the beginning of the end of new beginnings

i fought the heaviness, blinked my eyes, and rubbed the right side of my neck. the blanket scratched my collarbone like a burlap sack, where the oversized sweatshirt didn't quite cover all of y freezing-cold skin. i pulled my knees closer to my body to cover my toes, where that awfulfucking blanket didn't quite reach. at least yoga had done me some good.

i rubbed my eyes and felt the swelling where a wasp had stung my right eye, less than 24 hours earlier. i should've known. the universe was trying to tell me. nothing good can come from going out with a swollen eye. i hadn't had benadryl for over the allotted six hours, and it had swelled back to half-closed; pink and itchy. oozing. or maybe it was just that bed-mat, infested with germs from the last dead-beat female delinquent who had previously spent the night here; cold and itchy and alone.

i heard the door slowly creak open, the clatter of women's holding cell 3 shake with rage at being disturbed so early in the morning.

"Breakfast," the elderly cook squawked at me and the small brunette girl curled up on the other corner of the bench, furthest from the cold, steel toilet and matching sink. the old woman's hoarse voice betrayed what we were all thinking; 6 a.m. is too damn early.

i rolled toward the door and watched as Starr, my holding cell mate, presumably in for petty theft and not her first offense, stood wobbly from her bed mat.

"Do ya'll have coffee?" she rasped.

"No," the old lady answered, and handed her a yellow plastic tray filled with unidentifiable substance, all of the same general color and consistency. i didn't move from my spot on the bench. And then, presumably directed at me,

"Better eat. You don't get fed again till lunch. There's no snacks in jail."

I didn't respond. Instead, kicked my feet to the ground, slid on my plastic-y, orange slide-ons, courtesy of Kerr County, and made the short half stumble, half-crawl over to the door. She handed me the tray and i took it back to my spot, set it down, and stared. No way do i put any of that shit in my mouth. I looked up and Starr was drinking from her carton of 2% milk, facing the dingy white wall with her back to me. I thought of requesting soy milk just to see what that cranky old bitch would say to me. The thought made me laugh out loud, but it came out more like a dry cough, reminding me that the last thing i had to drink was a fruit-punch-flavored Four Loko. too bad i never got to finish it.

i worked up the nerve to pick up my spoon. and slowly lifted a mound of what i deduced to be apple sauce, into my mouth. my stomach turned as i swallowed it and i immediately felt the bile rise up into my throat.

nope.

i pushed the tray away from me and laid back down on the hard, white bench.

but this 4x4 cell block, empty, cold and gray as a raincloud in april, isn't where my story begins. this is where it ends.

damn.

it's the end of the summer. and i haven't posted since june. essentially, this matters to no one but myself, as all my crazy adventures have mostly been lived and, as we all know, memories don't live like people do.

as a brief recap, i suppose, i made some of the most amaaaazing friends. ever. again. i've learned who i can trust. blah blah blah. working at camp has been a really great, humbling experience. kids with special needs will hold a special place in my heart forevaaaa...maybe i'll want to work with them sometime in the future? there were a special few that really made an impact on my life...

that being said, one of the most memorable parts of my summer was my week off after 5 weeks of Handicap camp.

one of the first weeks of camp, maybe after H2 or H3, one of the counselors got fired because he just wasn't...right for the job? i guess that's what they told him. sadly, for so many of us at camp, he was an amaaazing person and friend, so much fun, and i was finally just getting to know him during his last week as a counselor. O was his name, and he is from egypt but goes to school at a huuuuge important school in east texas.

well, when he got fired he decided to go back and live at his apartment for the rest of the summer, rather than go immediately back to egypt. so, during our week off my friend E and i went to east texas to visit our friend. we partied every night, slept all day, and ate free birds like it was going out of style (hint: it's not. midwest, you do not know what you are missing out on. this food is bombbb.)

well, my friend E and i had an interesting relationship this summer..? he was the wing leader of my brother unit, so my...wing leader brother i guess, since i was the wing leader of my...wing. right. so, we hung out a lot, on all our nights off and on the weekend. our friendship took a turn...if you get what i'm saying. if not, that's fine too. but people quickly caught on to the idea that we were really close, and had just about the weirdest friendship they had ever witnessed. "no one understandsss usss" was uttered more than once a day when people made comments about our interactions, and lack of interactions during camp hours. ha. so anyway.

the thing about E is that he has a gf back home, that i did not initially know about. well, it maybe wouldn't have made that much of a difference, as we were really only going to be spending this summer together and quite possibly never see each other again. ouch. except, that when his gf found out he had decided to spend his week off with two of his faaaavorite people in the world and not her, pleased she was not. possibly also because less than a week earlier he had informed her of the less-than-socially-acceptable relationship we were engaged in.

so, gf came to O's apartment one afternoon, giving her unfaithful bf an ultimatum: come with me and live, stay with them and die. or something. he made it sound that dramatic. so he left. O and i were sad, but we drank away our sorrows...and such and the next day E came back, feeling sorry for what he had done and acting like such a pussalia i almost couldn't look him in the eyes.

needless to say, E and i's relationship hasn't been the same since then, and as much as i care about him and as important of a person he was in my life for 8 or so weeks...8 or so weeks is only 8 or so weeks of my life. the struggle that i am faced with now is whether or not such a friendship is worth the one-sided effort to keep up, or if giving up and letting go is the healthiest and smartest thing to do. for once, i would like the decision i make when i follow my heart to be the smart decision.

maybe happiness is too much to ask for.

'teach people to be different. that's all!' i shouted after her as the taxi moved off. that is joy. happiness would be feeling satisfied with everything she already had - a lover, a son, a job. and Athena, like me, wasn't born for that kind of life." - paulo coelho, the witch of portabello

i'm feeling rough, i'm feeling raw in the prime of my liiifffeee

whoa, i meant to post a new blog at the end of last week, but now it's been two weeks of events that i've missed updating!

well, i went into camp last monday morning to help set do some set up, a.k.a. folding staff and camper tshirts. while there i met some of the leadership staff who was there already, preparing for training of the rest of the staff. i also met D, a 20 year old from the same town where camp was being held. he wasn't really supposed to be there yet either, so one of our bosses had us start folding tshirts with some of the other volunteers. he was officially the first person i "met", and the first friend i made.

well...fast forward about a week and a half to training week for the rest of the staff. i met a ton of awesome people, the kind of people i love for the fact that we are all there for the same thing. we love to help people, we want to see kids who don't feel like they deserve to be happy have the BEST summer of their lives. it's really amazing to see that there are actually good people in the world, and i work with a whole mess of them.

there are staff at camp from australia and new zealand (which of looooovvvveee, of course), egypt, etc. so great. and all over texas and the south (except for me, haha). there are a whole lot of girls in my unit that i love. anyway...so back to D. apparantlyyy he said some hurtful things about his AL (his boss, essentially) and word got back to her, she told our bosses, and they thought it would be better that he just not be around any more this summer. so he got fired. but not before we (well, he because no one knew it was me) caused the first scandallll of the summer because people saw him and some "mystery girl" walking around camp late at night. hahaha. go me.

so then the first campers came and it was a learninggg experience to say the least. we had 6 girls; 2 with scoliosis, 1 with cp, 1 hearing impaired, 1 double amputee, and 1 girl with the craziest disease i have ever heard of. she was essentially a quad - no use of any of her appendages. she wore diapers and rode around in a wheelchair, which was uncomfortable for her so she was always in pain. it was a challenge with her more than anything, to say the least, and i learned A LOT about myself, my bunkhouse, and what we're going to be able to do this summer which, turns out, is pretty much anything.

last night, on our 24-hour night off, i hung out with some of my co-staff. it was dramatic. there is so much drama between the 150 people who work there than the 4 years that i was in college. good thing i'm used to it. haha. but i heard a lotttt about the drama from last year, got all caught up, and heard about what's already been going on this summer. i still wonder if anyone has heard about me, the "mystery girl", but i don't want to ask. i'm just pretending it's my little secret. haha. speaking of which, i got to chat with D for a bit before bed...

never never land

i start training for camp today! woo! i'm nervous, but so excited. it's time for a new adventure. x

Dance

"When I dance, I'm a free woman, or, rather, a free spirit who can travel through the universe, contemplate the present, divine the future, and be transformed into pure energy. And that gives me enormous pleasure, a joy that always goes far beyond everything I've experienced or will experience in my lifetime." - Paulo Coelho, The Witch of Portobello

the alchemist

"Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams."

i've been kind of a bum lately, waking up mostly just to do yoga and some zumbaaa classes. haha. however, today i decided to start a little job searching, for after my summer of camping adventures. i applied for jobs all over the place: chicago, seattle, new york. turns out i have no idea what i want or where i want to be. all i know is that if i'm not helping people, serving people DIRECTLY so that i get to see results, i won't be following my path, finding the magic. i remember realizing in jamaica that constantly learning and serving is the only way i've ever felt fulfilled. i crave it. it's crazy. i can't wait.

follow your heart and you won't get lost

i'm a college graduate! i can't believe this day has actually come, and i'm not just saying that to be cheesy and cliche. until about a week ago, i was hanging by a string, waiting for my grades back from macroeconomics. if i didn't pass that class, i wasn't graduating. and i'm not going to lie, i barely did. but i DID IT. and that's all that matters. i now have a B.A. degree in Psychology. win!

the last couple of weeks have been emotional...well, as emotional as i get. you know. i've made SO MANY new friends in the past year and, in the end, couldn't be happier. i've learned the importance of good friends, and meeting new people who change your life. i'm leaving wisconsin, maybe for the final time, with the most amazing memories and people i love who i know i can always come back to.

but now it's time for a new adventure...TO TEXAS! i'm so excited to be working at the Texas Lions Camp for disabled youth this summer as a wing leader for 9 weeks. i haven't really been to summer camp, as a camper or counselor, since high school. it will be an experience, that's for sure. if the next chapter of my life is as exciting and ridiculous as the last, i couldn't be more excited. xx