Back to Life, Back to Reality
Whew! Yesterday was the first day to be sitting at my desk in THREE WEEKS! Wowza. After a week of training and two blessed, wonderful weeks of vacation, I am once again at my home away from home. Not that I can complain too much. My job blesses me with 29 days of vacation this year, in addition to many Friday's off, so I can't complain in the least. Even better than that, I have an interview for a new and better position this morning at 10am. Will you pray for me? I would LOVE to have this job. Really, it's a perfect fit, and it's sounding really promising. They waited for three weeks to interview me. Yea! So, please pray that I'll do my best during the interview.
Being at camp was SUCH a restful reprieve. Seriously. It's the most relaxing vacation I can imagine. It's beautiful. It's serene. It's active. It's relaxing. It's stress-free. It's climate-controlled (sorta). It's 24 hours a day with really good people. It's a place to get quiet. To enjoy sunsets either with your friends or by yourself. It's laying on an 8 person raft at 10:00 at night out on the lake with your friends as you watch satellites streak across the Big Dipper. It's having a hard time locating the Big Dipper, not because of the light pollution, but because there are millions, billions of other stars in the sky that you can see. So much that it's hard to even make out where the Big Dipper is in all the vastness. It's laying on lounge chairs next to the water with your female friends, everyone with a book in hand. It's falling asleep in a hammock with a good book. It's going to bed in June and being COLD. 55 degrees means snuggling in a sleeping bag and listening to the water splash against the shore 30 ft. from your tent.
It's seeing wild turkeys, salamanders, deer, turtles (the box and snapping kind), fish, bats, and snakes (yes, I LIKE snakes). It's clinging to my husband's life-jacket as we zoom on a jet-ski going 55mph, with a 13 year old boy holding on to my life-jacket yelling SWEET!!! as we glide across the water. It's soaking teenagers with the afroementioned Wave Runner. It's hiking in the forest and watching my husband climb a 40 foot "waterfall". It's swimming a mile and then stopping to do Ai Chi on the shore with 40 year old women, but laughing the whole time and getting algae on your arms from being in the water so long. It's cheering the Oldies (over 30 and/or married) as they beat the Goodies (under 25 young studs) in a volleyball match.
It's eating smores and pies around a campfire, and drinking raspberry tea and lemonade because the water tastes bad. It's sharing an outhouse with 30 people and learning that an empty can of raspberry tea filled with peat moss and dumped in the outhouse hole really will make the smell go away. It's singing Blessed Be the Name, Blind Man, and I've Got Peace Like a River (with motions) around a campfire. It's teaching teenagers how to play Wahoo and then watching 8 year olds play it when they're done. It's riding around in a ski boat while kids who have spent every summer of their life on the island show amazing skill at slaloming. They get bored with regular skiing so they barefoot, or ski on an oar.
It's bonding with people that I've known my whole life. I became close friends with the Sunday School teacher I had when I was 4. My first memories include her and now my recent ones do too. It's being blindfolded late at night and being inducted in the Ga-Ga Sisterhood, complete with secret ceremonies never to be discussed even on this blog. It's sharing your joys and sorrows with people of all ages.
So yes, reality is here again, but so are the memories of two weeks of a true vacation. And now - I get to eagerly anticipate my trip to Scotland next Saturday. God is Good.
P.S. Blogger is not cooperating on the pictures. I will post those later.
Being at camp was SUCH a restful reprieve. Seriously. It's the most relaxing vacation I can imagine. It's beautiful. It's serene. It's active. It's relaxing. It's stress-free. It's climate-controlled (sorta). It's 24 hours a day with really good people. It's a place to get quiet. To enjoy sunsets either with your friends or by yourself. It's laying on an 8 person raft at 10:00 at night out on the lake with your friends as you watch satellites streak across the Big Dipper. It's having a hard time locating the Big Dipper, not because of the light pollution, but because there are millions, billions of other stars in the sky that you can see. So much that it's hard to even make out where the Big Dipper is in all the vastness. It's laying on lounge chairs next to the water with your female friends, everyone with a book in hand. It's falling asleep in a hammock with a good book. It's going to bed in June and being COLD. 55 degrees means snuggling in a sleeping bag and listening to the water splash against the shore 30 ft. from your tent.
It's seeing wild turkeys, salamanders, deer, turtles (the box and snapping kind), fish, bats, and snakes (yes, I LIKE snakes). It's clinging to my husband's life-jacket as we zoom on a jet-ski going 55mph, with a 13 year old boy holding on to my life-jacket yelling SWEET!!! as we glide across the water. It's soaking teenagers with the afroementioned Wave Runner. It's hiking in the forest and watching my husband climb a 40 foot "waterfall". It's swimming a mile and then stopping to do Ai Chi on the shore with 40 year old women, but laughing the whole time and getting algae on your arms from being in the water so long. It's cheering the Oldies (over 30 and/or married) as they beat the Goodies (under 25 young studs) in a volleyball match.
It's eating smores and pies around a campfire, and drinking raspberry tea and lemonade because the water tastes bad. It's sharing an outhouse with 30 people and learning that an empty can of raspberry tea filled with peat moss and dumped in the outhouse hole really will make the smell go away. It's singing Blessed Be the Name, Blind Man, and I've Got Peace Like a River (with motions) around a campfire. It's teaching teenagers how to play Wahoo and then watching 8 year olds play it when they're done. It's riding around in a ski boat while kids who have spent every summer of their life on the island show amazing skill at slaloming. They get bored with regular skiing so they barefoot, or ski on an oar.
It's bonding with people that I've known my whole life. I became close friends with the Sunday School teacher I had when I was 4. My first memories include her and now my recent ones do too. It's being blindfolded late at night and being inducted in the Ga-Ga Sisterhood, complete with secret ceremonies never to be discussed even on this blog. It's sharing your joys and sorrows with people of all ages.
So yes, reality is here again, but so are the memories of two weeks of a true vacation. And now - I get to eagerly anticipate my trip to Scotland next Saturday. God is Good.
P.S. Blogger is not cooperating on the pictures. I will post those later.
posted by Amstaff Mom | 6:57 PM
6 Comments:
so fun jcol - this makes me miss camp, it really is an experience like no other
(but jealously I'm glad you're back, i've missed you friend)
Aaaaaand she's back! Yay! (We'll just temporarily ignore the fact that you're disappearing again in a few days.)
Camp sounds wonderful and restful and stimulating and refreshing and wonderful. I admit to the small, sweet drops of envy dripping from my incisors. A month ago, when my boss asked me if I wanted to start full time right away or take off a couple of months first, I couldn't think of anything to do with three months of vacation, so I said I'd work this summer. Then I saw a perfect job in a summer camp as a counselor/mentor for troubled teens. Now I want a month off. Such is life.
Sorry I missed out on the interview yesterday - I hope it went well. I would have been thinking of you, if only I had known. Keep us posted.
And about the pix - glad to know it's not just me!
Welcome back! I hope your stay in reality is short lived!
Thanks K-T! I know, camp is great!!
Lia - Thanks! And actually I wrote it last night and then this morning I changed the verbage to today since I thought I was adding photos. So, the interview was actually today. And it went really, really well. I'm stoked. It's not official, but it sounds really promising. Yea!
Thanks Ben McMinn!
how was the interview????
that is a ton of vacation, can I have your job when you leave!
Waaaaaaaaaa!!! *I* Wanna vacation.
Post a Comment
<< Home