maybe tomorrow

hello again. i have returned from chicago and have a few days yet before i must go sprinting off again. i'm really way too busy this summer, its flown by. like, i haven't even bothered to start a back to school countdown yet. usually by the middle of july i'm counting down days and haunting back to school supply sections. i haven't gone completely unaffected by the scent of new notebooks, though. i passed by the back to school sections in target and kroger today, and i now have an irresistable urge to completely organize my room. everything- closet, desk, dresser, under the bed, bookshelves...crazy talk, as many of you know, because it would take weeks to do all that, and i leave again on wednesday. before i leave, though, i suppose i should write some about chicago, shouldn't i? well, i'm not one for big cities in general- too big, noisy, and confusing for my taste- but chicago was beautiful, and if i was going to live in a city, i'd live there in a heartbeat. plus, it has lake michigan. my favorite spot was the bare stretch of marina between the planetarium and the aquarium, where you can look across and see the skyline, and see lake michigan stretching forever as well. the edge of the world, as abby says. the entire trip is a blur, we did so much so fast, but i'll see what i can remember off hand. the blue man show, thats first thing i remember after that marina. they were absolutely awesome. they were kind of like stomp, only they acted like mimes and made each number into a little comedy skit. they were really big on audience participation, too, and it was just a blast. and we got to see a dolphin show at the aquarium, and beluga whales. the planetarium wasn't too exciting really. the omnimax show there was actually disappointing, to tell the truth, although the preshow interactive screen thingie was good times. we toured chicago in good weather by a boat down the river, and also by bus during downtown traffic in the rain (the ferry tour was more enjoyable and more informative and interesting). we went up sears tower, pretty views. we stopped at a thousand and one gift shops, maybe more. when we went to navy pier, me devan, abby, jessica, and katie all walked down to a beach, which was really neat. it was a small beach but it formed a ninety degree angle with the city, so that immediately on your left is the beautiful chicago skyline and stretching forever in front of you is lake michigan. we went to a mcdonalds of the future- other than decorations and size, nothing was different from your mcdonalds of the present except everything was about twice as expensive- five bux for a kids meal, almost! museum of science and industry was nice, we played video games and bought grow-your-own corn out of one of those quarter machines. oh, and we 'drove' a tractor. that should cover most everything, i believe. tour, musuem, planetarium, marina, aquarium, tower, blue man, beach, navy pier, ferry tour...yep, i think i covered everything.


Philosophy is the talk on the cereal box, religion is the smile on the dog.

neunundneunzehg luftballons

well, today was an interesting day at work. apparently, our ice machine was leaking water, and we had an older lady slip and fall. at first i was afraid she'd broken something, but the worst of it, i think, was that she'd hit her head and she had a cut around her eye from her glasses that was bleeding pretty badly. they called an ambulance, though, just to be safe, and everyone was gawking and staring and asking what happened.

thursday night was our summer academy presentation for upward bound. since our theme all summer has been the science of art, our presentation was 'a night at a german kaffehouse' (and i know i spelled that wrong). we all got to dress in black and be beatniks, and it was quite fun. and then melinda and her tech whiz brother had put together slideshows of pictures of us spliced with music videos, so me and abby and brij and karma and jesse and a few others were all dancing on the sides of the room and having a good time. and then we did a singalong to the 80s song 99 luftballons by nena, in original german, and it was fun, but sad also, because me and abby decided the song was dedicated to dieter, our german teacher, because we might not ever see him again, as he's not coming to chicago. he hadn't realized that yet, when we pointed it out to him, and he seemed to be in denial of that fact, and said he'd visit during saturday academys.

and i am still slowly posting mexico posts, i've got the first three up now.



ninetynine dreams i have had, in everyone a red balloon. its all over and i'm standing pretty, in this dust that was a city. if i could find a souveneir, just to prove the world was here...and here is a red balloon, i think of you and let it go.

Now Two of My Graduation Tickets are Promised Away

I just found out that Mrs. B is transferring to Wyoming School District. *tears* for me, at least, choir was mrs. b and mrs b was choir and its going to be so different now. and theres a chance, and it might be a good one at that, that the school board will hire someone to teach just choir and drop show choir, and they can't do that, not now that we finally got our show choir working right. and if we do have a show choir i know it will be run completely differently, and that could be a good thing, but it will be different, and i didn't want this much change for my senior year. and i don't know if i can convince abby to be in show choir if mrs. b isn't going to be the director, and mrs b wont be the one at music awards night giving us seniors dr seuss books and crying for us and even if the new choir teacher is wonderful it won't be the same because she still won't know us and love us as much as mrs b did. what is wrong with our school district that teachers who care for us and love us as much as mr begley and mrs barton did and do are being offered such good offers that they simply cant refuse them? whatever it is, it needs to be fixed, because i cant picture anyone teaching choir but mrs b, i just cant. and i know its too late now, but i dont care. and we wont just be able to talk to this new choir teacher, because she won't really know us yet, and that kind of repertoire won't be established for several months, and we won't be able to convince her to do the songs we want for show choir, or maybe we will, i don't know, but right now it feels like we won't. because i know mrs b. probably would have seriously considered rainbow connection and break away to fit into her theme of dreams for this year, at least would have considered break away, but now we very likely won't even have the theme of dreams, and i don't know, everythings all messed up.

*breathe*

but, it's not like i'm never going to see her again. i'm going up to the sca performance on saturday, where i will see her, and shes trying to arange a saturday for us (not sure who all is included in that, but probly several first period kids at least) to get together, and we can vist her at wyoming the same way we do begley at little miami, although i'm pretty sure wyoming is further away. but it isn't the end of the world, it really isn't. and it could turn out to be a good change for the choir program. and she is coming to our graduation, no matter what. but we really need to do something to keep the other districts from taking away all of our good teachers, because thats what they're doing.



"100 years from now, it wont matter how much you made, what kind of car you drove, what sort of house you lived in. But, 100 years from now, the world will be a better place because you made a difference in the life of a child!"

Dorothy has returned from OZ

okay, many of you may be thinking i have abandoned my blog, because i don't think i talked much about my trip on here, but i have just returned from a mission trip to mexico. (33 hours in a van. what fun) actually though, it was awesome, but instead of one reaaaaaaaaaaallllllly long post, i kept a journal while i was down there, and i'm just going to post each one under the date i wrote it, so all entries from july 5 to today are actually new. make sense? good. it might take a while, becuase i wrote a lot and i'm tired, but i'll do my best.


God is a good god, he is a great god, he can do anything but fail. he can move any mountain out of your way (out of your way), our god is a wonderful god.

Mexican Elephants and Coca Cola Engagement Rings

Its too early. Ok, anyway, more about yesterday. if i like skip around a lot, firgive me, theres a lot of little details i want to mention and they may be out of order. yesterday we started off with a tour of piedras negras. two things really stuck with me from that. one, the city isn't an endless sea of poverty. there are plenty of middle and upper class families, with nice cars, houses, and grass (grass is really really hard to grow in mexico). but on the other hand, two, going up on a hill in the government housing section and looking back and seeing government housing as far as you could see in what seemed like every direction. what else about yesterday? so much happened, its hard to remember it all. it feels like weve been here a lot longer than two nights. then after dinner, we walked all around their walmart equivalent, which was called...i forget. and i had my first true spanish exchange, when i bought an ice cream cone. they put chocolate syrup on my cone, which made it very messy. not sure if they usually do that or just misunderstood what i was asking. tori and gabby just came back from their home visit.
-Later-
okay, onto today, because so much is happening i cant remember anything that happened over, like, ten hours ago. so today we went to a river for worship and swimming. it was so amazingly awesome. i mean, i swam in a river in mexico. how cool is that? it was really pretty around there too.
-Later-
wow. there is so much happening. i could use a pensieve. its one of those times where there are so many things happening that if you try to remember every single thing, you forget most of them, and lose the moment in trying to remember it. we had our festival today. we did our clown skit (we as in the nine of us from goshen) and then the tribute group did their show choir thing. they were so amazingly awesome. words cannot describe how awesome they were. the entire thing was in spanish, and they still brought tears to my eyes. it was so moving and just fantastic. and i'd say about fifty people were saved, which is great. and there was this adorable little girl, about four, whose name i don't remember, but i call yellow flower because there was one on her shirt. anyway, at one point, she actually got up on the risers and started trying to dance with them. then she came over and was giving me a high five, and then ten, and then i started teaching her patty cake. and she grabbed my fingers and twirled around. she nearly twisted my fingers off, but she was adorable. oh, and i remember somehting from small group at the river i wanted to write down. we were talking aabout gods purpose for us and how we learn from good and bad things that happen to us. i think that can be one of the biggest stumbling blocks in peoples faith, is that bad things happen to good people, and how can a loving god permit that? but god never said bad things only happen to bad people. if god allowed his own son, who never did anything wrong at all, to be crucified, then there's no reason we shouldn't have our own share of tribulation (cool word there) as well. the important thing is, god always has a greater purpose in store, even if we don't know what it is, and if we trust him, he will help us through.


My precious, precious child, I love you and I would never leave you. During your times of trial and suffering, when you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I carried you

Squeakin Creaket

Its still so nice here. its about seven in the morning, ten minutes till breakfast. it actually feels really nice out here. its going to get hot later, but now its about seventy with no humidity. last night we broke into groups of eight, and i'm very happy with my group. our leader is baret, and then we have me, gabby, megan, david, linda, cj, sam, and bob. i know gabby of course, and megan is the girl whose house we stayed at, and david i met last night, playing cards. we played egyptian ratscrew (which their church has developed the clever habit of shortening to ers) and a new game he taught us called shooter. last night we also had a very humorous demostration of the rules, and signed up for our 3 minute shower slots. i don't think i'll have too much trouble with that, but a lot of people will. mmm, breakfast smells good. it turns out that breakfast is pancakes sausage and such, lunch will be sandwiches, and only dinners will be authentic mexican food. this is a relief to my picky eater syndrome. actually, i had a cheese quesadilla last night, and it wasn't bad. it tasted like a grilled cheese. and now i think it is almost my color's breakfast time. i'll go read my devotional for today really quick. and i'll do that inside, becuase josh is chirping and all the people who've never heard it are obsessing again
-Later-
i feel better now. okay. well, we worked on our houses today. our house is mostly painting work, its been painted twice already, but hte colors didn't match right, so we have to paint the entire house. we used one bucket of paint fine, opened the second one, same number, all that, but guess what- it was a different color. me and betsy managed to finish all of our room in the original color, though. anyway, i got dragged into too many card games, and we didn't finish nertz until a couple minutes before lights out, so more later.


Better is one day in your courts, better is one day in your house, better is one day in your courts than thousands elsewhere, than thousands elsewhere.

Oh, You're The Clowns

its hard to write on bumpy roads. its even harder because i just have a couple small pieces of paper that Tori gave me, as my notebook is in my luggage in the penske truck. right now our vans are all in one line (ducks in a row) and dwe're having quiet time for prayers and devotions, and i am suddenly struck by how cool all this is. i mean, we've got a hundred people all gathered together who love jesus all traveling to the same place for the same purpose, which is to spread the word of god. i don't know, it just kind of struck me how awesome that is. now people are starting to talk again, though, all our inide jokes- nananana, frosted flakes, your just jealous, quiet you... then every once in a while, something reminds me of a joke i have with someone back home- uneven pavement, D Lizard, finding nemo, nicht bless you, treble clef Gs, broken watches, i win, cute couple... i do miss everybody, but i don't think its so much that I'm homeick already, but that i know i'm nto going to see anyone for two weeks and i'm mising them in advance... if that makes any sense. if nicole was on time, abby and corey and bethy and kayla and the rest of em will be waiting for her to get her powerpoint of the day up. or they'll be headed to the computer lab. i'm glad on the way back we're driving straight thru without stopping overnight.
-Later-
okay, now we'er sitting on some side street in eagle pas, which is the town we're crosing the border in. we had to get off our van and on a bus, and now...we;re just sitting. we opened our last envelope a little bit before we got to eagle pa. we had to wrap someone from our van in duct tape. we wrapped josh. we didn't win, we actually did very badly, but we had a lot of fun. i got a headache from the heat and laughing o much, though. hey, we're moving. air is flowing thru the windows. ahh. i was able to buy a bottle of water and sit inside for a bit inbetween the van and the bu, though, so my headache is getting better. and we moved about five yards and now we're sitting again. i really hope we get across the border without problems and don't have to wait over ix hours like they did 2 years ago, according to megan. and we're really off this time, okay. alright, supposedly the bues get to go thru to the church although the trucks have to stay and be inventoried. however the next official we passed told us to park. and o we sit, sweltering. turns out we parked becuase if we just parked the trucks it would take them forever to get down here. having eighty of us wait with our stuff should speed them up a bit (its 80, not 100, because people on the first three vans didn't have to switch to buses and went straight to the church) o we're itting in the shade behind the buses. its actually not o bad. it is really hot, but theres hardly any humidity, theres some breeze, and like i said, its shade. boring though. i suppose i could always read over tori's shoulder- she borrowd HpatSS from me. and they should really wash these loading docks they're filthy. okay, i don't know when we got here, but its 6.00.
still here 6.30. we decided earlier today that sarahs shirt made her look like a firecracker popsicle, and now she's decided that my tiedied shirt makes me look like cotten candy.
its 7.00. i've been told by reliable sources (ie sarah) we'd been here since at least 5.00.
7.10 headed dback onto bues. I have now officially seen real palm trees. sadly, they do not wiggle. this place is so neat. its not what you would think of for mexico- ramshackle buildings, dirty, surly mexicans, etc. its this really tidy, sturdy little church, and everyone's really friendly. i mean, it feels like a real mision place, with a courtyard and playgroundand little kids and everything. well, thats because it is a real mision. i guess thats it then, that it all feels so real. but its after lights out and its hard to write in the dark, o details later.


do not let any unwholesome words come out of your mouth, but only what is useful for building others up, according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen (ephesians 4.29, hehe.)

Pillow Huggers Club

Well, we're on our way to Mexico. Actually, to our hotel in Texas. And actually, we're not moving at all, we're sitting in an Applebees parking lot because the group we hooked up with an evansville thinsks that the 90 of them can walk into a crowded applebees without reservations. but I'm getting ahead of myself. The trip to evansville was fairly uneventful. i was riding in the PHiL family van, and they had enough chips to feed a couple armies. once we got there, their church was the size of two of our high schools, at least. we were on our way to the fireworks by 7.45 and the fireworks weren't supposed to start till 9.00. however, we stopped at a hardees on the way to the firworks, and it was officially the slowest hardees in the history of the world. then by 8.15 we were on our way again, but they were shooting fireworks off already because a storm was comng. it started pouring when the grand finale went off, but it was actually neat to watch with the ligthning, thunder, rain, wind, and fireworks all togehter. it was less cool when it was pouring rain on strange dark roads with tons of people and cars trying to leave at once. when it was juli'es turn to go some car came out of nowhere and slammed on its brakes right in front of us, and then the rude angry lady and her son thought we hit them, even though she could put her hand between the cars. anyway, we spent the night at different family's houses. me tori and ashley stayed with megan, and she had a really nice house. we left this morning a little after 5.30. we have eight different 12-15 passenger vans. us cool goshen kids get a van to ourselves, which is nice. its cool to watch the nine of vans going down the highway. every so often we open envelopes that have tasks for us to do.the first was to unscramble a bible verse, then we had window chalk to write our names on the windows (although we had to redo it at the next stop because we didn't realize the windows were tinted so you couldn't see it) and when we stopped for gas they gave us seven dollars- five dollars to give to someone not connected with our group to help get gas, and two dollars to buy someone who wasn't with our group a drink.the idea was to serve on the way down to mexico as well as on the actual mission. it was actually pretty nice to be able to surprise people like that. anyway, this most recent gas stop, which was also a dinner stop, they pulled into applebees. two big problems- Jal allotted only six dollars per meal. equally problematic, there were 90 of them, and they didn't call ahead, they just showed up. we smart goshen kids went to some fast food place. but were back on the road now, so so be it.


So here is what i want you to do. God helping you, take your ordinary, everyday lives, your eating, sleeping, working, walking around lives, and place them before God as an offering.