i havent written in while. i feel it is because nothing is going on here, or maybe just too much is going on here. all i know is that the last week has been crazy and i cant even explain it.
the last two days have been so cold. im sure they were in the fifties but to me it felt colder. i was bundled up from head to toe while there were still girls in skirts and flip flops. everyone couldnt understand how on earth i was cold. "youre from alaska" they claimed. hello. that doesnt mean i dont get cold. especially me, i am one who is cold in the summer. all i can say is that the weather here is crazy. one day its storming and fourty and the next day its sunny and seventy. who knew colorado was so weird.
on another note. i had no idea how much people get excitd over halo. last night i got to experince friends who purchased halo three the minute it came out and raced home to play it. it was a pretty exciting event to witness. the game came in a huge box. one would think that for a game it would come in a little dvd cover but no this one hundred and fourty dollar game came in a enormous box. once it was opened we knew why. our friend pulled out a life sive helmet that the characters in the game wear. granted you couldnt wear the helmet, but it came with a stand so that it could be displayed to everyone. it was crazy stuff. ohhhhh and there was a fold out poster. cant forget that!
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Monday, September 17, 2007
the cabin
a paper i wrote for english that i thought my family would appreciate. a lot of the juicy details were left out because it had to only be a page and a half long.
As a child a two-hour car ride feels more like two weeks, but the time spent at our cabin was well worth it. I always got excited when we passed the general store on the side of the road because it meant we were almost there. Pulling in was bumpy and rough because the ground was covered in lots of rocks. As soon as my mom would turn off the car I would jump out and leap on to my old tire swing. My family had brought this tire up from the river to create this fun play toy that would keep me entertained for hours. As fun as it was, every time I got off I was always covered in black marks. As I swung on the tire swing by myself I felt a fairy. It was forested all around me with dead trees and moss everywhere. I could hear the river from up the hill where our log cabin was. The cool, bitter wind blew through my childish curls.
Once my mom had finished unpacking the car I would follow her inside. It was always chilly when you first walked in because no one had been there for a while, so my mom always immediately turned on the heater. Inside the cabin I took every step very lightly for fear of making the floor shake or creek too loudly. The furniture was rough and old, the carpet gray and faded, although one would expect that after fifty years. The kitchen and the living room were one area with a wood stove, a couch and coffee table, a VCR with antennas that stuck out like enormous bug feelers, a table and a moveable island with a cutting board on top. The kitchen had high cupboards where old, and I mean old, food mixes are displayed, originally to keep our aging great grandfather from eating them, but now just for show. This was all the cabin consisted of for a number of years until it was built on to with a hallways, bathroom, and bedroom.
Outside of the bathroom in the hallway was a full size bed that I claimed to be mine. I loved this bed with a passion. I would jump into it and sink so deeply like falling into a pool of feathers, although it probably felt this way because it was so old.
Though I was crazy about my tire swing and bed, the river was my favorite. Just a short walk down hill led to a beautiful view of the huge mountain across the river where on certain days you could spot flocks of mountain goats with binoculars. The river had a rock beach where my brother and I would spend hours searching for flat rocks and teaching ourselves to skip them. If we were lucky we got to go down to the cabin in late August-early September. This was fish season, which to us meant finding dead fish washed up on the banks. As gruesome as this sounds, we would find sticks and walk up and down the beach poking at every fish that we could find. If their eyes were still there we would poke at them until they gushed and oozed. This event was definitely the highlight of the trip.
One time, when I was very young, my grandma came down to the cabin with us. As a girl she had come here often so she knew all of the “secret places”. One cool afternoon, we strolled down the river to a place she called the “fairy trail”. She took me to a creek that ran through it and told me that if you waited and watched very quietly you could catch a glimpse of fairies splashing in the water. Each time I return to the sacred spot, I always take the time to sit and wait a while searching for these creatures but I have yet to spot one. Someday I will though, I know it.
Every year we go there fewer and fewer times. Each time it remains exactly the same, the furniture doesn’t move, the food on the shelf doesn’t change, and my bed is still as comfortable. Each year though I change, but coming back to this magical place always reminds me of who I am and where I came from.
As a child a two-hour car ride feels more like two weeks, but the time spent at our cabin was well worth it. I always got excited when we passed the general store on the side of the road because it meant we were almost there. Pulling in was bumpy and rough because the ground was covered in lots of rocks. As soon as my mom would turn off the car I would jump out and leap on to my old tire swing. My family had brought this tire up from the river to create this fun play toy that would keep me entertained for hours. As fun as it was, every time I got off I was always covered in black marks. As I swung on the tire swing by myself I felt a fairy. It was forested all around me with dead trees and moss everywhere. I could hear the river from up the hill where our log cabin was. The cool, bitter wind blew through my childish curls.
Once my mom had finished unpacking the car I would follow her inside. It was always chilly when you first walked in because no one had been there for a while, so my mom always immediately turned on the heater. Inside the cabin I took every step very lightly for fear of making the floor shake or creek too loudly. The furniture was rough and old, the carpet gray and faded, although one would expect that after fifty years. The kitchen and the living room were one area with a wood stove, a couch and coffee table, a VCR with antennas that stuck out like enormous bug feelers, a table and a moveable island with a cutting board on top. The kitchen had high cupboards where old, and I mean old, food mixes are displayed, originally to keep our aging great grandfather from eating them, but now just for show. This was all the cabin consisted of for a number of years until it was built on to with a hallways, bathroom, and bedroom.
Outside of the bathroom in the hallway was a full size bed that I claimed to be mine. I loved this bed with a passion. I would jump into it and sink so deeply like falling into a pool of feathers, although it probably felt this way because it was so old.
Though I was crazy about my tire swing and bed, the river was my favorite. Just a short walk down hill led to a beautiful view of the huge mountain across the river where on certain days you could spot flocks of mountain goats with binoculars. The river had a rock beach where my brother and I would spend hours searching for flat rocks and teaching ourselves to skip them. If we were lucky we got to go down to the cabin in late August-early September. This was fish season, which to us meant finding dead fish washed up on the banks. As gruesome as this sounds, we would find sticks and walk up and down the beach poking at every fish that we could find. If their eyes were still there we would poke at them until they gushed and oozed. This event was definitely the highlight of the trip.
One time, when I was very young, my grandma came down to the cabin with us. As a girl she had come here often so she knew all of the “secret places”. One cool afternoon, we strolled down the river to a place she called the “fairy trail”. She took me to a creek that ran through it and told me that if you waited and watched very quietly you could catch a glimpse of fairies splashing in the water. Each time I return to the sacred spot, I always take the time to sit and wait a while searching for these creatures but I have yet to spot one. Someday I will though, I know it.
Every year we go there fewer and fewer times. Each time it remains exactly the same, the furniture doesn’t move, the food on the shelf doesn’t change, and my bed is still as comfortable. Each year though I change, but coming back to this magical place always reminds me of who I am and where I came from.
Saturday, September 15, 2007
mama and papa
heres for mom and dad, who dont have facebook so they cant see all the pictures of whats going on in my life and who ive met.
jesus saves
ive been struggling to write for a while but so much has been going on in my life, bad and good. i just wanted to take the time out of today to write about my experience the other night. friday night a group of about 50 of us gathered at school to go downtown to do the fatboys ministry program. which is where you pretty much bring food and clothes and talk with homeless people. our older friend told us to take off all of our jewelry, all of our makeup, and wear baggy clothes. we met together at the ministry house and divided up into groups by which route we wanted to go on. there were shorter ones, ones where you go into shelters, ones where you go to the heat grates, and so on. me and my two other friend decided to go on the jesus saves route which i guess is the more difficult one. jesus saves is a mission in downtown denver that feeds and gives homeless people a place to stay at night. but after they fill up many homeless people are left outside. we took the vans downtown and we started on our way. we walked for about twenty minutes until we finally got there. our group had about fifteen people so we decided to split up into two groups so it wasnt so overwhelming. when we arrived there we had to stay with a guy so i was with this boy V who is a year older than me, pretty big and protective looking so i guess you could say it was alright.
the first couple people we talked to were pretty friendly. we gave them some food and olnly talked to them for a short amount of time. it was easy to see that many of them were under the influence of drugs and alcohol but i still felt compassion over them. we walked around the corner to where more of our group was. we saw this older man, with a walker, who we talked to for a good amount of time. he told us how he had injured his leg (it really did look like a bad leg). he told us it was from a bull riding accident. he told us how his wife had died in a drunk driving accident about ten years ago, and that one of his sons died in iraq about five months ago. he said he still had two other children though. it is so hard for these type of situations because you cant always tell if they are lying or not, but all you can do is show love to them nonetheless. this man, his name was david by the way, was older and a very slow speaker. it made me realize that i need to work a lot more on my patience. he spoke very slowly and i knew that he had more to say, even if he was quiet for a moment.
after that we headed back to the cars and met up with everyone else. that night was so moving. its definitly something i would like to go back and do again.
the first couple people we talked to were pretty friendly. we gave them some food and olnly talked to them for a short amount of time. it was easy to see that many of them were under the influence of drugs and alcohol but i still felt compassion over them. we walked around the corner to where more of our group was. we saw this older man, with a walker, who we talked to for a good amount of time. he told us how he had injured his leg (it really did look like a bad leg). he told us it was from a bull riding accident. he told us how his wife had died in a drunk driving accident about ten years ago, and that one of his sons died in iraq about five months ago. he said he still had two other children though. it is so hard for these type of situations because you cant always tell if they are lying or not, but all you can do is show love to them nonetheless. this man, his name was david by the way, was older and a very slow speaker. it made me realize that i need to work a lot more on my patience. he spoke very slowly and i knew that he had more to say, even if he was quiet for a moment.
after that we headed back to the cars and met up with everyone else. that night was so moving. its definitly something i would like to go back and do again.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
young life camp
despite a terrible start to the weekend, it was probably the best one ive had since ive been here. all of our freshman class took buses three hours to buena vista where we stayed the weekend at a young life camp in the mountains. it was so beautiful there. I wont go into moment by moment details about the weekend but i must say i probably made some of the best friends while i was there. jasper, breezy, champ, and i got so close it was awesome. finally some people that i can create inside jokes with, i miss that. just hanging out with them in general was probably the highlight of my weekend. praying for each other, learning personal things, just getting closer was so awesome. the chapel this weekend was amazing. it was so great to be able to feel closer to god again. it is exactly what i needed. one of the other best parts of the weekend had to be the waterslide hands down. it was SO much fun. except for the cut i got from going down it with like ten other people. im so thankful that i had this weekend.
secret verse:
John 15:12-13 His command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends.
that was from memory girls...
secret verse:
John 15:12-13 His command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this that he lay down his life for his friends.
that was from memory girls...
Wednesday, September 5, 2007
people
tonight my brother reminded me that i have yet to write about any of the people ive met here. i write about events, and places, and things i do but i never mention any people. its about time.
kaylan is my direct roommate. i love her and i couldnt ask for anything more. shes so much fun and exactly like me. she plays soccer for the school and shes very talented and fast. she listens to the exact same music as me. we wear the same size clothes and have the same size feet. its perfect. she has bright blonde hair that i adore. we are so compatible and i love it. she is really encouraging and a great person to be around.
karissa and kait are my apartment roommates. they live approximatly ten feet away from me down our hall way. they are both music majors and very talented. both play the piano. they are fun girls to be around. kait just got a really neat tattoo that i really like. karissa is a down to earth girl.
Louisa is my RA and Amy is my Chaplin. They are both sisters that look so much alike that they could be twins but louisa is the older one. they are both so much fun and have a great sense of humor. i love having them around. amy has the best laugh i have ever heard. they are both runners and very outgoing, always up for doing something new and fun.
The girls in the apartment next to us seem nice. I havent taken a lot of time to get to know them though. Averill is from new hampshire. i really like her. but other than that i dont know too much about those girls but hopefully over the course of the year i will get to know them much better,
The girls in the apartment below me are my absolute favorite. Theres Breezy, Kyra, Jessica, and Sarah. Breezy is from south dakota and i think has three or four older brothers who go here. We all went bowling the other night and that was lots of fun. Breezy and i won a bet so we should be expecting some blueberry muffins pretty soon. Kyra is from illinois and so outgoing. she has a loud personality that i love and a distinguished accent. she always has to be doing something and her all time favorite thing to do is play in the rain. i love that about her. Jessica and Sarah both play tennis. Jessica is great. She looks exactly like mischa barton im convinced. sarah is probably one of the funniest people in our stairwell. i havent gotten to know her too well but she seems like fun. i do feel bad for her having to work at starbucks at four in the morning. i love going into this apartment. the oc is always on.
Austin and Teddy are the two guys ive been around the most since ive been here. mostly because of sniagrab i have gotten to know them pretty well. they are both soccer players and looked absolutly rediculous when they had to shave their heads all awkwardly because they were freshman. they both are very unique and genuine boys that i love to be around. i hope i get to be closer with them over the year.
mike is from nome, alaska. finally someone that i can share something in common with, although i have never been to nome. its actually kind of funny because we know a lot of people in common from up there. he and austin have been teaching kaylan and i to longboard which is the most fun thing ever.
since ive been here ive met a lot of people but i havent been here long enough to really get to know people. i think the next month will be really good for settling in and getting to know people. im really looking forward to it.
kaylan is my direct roommate. i love her and i couldnt ask for anything more. shes so much fun and exactly like me. she plays soccer for the school and shes very talented and fast. she listens to the exact same music as me. we wear the same size clothes and have the same size feet. its perfect. she has bright blonde hair that i adore. we are so compatible and i love it. she is really encouraging and a great person to be around.
karissa and kait are my apartment roommates. they live approximatly ten feet away from me down our hall way. they are both music majors and very talented. both play the piano. they are fun girls to be around. kait just got a really neat tattoo that i really like. karissa is a down to earth girl.
Louisa is my RA and Amy is my Chaplin. They are both sisters that look so much alike that they could be twins but louisa is the older one. they are both so much fun and have a great sense of humor. i love having them around. amy has the best laugh i have ever heard. they are both runners and very outgoing, always up for doing something new and fun.
The girls in the apartment next to us seem nice. I havent taken a lot of time to get to know them though. Averill is from new hampshire. i really like her. but other than that i dont know too much about those girls but hopefully over the course of the year i will get to know them much better,
The girls in the apartment below me are my absolute favorite. Theres Breezy, Kyra, Jessica, and Sarah. Breezy is from south dakota and i think has three or four older brothers who go here. We all went bowling the other night and that was lots of fun. Breezy and i won a bet so we should be expecting some blueberry muffins pretty soon. Kyra is from illinois and so outgoing. she has a loud personality that i love and a distinguished accent. she always has to be doing something and her all time favorite thing to do is play in the rain. i love that about her. Jessica and Sarah both play tennis. Jessica is great. She looks exactly like mischa barton im convinced. sarah is probably one of the funniest people in our stairwell. i havent gotten to know her too well but she seems like fun. i do feel bad for her having to work at starbucks at four in the morning. i love going into this apartment. the oc is always on.
Austin and Teddy are the two guys ive been around the most since ive been here. mostly because of sniagrab i have gotten to know them pretty well. they are both soccer players and looked absolutly rediculous when they had to shave their heads all awkwardly because they were freshman. they both are very unique and genuine boys that i love to be around. i hope i get to be closer with them over the year.
mike is from nome, alaska. finally someone that i can share something in common with, although i have never been to nome. its actually kind of funny because we know a lot of people in common from up there. he and austin have been teaching kaylan and i to longboard which is the most fun thing ever.
since ive been here ive met a lot of people but i havent been here long enough to really get to know people. i think the next month will be really good for settling in and getting to know people. im really looking forward to it.
Monday, September 3, 2007
hiking
today a group of girls from my stairwell drove up to st marys glacier, although i would in no way even begin to call it a glacier. haha. along the way we ran into some firemen who were offering free hot dogs for donations into their boot. so we got some tasty food and some quality time with firemen. i love them. we drove the rest of the way up to the trailhead. we started hiking up. it was kind of hard because it was pretty steep and there was no real trail. just lots of big loose rocks. we finally made it to the lower summit. it was so beautiful. there was a little clear lake, pretty trees, and a cute bridge. we watched some people jump off of the rocks into the lake. it looked like fun. we decided to go up further to reach the upper summit. that climb was a lot harder and steeper. for me the alaskan, elevation zero, i wanted to die. my lungs hurt so bad and i felt so light headed. we stopped for a minute to see these huge storm clouds coming in as well as thunder. we decided it would probably be a good idea to turn around. the thunder got closer and it started to rain. when we were almost to the lower summit it started to pour rain and the lightening was right over us. it was terrifying. it made the popping sound and echoed off of the mountain walls. we started running down the mountain and it started to hail. the hail was so thick you could barely see and it was so incredibly painful. there was no tree covering so we ran most of the way to the bottem for fifteen more minutes while we were underneath the lightening and getting peltd by hail. we finally made it to the car. safe and wet.
Sunday, September 2, 2007
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)