as well. I had one-on-one sessions with people in my group where they shared about their favorite activity, what they loved most about themselves, or a problem they were experiencing. I just had to sit there and listen. I realized how infrequently people actually listen to each other. We are always waiting for what we want to say next, we always want to relate everything to ourselves. When I directed my attention away from what I wanted to say or how I thought I should respond, I became more present and could see the other person more clearly. I was reminded how beautiful people are. I realized I need to pay attention a little bit more, because beauty like that is easy to miss. ...

It's been super for me to try writing lately, it seems impossible to put everything into words. I made it to Sacramento on Wednesday, and everything has been a hectic blur of continuous social stimulation and overwhelming amounts of information. Not the mention the nervous excitement, crippling exhaustion, and self-doubt that apparently comes along with these things. I haven't been thrown into a foreign situation like this since I first left for college, and I forgot how strange of an adjustment it is. I remember how anxious and uncertain I was at first, just hoping it was the right thing. Hoping I belonged there. By the time I left this past May, there wasn't a doubt in my mind that it was the right thing. I've been keeping this in mind during my first few days here, that every experience needs a little bit of time and patience to unfold into something truly beautiful. Since I've gotten here, I've had moments of confidence and peace, where I have felt belongi...

11:00 am: It's October 3rd and naturally, I'm sitting here thinking about Mean Girls because I think that's what millennials are supposed to do on October 3rd. I'm sipping on my coffee and just starting to wake up. I had a tough time sleeping last night. I kept myself up for a while, heartbroken from the tragedy that just happened in Las Vegas. The horrible images and videos I saw yesterday were so powerful they jolted me up in the middle of the night. I tried sending out as much love energy as I could muster up, hoping it would somehow help the world become a bit softer. All I know is I saw all those wonderful people on the news the next day, lining up for hours to donate blood and hand out snacks and work together towards healing. There is so much goodness that pours out of all that pain. 12:39 pm: Now, I'm sitting in the New City Library pretending that I have really important things to do. I chose a table that has a single streak of light on it, the only table...

I don't really know what I'm trying to do by starting a blog. I think my thoughts and experiences crave to be documented. I think this way because I miss a lot of things, and a part of me believes that I will not miss them as much if I have a way to go back to them. I'm someone who already starts to miss the light of the day as I watch the sunset. Sometimes I already start to miss people while I have them right in front of me. This makes it hard for me to stay present with many things, I am so easily affected by what is temporary and fleeting, which as it turns out, is everything. I'm terrified of time running out. But, beautiful moments come as quickly as they go and we cannot hold onto them. This always gets to me, that there's no real way to re-visit memories. Only in dreams, and in photographs, in conversation, maybe in diaries. I'm not good at keeping up with those classic old hand-written diaries, but typing requires much less effort so maybe this will be ...