Grantham

I don't how it works for the rest of you, but I found out last night that if I need to pray about something, it really helps of I'm in the place I'm praying about. That may seem complicated and unreasonable, but last night the place I needed to pray about was only a ten minute drive from my house. Joel needed to go in that direction anyways.

See, for whatever reason I have been extremely worried and stressed about paying for college. Well, I was upset and worried about more than that, but it's taking a lot for me to work through everything that's bugging me. I have troubles voicing my "deep down opinions" for fear that my parents won't honestly listen, therefore leaving me worse off. Except for the fact that I'll be worse off either way because everything just keeps eating away at me, which is probably one reason why I'm really looking forward to moving out. Even so, I have a feeling that these problems will follow me to whatever residence I end up living in.

Anyways, sorry to digress. As I mentioned, paying for college probably stresses me out more than the work load itself. Even though I have tuition remission, the bill for living (and breathing) at college is a lot for an 18 year old to pay with no help what so ever. Well, I haven't had any help yet. No scholarships (yet) or secret benefactors. I don't even know of anyone who could be a secret benefactor. All I have is my stupid stupid self who just works maybe 7 hours a week if I'm blessed enough, and has been making minimum wage for the past two years! Why did I ever take this in the first place?

So anyways, I'm looking for a new job, and hopefully a full time job for the summer. It's kinda hard to come to this realization before a holiday, because I can't just go out and ask for applications on Good Friday. Well, I could, but I really want to focus on Jesus, not money. I may have to let go of my not working on sundays thing, which bothers me. Seriously, I will die if I don't go to church.

I digressed again! My point is, since I didn't know what to do, and I didn't really feel like being around other people, I took Joel to Chill Time at Grantham, and went to the college library, to work on a scholarship essay. I needed to get online for something, probably just to check my email, but I couldn't access the college's internet on the laptop. I typed in my user name and password, but over and over again it wouldn't work. Even when I came home and tried to log onto my college email, that didn't work either. I don't know what's going on with that, so I hope no one important emails me on my college email. Anyways, I wrote down some ideas for the essay, and then headed down to the creek. I walked around and prayed. And I felt like praying that the place of my future schooling/residence really helped give focus. I know that God would've still been listening if i would've stayed home and prayed, but I would've been distracted. I'm always distracted while I'm trying to something important. Some family member is always either asking/telling me to do something, or wants to show me something, but I'm not getting graded on housework/chores/viewing random youtube videos, I'm getting graded on understanding Shakespeare, and doing calculus problems.(by the way, I'm starting to question why Shakespeare had to be so great. why couldn't he have been a fad that went out with the 16th century?) These distractions are part of the reason I refuse to live at home and go to college.

I really felt at peace while I walked back to Lady Blue.(um..that's our mini van. i have a bit of an emotional attachment to that thing) I'm not exactly sure where to go from here.(insert Pillar song) I guess I need to continue with my job search. I did come to the conclusion that if Jesus can sacrifice His life, maybe I can sacrifice sleep, school work, and sundays(afternoons and evenings). I'm working on being open to pretty much anything, as long as it pays, and can give me lots of hours over the summer. I'll be sad to leave the pizza buffet, seeing how it's been apart of my life for the past two years. They can't give me the hour i need/have been looking for.

I also found last night that walking helps my anger. I've always had problems with anger, but no one bothered to show me practical ways to get rid of it. The only problem with my solution is that I'm not allowed to walk in town after dark, because I'm a vulnerable adult who could get mugged or something. So that leaves me with one other option: writing. How is it that I can never meet word requirements on essays about natural disasters, and yet I have gone on and on and on just now? I have no problem writing. My grammer and style, and comma uses suck, but I like writing.

Speaking of which, I need to switch laundry and then write more for my essay. Maybe later today I can post about planning our lives around TV, and how it's starting to really disgust me, and how I fear it can tear a family a part.

Craziness

I've just started to realize how crazy life is for me right now. I mean, I'm graduating in two months and five days, and officially moving to Grantham in...I don't know how many days. But I've heard that the count is down to less than 150 days. I'm trying as hard as I possibly can to resist senioritis, but alas, my efforts are slowly stopping. I'm still trying in my classes, but I just seem to get more frustrated with the hard stuff, and the long stuff, and confusing stuff. How is it that we get to a point where we don't care? How do we get out of it?

All I know is that the time is flying by. In some ways I feel sad, because sometimes I can feel this school year slipping away from my grasp. At the leadership meeting the other day, we realized that we don't have that many Christian Clubs left. Just one more for April, and then we'll be in may, which only has three or four! Christian Club has been one of the soul factors of helping my attitude about high school. In fact, I still come in early for Christian Club even though I could sleep in, and don't have to be at school until 8:55.(first period study hall) It's been a distinct love of mine, and something from which I will carry memories. I feel so sad knowing that it's all going to go away. Or maybe it's just me who's going away. Either case, I'm feeling bittersweet. Some other days I'm just ready to be done, and be Grantham-bound. but I know I have work to finish here at school before I go on to the next school.

Moving on...I finished Deuteronomy today! I just need to ready Psalm 91 (or is it 19...) and then it's onto Joshua and Judges. After that I should be back on schedule. With that said, I think it's time to wrap up this post.

Lost, the 90s, and more!

So...admit it...who watched Lost last night? I won't give away too much, because I understand some people are way too busy, and need to catch up. I will, however, say this: I think there's a running theme of sandwiches, and people bring other locked up people sandwiches.

Before Joel and I sat down to watch Lost, we watched some old music videos. I got this DVD several years ago called "The Vault." Well, I think that's what it's called. It's basically every single music video from Gotee Records up until 2004. See, during supper we talked about this one music video from John Reuben called "Dippity Doin'" and we felt that we needed to show Aunt Tracey this music video. So after that music video, we just kept watching. These videos go from the most recent to the oldest. It was interesting scanning all the ones from the 90s, and even the earlier 2000s. I absolutely LOVE 90s music! While some of the music videos are cheesy, it's still fun to watch. The music video for "Two Sets of Jones" is very well done in my opinion.

It's musical season again! Our musical opens tonight. But I'm not going until Sunday. I volunteered to usher so I can get in for free! This will be my third year in a row ushering, so hopefully I'll be pretty good at it.

On another note, I found that I'm really sick and tired of driving every single day in a row! I think I've driven every day since........March 24th? See, I can't even remember! How do people do this every day? I'm used to driving for not long maybe 6 out of 7 days a week. I normally like driving, but I'm ready for a break. I did, however, enjoy the opportunity to sit in student parking lot traffic after school yesterday. That was the first and only time I have done that while being in the driver's seat. Mr. Robinson was still out there in the rain with his umbrella making sure no collisions occurred. It took me longer to get home than if I would've walked.

Well, we're nearing the end of another study hall. Aunt Tracey called Juno, and they're sending us a new modem within three to five business days. So that means between monday and wednesday. I'm not complaining, because I lived without it for three days now, so I can do without it for a while more. Plus, if I really need it, I can go to Messiah College on Sunday afternoon.

Now for some Actual News...

My first intended purpose was to update you on how the home life is going. Well, it's quite swell I suppose. The DSL still isn't working, but I'm getting used to it. I think we came to the conclusion that our modem is dying? Since Mom and Dad are away, we can't really do anything about it other than deal with dial up. Since we have access to the church's laptop, we can take that to the Library or the church if needed. Plus, I can always check my email here at school, which is what I'm doing now. I guess it proves we don't really need the internet. I mean, obviously it has become necessary in the past ten years, but just because it's necessary doesn't mean we should be on it every second of our lives. What if we only checked our email once or twice a day? What if we only checked every other day?

I hear your complaints. You're saying, "But my friends need be to be online so I can talk to them! I need to do school work! I have to do research!"

Okay, so maybe you do have research waiting. But how many times do you "research" and have facebook up in another window to check on it? I do it too, but that doesn't make it right. Sometimes I amaze myself with how fast I can get something done if I really put my mind to it. Sometimes while I'm working on an essay, and have a window up with my email or facebook, I also bring up a tab with the website www.something.com. try going there sometime, and tell me what you see. It's nice because then I don't see the words "Facebook," or "Gmail," staring at me from the task bar, so I don't click it as much.

And tell me, what would happen if we decided that with the time we won't spend on the internet, we did something else productive. We could read our Bible more (I am two books behind in my Bible in a Year goal), or clean our room! Better yet, we could actually put some effort into our homework. In some ways it's good thing to not be concerned with getting online. In fact, I'm very glad that I won't have to pay for internet for a long time. That means no worrying when something goes wrong!

Well, we have come to the end of another study hall. I hope you enjoyed my commentary.

Center of the Week

Happy April Fools Day! I've heard some crazy things today, and thankfully I have discernment as to what I can and cannot believe. While I was driving to a meeting at 7am, I heard something on the news having to do with someone important in our state resigning or something. I have to admit I was only half listening. By the time I was truly listening they were saying stuff about two newspapers that are merging, and it sounded kinda sketchy.

It makes me remember last April Fools day, with the media just dumping all their April Fools jokes on their audience. On the Word FM, at the beginning of the morning show(I just happened to wake up for the start of it.), they said that they had a special announcement. They claimed the from surveys that they took, changes were needed. So the host of their Sunday Evening Bluegrass show came on and made some sort of announcement that the Word FM was going to a bluegrass only format. The crazy thing is, people actually believed it! Now, even though I was half awake, I realized that it was April Fools Day, therefore this obviously was a joke. But I guess some people are wrapped up so much in their own lives that they don't remember what day it is.

This morning on the announcements they made all sorts of claims. If they really want to get us, and get all of us, they need to come up with something that would affect the seniors too. Everything they said, if true, would affect everyone except the seniors. It was a nice thought however.

Well, I really don't want to find a fish on my back, and I hope no one sticks a fish on your back either.