1) Immense thankfulness for the warm sun finally shining after so much rain
2) Stuffing myself with the best homemade salsa and guacamole I've ever tasted
3) Babysitting: Pretending to be a yellow Power Ranger, shooting "bad guys" with imaginary laser beams out of my hands, building a pillow fort and hosting a tea party with imaginary tea.
a good day indeed.
................................................................
I never realized how much I disliked TV journalism until today.
My dance improvisation class decided to have class outside on the campus lawn today. As we practicing, we were approached by a reporter and a cameraman from a big local news station. They asked if they could talk with us about a campus security alert that just went out today, and we said yes. The interview started out with pretty open ended question, but as it continued, the reporter became increasingly pushy in directing our answers towards particular soundbites she wanted. Clearly, we were supposed to sound like terrified, clueless students. After 30 minutes of questions, we were asked to give our names so they could identify us on the screen as they aired our clips. We all resoundingly refused to give our names....why would we identify ourselves talking about a security threat?! Rather than respecting our decision, the reporter and the cameraman both got upset, questioning us repeatedly about why we wouldn't share our names.
So that evening, in the 6:00 news, I show up in the headline story on the TV screen, looking like a complete slob in my dance clothes, with a couple of clips about why I thought students should be cautious. And of course, just as I guessed, the fact that we were "too afraid to even be identified by name" was one of the key points of their TV story. Funny how easily the media can manipulate things....
I spent the rest of my week home in the mountains with my family. There's nothing quite like driving back into clean, fresh mountain air and suddenly being surrounded by natural beauty everywhere you look. It was wonderful to be with my family (have I mentioned they are the best in the world?) and really sad to leave them Friday morning.
On Saturday, me and a few of my friends drove to Roxboro to spend some quality time with our friends Andrew and Katherine. That's the bummer about college....before you know what happened, your friends are married, buying a house have a baby. After visiting the Youth For Christ facility where Andrew and Katherine work, we crowded into their tiny little home for a great night of games, music, and great conversation until the wee hours of the morning. We slept in late and woke up to the biggest, most delicous brunch I've ever consumed. It was a wonderful weekend, thanks to some very gracious hospitality and amazing friends.
And now.....back to school, back to routine. One of my friends who is student teaching asked me if it was hard to go back to "real life" after this week. I had to stop and think for a minute, because I realized just how much spring break didn't feel like a vacation. It felt like "real life." Doing things I enjoy, reading books I've wanted to read for months, spending time with my family, enjoying the laughter and conversation of my friends....it all felt so much more real than the day to day grind of classes and homework.
On a final note, I recieved an email today telling me I AM ACCEPTED TO STUDY ABROAD AT UNIVERSITY OF STRATHCLYDE. I'll be picking classes and applying directly to the school this weekend. Glasgow, Scotland here I come!
.............................................................
currently listening to: the new U2 album, which is great if you happen to like U2 (I used to think everyone did, but I have recently been informed that I was sadly mistaken). Also, I can't seem to get enough of "Mostly Prove Me Wrong," by Fiction Family.
I never take trips by myself, and I thought now would be a good time to start.....with a day trip to the beach. I got up early on Monday and
drove three and a half hours to Wrightsville Beach. I just relaxed all day on the sand, reading, listening to music, walking in the waves, and taking a break for a seafood lunch. With the help of three shots of espresso, I made the long drive home that evening, happy, sleepy, and slightly sunburned.
It's a great way to spend a day.
After finishing my final midterm on Friday, my friends and I celebrated the inaguration of our weeklong break with a sunny ourdoor picnic and a
huge homemade pot of jambalya for supper. My rooomates and I took advantage of the beautiful weather Saturday morning by going on a run around the neighborhood, which we followed by stuffing ourselves with pizza at Mellow Mushroom!
That afternoon, I went with Lauren and Sarah in to a local lake on a boating adventure. We rented a rowboat and sailed out to the middle of the lake, where the bolts holding the oar in place suddenly broke off the boat. After drifting towards rocks for a while, we eventually realized the only way to make it back to the dock was to use our oars like canoe paddles. Lauren and I
paddled on each side of the boat up front, while Sarah alternated left and right in the back to steer us. The process was surprisingly slow and strenuous, and definitely made us use every ounce of upper body strength we had between us! We woke up Sunday with very sore arm muscles, but the experience was definitely worth it.
On Sunday we packed a picnic lunch and drove to Hanging Rock State Park for a fun day of hiking. The view from the trail summit was absolutely beautiful...totally worth hiking in the hot sun all day. I also sustained some wounds from the day, after I slid on my knees in some loose gravel on the descent. Blood was pouring down my legs as we walked the rest of the way down the mountain.....a nice visual cautionary reminder for the rest of the hikers passing us on their way up! One of the perks of having a professional nurse for a friend is having great access to medical expertise and supplies at all times, even in the middle of the woods. Sarah cleaned my wounds and bandaged me up with fancy
clear
medical tape (I still currently look like I'm wearing patches of plastic wrap on my knees)!
It feels like forever since I last wrote. These past two weeks have sped by in a busy, busy blur. One of those weeks was filled with lighting rehearsals, technical run-throughs, and dress rehearsals, all leading up to a weekend of performances. The process was time consuming, but it was exciting to perform, especially since I was dancing for my friend Faith. It's nice to be in something you really care about, to be able to put your heart into it.
The next week began with an enormously wonderful surprise: A SNOW DAY! This is the first snow day we've had since my freshman year, and I've never seen this much snow in Greensboro. It definitely brought back happy memories from
home. Freezing rain started on Sunday, and as the snow started to fall early that evening, our hopes were increasingly heightened. By late that night we found out scho
ol was canceled, and we ran out in the street to celebrate. I'd never seen that much snow fall in the city before, so it was neat to see it so illuminated by the city light sky glow. That night we bundled up and hiked through the snow over to my friend Paul's house, we we got sneak attacked by my friend Sam pelting us with large snowballs. His fiance Gina held the door locked from the inside so that we had no choice but to stay outside and have a massive snowball fight. The next day the twins and I played out in the snow around campus, warmed up at home with cappuccino, and ended the day with a delicious banana chocolate chip feast courtesy of Gina's amazing cooking skills.
The rest of the week was a bit more stressful.....professors tend to pile on work right before breaks. One bright spot of bright spot of this past week was a visiting Scottish professor from the University of Southampton in England. He sat in on/taught two of my English classes, and it was such a delightful change of pace to have this brilliant, intellectually fascinating old man teach us in his charming, thick Scottish accent. My friend Sam and I went up to thank him at the end of one of our classes, and he told us he thought we were exceptionally bright young people with stellar features ahead (after which our regular teacher told this man that we were two of her best students) ....naturally, we went around feeling really ridiculously conceited for the rest of the day! I'm hoping I can get a least a couple of awesome professors like this for my semester abroad.
And now I'm on a much needed SPRING BREAK. I've already had a fantastic couple of days this weekend (lots of sun and playing outdoors involved) and I'll write about that soon.
