Outsider

I'm an outsider here.
Please note that I don't say that like it's a bad thing at all. It's just weird. What I mean, I think, is that being here and surrounded by people at all times is so strange to me. Everyone else seems to want to spend every moment of every day together, even when we have free time. Meanwhile, I've been content to spend my entire day off alone. I saw a movie alone and then spent the rest of the day laying in a hammock, happily lost in a book. I think the most I've spoken today has been like 2 sentences. And it has been lovely. I do love spending time with people and getting to know them, but it's exhausting after a while. I fear I may be being taken the wrong way by some of my peers. I'm not really sure there's anything to be done about that though. If I over extend myself I tend to lose my mind. And I'd rather that not happen here. I guess we'll see how it all plays out as the summer goes on. I'm probably just over thinking it and likely nobody even notices my not hanging out with them all the time.

In other news, we wrapped up our 2 weeks of staff training last night. I feel like my 2 weeks was less training and more a mad rush to get things ready, but yeah, that's over now. Tomorrow we have over 1,000 campers coming. It is going to be craziness! But I'm eager to get to work and see what life looks like when campers are actually here. There are so many unknown things in this adventure for everyone and it's going to be so cool to see God work in this amazing place.

Please be praying for campers, staff, volunteers, and just this place in general as we are about to jump into something huge!

One week down, many to go

Laying in my bunk bed, unable to sleep yet again thanks to the lovely snoring of my roommates, so I thought it'd be a good time to update everyone on life here at camp.
The summer staff as a whole has been here for a week now. It seems like so much longer already. Our days basically consist of everyone eating breakfast together and then splitting off to train on various things around camp or do various work things that need to happen before campers arrive. My team has pretty much been holed up in the coffee shop the whole week. And I'm totally ok with that. We have a really small team; just myself,  one other summer staffer, and 3 full time girls. We all work together and get along so well. We've spent many hours this week jamming out to Disney music in the coffee shop together so you know I like these people. :-)

I've done lots of really random tasks this week, from learning to make espresso shots to carrying plywood up stairs. I suppose that's camp life. I love always having things to do even if they seem random. We keep busy basically from breakfast until dinner which is great.

I'm already being shoved out of my comfort zone here though. Which is good but obviously uncomfortable for me. For one, we've all been assigned a full-time staff person as our mentor to have one on one meetings with. So not my thing, especially when someone else assigns the person to me. This week we're also the guinea pigs for the camp counselors. That means we have to have all of thosen fun little sit in a circle and talk about your feelings chats. Also not my favorite things. But this summer isn't about staying in my comfort zone so I'm doing my best to look on the bright side of both of these situations.

In other news, yesterday we got our first day off and I used it to go to Santa Fe to see X-Men with some new friends. Considering the amount of joking I did with my friends before leaving home about spending all my days off holed up in a movie theatre, I find this hilarious.

Oh, also, the weather is totes cray around here! It has rained for the past 4 days. But it is sunny most of the day then dark clouds will roll in and it will pour and hail for a bit before the sun comes out again. And it's cold. I had a hoodie on today and it's nearly June, people!

And I got my first letter out here last week. That really made me smile. So even though I have my phone and Facebook and everything...remember that letters are the bomb. Hint, hint :-)

That's all I got for ya about my first week. I love and miss all of you at home! Thanks for following along with my adventure.

Greetings from New Mexico

So I'm writing this on my phone. Because I'm in my hammock. On the side of a mountain. Typical.
Anyway, I know I've only been gone a few days but I wanted to keep y'all updated. So the 12 hour drive here was good and uneventful. I arrived Friday afternoon and was immediately in awe of the beauty of this place. The lake, the mountains, the trees, all of it is amazing! I really just wanna jump in the lake but it's kind of freezing still. Everyone I've met is super nice and I've enjoyed spending time with the whole group of summer staff. Um, let's see here...I have 3 roommates who seem pretty cool.
I'm discovering that the Campus House key words for mission trips, patience and flexibility, are going to be super important here as well. I haven't really known what's going on since I've been here which is pretty frustrating to me. I'm trying to remember that mantra of patience and flexibility to remind me that that people who need to know what's going do know and that I'll be filled in if and when I need to.
Today the summer staff all loaded up and went to church together in El Dorado. The church was really great and I loved going with all of the staff to worship together. We now have the afternoon free until cooking out all together tonight once everyone has arrived. I took the free time to enjoy some quiet time on a solo hike. I found a place to put my hammock up and now I'm just chilling out and enjoying the beauty of creation.
This place is cool. God is going to do some cool things this summer and I cannot wait.

Getting the grade

2 Days ago I entered the classroom of my friend and former teacher, Rachel Shuck. I was visiting so that she could proof read my Spanish paper as she has all of my Spanish papers for the past 4 years. And you know what? 

She told me that my writing has gotten good and that she can really see improvement. 

And right then, I decided that I could not care less about what my professor says about this paper. 

I can guarantee that he will rip it to pieces. 

But that doesn't matter. 

Because the person whose Spanish 1 class I sat in nearly 8 years ago told me that she can see my writing improving each time she reads my papers. 

And that's what matters to me. 

Because that means I'm learning. 

That means my knowledge of the language I love is ever improving.

And this pretty much sums up my feelings about grades in general. 

I sometimes say that ruining my GPA was the best thing for me because I realized that the 4.0 cumulative would ever happen again after that. Since then, I'm content to learn and d my best but not kill myself for an A.

I've been thinking about grades quite a bit lately thanks to an education class I had this semester and I'm over it. I think that grades give kids the wrong motivation in school and that they are totally overrated. 

That being said, I'm very interested to find out what other people think about this. So tell me what you think...do we need grades? Are they helpful or harmful? Why do you think this?

Can't wait to hear your thoughts!