So What do I do?

Well, I am having a hard time being an RA. No, not with my freshman girls - not with the rules - not with questions. But with dealing with everyone in my life. I want to hang out with old Pittman. I want to hang out with my new RA friends. I want to hang out with my new girls. I want to hang out with David and Tyler. I want to keep in touch with Noah's people. I want to skype SB.

What do I do?
I feel like I end up blowing everyone off.
I don't know how to balance everything.
There is no time in the world.

--

But either way.

One word: Freedom.
I feel so free. And not just spurts of freedom, but real, true freedom.
Free of judgment. Free of fear. Free of failure. Free of bitterness. Free of Nate. Free of Fairhope people. Free from the past. Free from anxiety about the future.
Just free.
And it is so wonderful.
I know "Free to Dance" is some cheesy little saying, but tonight, when I was dancing wildly/wrecklessly in front of the entire Samford class of 2014 and at the 90's party, I felt so much freedom. I was wild, sweaty, and ridiculous. And I was having the time of my life. It was so much fun.
Thank you, Jesus, for your grace that brings freedom - your love that covers fear - your forgiveness that allows me to forgive others - your strength that brings joy out of pain.

--

I know I've probably posted these pictures already this summer, but I like them.

So We Need It

Well. Yesterday after lunch, instead of being at a meeting that I was supposed to be at (I got confused by a text I received from my SRA, and I ended up making it to the meeting.. 15 minutes late), Kaleigh and I went to Salvation Army. After wandering around, looking, and laughing, we made our way to the back. We found a tiny, child-sized trampoline. After jumping on it, we decided we needed it. But it was $20. Way too expensive.

Small pause: Today, my girls moved in. I had 3 girls who were already here, for orientation or band, but the rest moved in today! So I did a lot, let me rephrase that - a TON - of talking to parents, checking in on rooms, walking around, answering questions, pretending like I knew what I was talking about, etc. Lots of things. Lots of words.

Anyways, back to my story. Today, after move-in, Kaleigh and I went to lunch. After lunch, we went to Salvation Army. Again. And of course, we jumped on the trampoline. Again. However, I could not be convinced that the trampoline was worth $20.

At our RA dinner tonight at Jim-n-Nicks, Kelsey convinced me to make an announcement about it. So I stood on a chair, hit my knife against my glass, and immediately started laughing. But then I said "Guys, there is a child-sized trampoline at Salvation Army. I've jumped on it twice. It's $20.00 and it is very jumpy. We need it for the central campus office. If every just gives about 75 cents, we can have it. It can be ours!"

I now have $13.46 and at least two pledges for $1. We have almost reached our goal.

But the question of the day is: why do we need a trampoline?

I mean, what in the world? A trampoline?? Haaha.

Anyways, I am so tired from being so social. Being ridiculous is so tiring.

So He's the President

Well the past week has been lonng. Lots of preparation for little freshman. Paperwork. Door tags. Letters. It's also been pretty boring. Lots of power-points and being inside. But it's also been really fun. I've met a lot of really cool people that I didn't know last year, and now I'm good friends with them. I like them a lot.

Anyways, all of the RA's had a breakfast with the president of our school this morning. And after that meeting, I emailed this to him. This is exactly what I said. Copy and paste.

"Dr. Westmoreland,
My name is Liz Vincent, and I am an RA in Pittman, so I was at the breakfast this morning where you mentioned gutting and renovating Pittman. I lived in Pittman last year and loved it, which is the reason why I requested to be an RA here this year. I just wanted to say thank you so much for saving Pittman. You are a winner, and winning is for winners.


Liz Vincent"

Yes. I told the President of Samford University that he is a winner, and that winning is for winners. For the win.

----

Also, I forgot to say this last week. But on my last trip of the summer, when we were getting ready to go, I run up with life-jackets for my boat. I go "Here are some life-jackets, ladies," and start to hand them out. Then I hear, "Actually, my name is Joel."

Oh gosh.

Among the other 6 girls in my boat was a Canadian boy with really long hair, that he wore down. He looked more like an ugly girl than a boy. But yeah - after I said "ladies" he definitely called me out and let me know that he was a boy. Great start to my last trip ever.

----

Well that is all for now. I am going to try to write more soon. I've been slacking a lot this week.

So It's Over

Well, I’m sitting here in Denver International Airport, waiting to board my plane to St. Louis, where I will have a short layover, before I fly to Birmingham. Jeff and I arrive in Birmingham at 2:45 and I have to be checked in at Samford before 4:30, and RA training starts at 5. Big day.

But good news. Last night, Jeff and I, and our friend Kate Onion, spent the night at the house of our friend, Connie, who lives about an hour away from DIA. We woke up at 4:15 yesterday morning, brought our friend the King to the airport, then went back to Connie's house and napped and hung out all day. All of that to say, last night, after dinner, Connie and Kate and I found a picture and the last name of my destiny love, Carson. He's from LA, was a really good lacrosse player in high school, and was a first year guide at Wilderness Aware rafting this summer. One night, two of my friends and I went to guide dinner, which is a free, weekly dinner at a church in BV for all of the guides in the valley. While we were there, I see this boy walk by, and I say "I am going to meet that boy before the summer is over." And my friend, Daniel Walsh, as Carson goes walking by, says, "Hey Carson, I just wanted you to meet my friend Liz." And Carson, who had just taken his name tag off, so there was no reason that Daniel should have known his name (I just knew it from earlier creeping), looks really confused, shakes my hand, and then asks where we were from. When we told him Noah's Ark, he goes, "Oh, I'm guiding for y'all tomorrow morning" (we had a reallly busy morning, so we had to rent two guides) and makes some other small talk for a few minutes.

I could not believe it.

Not only had I just met the boy I half jokingly said that I would meet, but he was guiding for us the next morning. So that whole night, I joked about how Carson and I would fall in love, because it was destiny. But guess what? Carson was freaking in my pod. I saw him a couple of other times throughout the rest of the summer, and I'm not entirely convinced that it is destiny, but who knows - it could happen. Anyways, here's a picture of him. By the time I met him, his hair was longer and we was tanner. So looking cuter than this picture.





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Ok, my computer died so I couldn't write more on the airplane or during our layover.
But now I am back at Samford.
Sitting.
Inside.
All day.
Listening to power-points.
About who knows what.
I can't handle it.
It's ridiculous compared to rowing, hiking, or repelling every day.
And the humidity is unbearable.
I didn't realize how bad it was.

But besides all of those negative things, I have my own room. In Pittman. It's a single room, so it's small, but I like it. Like a lot.
I'll try to post some pictures once I get it finished. I have very few things in my room, as of right now. The main decoration I have so far is my We Are Tokyo poster, on the ceiling above my little bed. So nothing else really matters, since I have that.

I'll try to write some more later, with some more details.

So it was the Best ONB Ever

Well business is slowing down here, because the rafting season is almost over, so instead of sitting around and doing nothing, we do "projects." When you show up at 8:00 am, you have no idea what your day could entail. For example, Monday, I washed wetsuits, cleaned out the boys' body shop, and spray painted hand-washing stations. And today, I dusted/cleaned logs in the lodge, cleaned the girls' body shop, washed coolers, and sorted/counted paddles. It's weird to do things besides raft/climb/backpack at work. But it can also be really fun.

While I was working on projects on Monday, I was informed that I was going on the overnight rafting trip (ONB) the following day, with Tony and Ben (two very attractive older guides here). Now most guides go on one or two ONBs a summer. But not this girl. I've been on six. I don't really know why. I guess they think I love them or something. Whatever.

So I show up to work at 10:00 am on Tuesday, and start gathering supplies and gear, and rigging the gear boat, which I was to row. After I grab lunch, I get river ready, finish rigging, and drag my boat up the eddy and get ready to leave. Right then, Tony comes running up and says that our group consists of two separate families and then one random guy who came by himself, and that neither of the families want him in their boats. So the +1 ended up in my boat. Yes, he was in the gear boat - sitting on the front, holding onto the straps for dear life. And think about it - anyone who would go on an overnight rafting trip by themselves is going to be a little odd. This character was 20 years old, decked out in all camo, and his voice still cracked when he spoke. And I got to row him through the whole canyon (and on Wednesday morning, after we dropped off the gear, I rowed him the last 8 miles as well).

But either way. We finally make it to camp, and we de-rigg the gear boat, and start setting up the kitchen. Since Tony (who calls himself Big T) and Ben are older, and male, I let them be in charge of setting up the kitchen tarp, and offer my assistance whenever possible. Now usually, we tie the tarp off to trees, use the two poles that it comes with, and then sometimes one oar. But not this kitchen tarp - Tony decides to use three oars, one of them right in the middle of the tarp, so it looks like a circus tent. From then on, the kitchen tarp was deemed Big T's Big Top. And as you can imagine, several other very funny things happened that night to make the ONB a clown show. It was so funny. And fun. And really weird.

But yeah. I did enjoy the ONB, but when I got home, a lot of my good friends had left to go home, and if I said goodbye at all, it was for like one second on the beach, before I left with my gear boat + 1. So that sucked.

So it's a Circus

Well, my family is here for the week, and it's a clown show. Of course my dad chose to stay in a ridiculously redneck place called the Thunder Lodge, that is a small group of these cabins, equipped with a community shuffleboard concrete slab. And the little boys are running wild, Em is doing nothing, Joe is watching tv, and my parents are walking everywhere (of course) and asking a trillion questions about this summer, whatever I did that day, and about the fall.

But it's really weird being around my family now, after being away from home for the past year. I didn't really spend much time at home in high school anyways, but I feel like I have grown up so much at school and Noah's, and learned how to be very independent. As a result, I don't really know how to relate to bickering little siblings anymore. I still love love love hanging out with Zach and Nathan, but it can get so frustrating when I'm at dinner with everyone, and the kids are tearing each other down to make themselves look better and just arguing about stupid things. I know everyone does that at least slightly, as a part of human nature, but they can get a little ridiculous.

And it's hard to find a good balance between spending time with them while they're out here, because I won't see them for another month or two, but also spending time with my friends from the summer who are leaving within the next week who I will only see once (and that's only if they go to the Gauley in West Virginia in September) before next summer. So it's been weird, but good and fun, having them out here.

That wasn't very interesting.. Pretty boring.


ps. crush status: over.

So Two Weeks Notice

Well I'm flying out on August 17th. In exactly two weeks I'll be in Birmingham, at Samford, for RA training.

Do I have to go back? I don't really know if I'll know how to go back. This summer has been the craziest, most challenging, best summer ever. I have met so many real people. I have been surrounded and encouraged by such a strong body of believers, and poured into by so many people, that it will be so hard to leave them and to go back into a community that is almost the exact opposite, in a lot of ways. I've been praying that God will change my heart and give me the desire to go back to school, but it hasn't exactly come just yet.. But I do have two more weeks.

Anyways, yesterday, a bunch of guides who had the day off went to the Royal Gorge, which is a section of 4 to 4+ white water about an hour and a half away from here that is way more intense than Browns Canyon. It was so much fun. After the big rapids were over, we all flipped on purpose, and then after we flipped our boats back over, had an all out brawl. People were jumping or swimming from boat to boat, throwing people in the water, deflating tubes, and wrestling on what was left of each raft. When we got to the take out, all 4 of our boats had at least two tubes almost fully deflated. It was so much fun.

At one point, during the battle, Abe threw me out of the boat for deflating their tubes, and swam after me. Then after they pulled me back into their boat and I started deflating it again, he put me in a headlock and picked my nose.

It was weird.

But the trip was so much fun. Here is a picture of the Gorge:

Today, I took my family down the river. Jeff just sat in the back and whistled and then played football with Drew, who was in the boat in front of us on a guide gut trip, so I guided the whole thing. So I spent a lot of time going after the ball, when one of them would miss it. It was fun though. And funny. None of my siblings or my parents had been rafting before, so they didn't really know what to expect, but they had a lot of fun. And the weather was really nice, and the water was at 1130 cfs, so it was sweeeet. A lot better than good old 680 cfs.

Well, that is all for now.


ps. I can't decide if I'm crushin' hard, letting it go, or giving up.