crash

This year, the beginning of my post-camp crash coincided exactly with my crashing back into school and work. Sunday I bid adieu to the Brits, and spent some time at Lorettas. Monday I dropped a Kiwi off at the airport and came straight down to school.

The road trip was awesome - an excellent chance to let loose (in legal and mostly appropriate ways), and try not to think about all the responsibility waiting for me. I saw Cleveland, Chicago and parts of Wisconsin. I shot a shotgun and ate a corn dog for the first time. How American. We read Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince aloud in its entirety and listened to a whole lot of musicals. How nerdy.

Now I'm at school. I have a room at seminary on Monday and Tuesday nights. Yesterday I walked up to Wisconsin Ave and checked out an outdoor store that I've been wanting to see. They sell climbing stuff and clothes from Patagonia!!!! Today I went to my first class and bought A LOT of books.

Being back at school makes me feel really awkward and shy again. And young. And inexperienced. During chapel I was thinking about the fact that I am (deep down) grateful that I can relate to a lot of the things that my middle and high schoolers are going through. I'm awkward and shy and experiencing the first day of school. I am still in a stage of life where crushes and talking to boys are... a challenge. I don't exactly know what I'm going to do with my life long term. As much as I dread some of these awkward experiences, I am constantly aware that God is with me through even the silliest of my struggles. It means a lot to me that I can walk these paths with (although a little ahead of) the youth I serve, and I can say from experience that God is with us.

I <3 DC

Today was my first day back at school, and I'm actually really glad to be back. I'm feeling rested (spiritually, that is), and have a renewed excitement about my calling. I went to my first class, Gospel in a Consumer Culture, which is going to be really cool. Except that there's a lot of reading. I think this will be a good chance to make some social justice-y friends.

Class got out early, so I paid tuition, bought books, validated my library card, and found myself falling asleep in the student lounge with 2 1/2 more hours until dinner. I tried to take a nap in my car, but that didn't really work, so instead I drove down the street to Starbucks. I sat on a stool in the window and did some reading, but mostly I looked out the window and thought about how much I love being in DC. I would love to walk down every Monday, but I won't usually have enough time unless I come early.

The Starbucks is right across from the American University Law Library, so I was surrounded by the kind of humanities/social science major conversations that make me miss Mike Buck. There were also a few pockets of stubbly be-hoodied law student (read: guys in their twenties), so I may invite Marti to come hang out with me there sometime. Who knows, maybe I'll be sitting there someday and some Christian law student will come up to me and say, "Are you reading Following Christ in a Consumer Culture? I love that book!"

DC is just so pretty and full of interesting places, that I'm looking forward to the days when I'll be one campus enough to go out and explore.