Movin' on up!

Okay friends...

So I'm going to be trying out something new...

Tumblr.

I know, it's blasphemous.  I'm abandoning google's blogger.  It's the end of an era.  The end of a relationship.  A three year love for blogger.

But I've found something better (for now). Pretty themes. Link to Twitter. Easier access. It even uploaded all of my old posts!

Tumblr.

You can find me at http://geales.tumblr.com.

Love y'all!

5:28am

I'm pretty sure I've quoted this before, but I ran across it again today and loved it....

"Laughter and tears are both responses to frustration and exhaustion.  I myself prefer to laugh, since there is less cleaning up to do afterward." 

--Kurt Vonnegut

So.  What's been going on for the past few weeks of my life?

I'm finally getting the hang of being the Waumba LDP.  This coming Sunday will be my SEVENTH (wow!) Sunday as the LDP for Waumba Land, and I couldn't be loving it more. I love being poured into as a college student, as a staff member, and as a leader, and being surrounded by such incredible people has already created change in my life.  I feel SO blessed for this experience, and know God is going to be doing incredible things this year.  Best part? Part of my job, (LITERALLY, it's my job!) is to create RELATIONSHIPS with the volunteers and other staff members of Athens Church.  Um, hello.  I. Love. This.  :) AND I'm finally getting the hang of my Sundays.  Last Sunday, I had the realization: Oh my gosh, I ACTUALLY know what I'm doing now! Big step.

Here's the run down of my Saturday-Sundays:

Saturday:

2am: Wake up, think that I've slept in, realize I haven't, and head back to bed.

3am: Wake up, think that I've forgotten something ridiculous, like making cookies.  Realize I'm just going crazy, and try to fall back to sleep.

4:30am: Wake up, realize I have about half an hour to sleep, and debate falling back asleep.

5am: FINALLY hear my alarm and bolt out of bed, usually tripping on something, and try to be as graceful and quiet as possible so as not to wake my sleeping roommates.  (Funny story... once, when I woke up at 4:30am to tie up some loose ends before church, I ran into one of my roommates.  She was going to bed.  I was waking up. We both thought the other was crazy)

5:28am: Arrive at the Classic Center and begin unloading everything.  As a portable church, literally EVERYTHING is unloaded from a trailer on Sunday morning and then repacked and reloaded.  The reality of this can only be fully grasped at either 5:30am, when the sun is rising and the Classic Center looks bare and crates and crates of pre-school toys, portable walls, and resources come pouring out of our trailer, or at 2pm, when the last crates, signs, and doors are loaded back onto the trailer for next Sunday's adventures.

5:45am: "Hmmm.  I wonder if this will actually all get set up this morning."

5:47am: "I swear these crates are multiplying."

5:53am: "Oh my gosh.  This isn't going to happen.  The walls aren't even all here yet.  I can't move this.  This is ten times my weight.  We'll never get everything set up.  We'll be lucky if there are doors on the classrooms this morning."

5:59am: One minute until the volunteers arrive.  I'm pulling out my hair, scatterbrain-ly putting crates in their respective corners, hoping the volunteers will be more "present" than I am.

6:20am: I breathe a sigh of relief.  The volunteers never fail to put up the walls, unload the crates, and set up the jungle that is Waumba calmly, quickly, and efficiently. My thoughts: "Thank goodness, this will actually happen this morning."

6:58am: "I can't believe I've been up for two hours.  I'm hungry.  I need caffeine.  Scratch that: I needed caffeine an hour and a half ago."

7:03am: I hear Adam calling for breakfast and finish whatever I'm doing, my mouth salivating at the thought of a sugary donut and caffeine finally hitting my bloodstream.

7:10am: I sit down for the first time this morning, and breathe a big sigh of relief.  We are almost done setting up Waumba Land and I know for a fact that... this will actually happen this morning.  We have our roadcrew breakfast meeting, eating Dunkin Donuts, injecting ourselves with caffeine, and telling incredible, inspiring stories from the past week.  I love this meeting and the lunch meeting most, because we get to hear stories from all across the ministries--from the 2 year olds in Waumba Land to the 17 year olds in Inside Out.  Sharing God's awesomeness? Perfect way to start the day.

7:30am: We head back upstairs and put the final touches on our environment.  I change out of my T-shirt and athletic shorts, and get ready for the volunteers to arrive.

8:30am: My first wave of "Oh-my-gosh-I've-been-up-since-5" hits me.  Cue Coke Zero.

9:00am: Did I really already finish that Coke Zero?

9:15am: This is when the day settles into a sort of routine (as long as I hopefully remembered to put everything in the zebra bags! Eek!).  I head to service.  The next three hours are a blur... service, check in (take 2), Large Group with the chickadees, and pick up.

12:30pm: "Is this really over?" Delirium hits, right in time for lunch.  We scarf down Meerko/Jason's/Papa Johns and head back upstairs to somehow fit everything back into the crates.

1pm: Did everything really fit this morning?

(This is the point, both in my blog and the actual day, that I run out of witty remarks.  So basically what happens is pack up, crack jokes, and hope no one gets run over by a runaway crate cart.  yay.  The end.)

I head home around 2pm, amazed it isn't dark yet, and marvel at my friends who are somehow still asleep.

Point of the story? Our volunteers, whether they are the ones who come hours before services begin, those who stay well into the perfect Sunday-afternoon-naptime, have a special place in my heart.

Dear world and people who surround me,

Thank you for being so supportive of me.  For real. I do not deserve you in the least, and every day I am amazed at the people in my life (this means you).

So thanks.

Love,

Geales

What motivates us?

What is real?

After a wonderful little Monday night with wonderful friends, I thought of this...

he Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else. For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it. 

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

"I suppose you are real?" said the Rabbit. And then he wished he had not said it, for he thought the Skin Horse might be sensitive. 

But the Skin Horse only smiled.

Cute.

Under the bridge.

Today after church, I joined a few of the other LDPs (college staff members) of Athens Church to deliver extra food and water from the services today to the homeless that live under the bridge.

I'm speechless.

Literally, as I was driving to deliver food, I was thinking about how my car, who I lovingly refer to as "Betsy," is showing her age by sucking up fuel like it's her job.  (AKA my gas mileage is... not so hot.)

I wasn't thinking that as I left the bridge.

Since this is one of our first times delivering food, we merely stopped by, dropped the food off at the table, and handed everyone water bottles.  We introduced ourselves and asked their names as well, shaking their hands as they eyed the food we brought in Dunkin' Donuts bags.  It's quite the set up they have down there.  They've set up cots, tables with all sorts of food, and hung blankets all around.  One of them proudly showed us his collection of sports jerseys.

Even though the encounter lasted no more than five minutes, it was one of those things that just made me stop.  My head stopped spinning with all of the things I had to do.  I stopped thinking about all of my "problems." I instead became thankful that I have felt burdened by decisions about my post-college life.  Because I have a post-college life.  I had a college life. I have options. I live in abundance.

Walking up the path to our cars, we passed two women and a man headed down to the bridge.  The two women stopped to talk to me and another girl, while the man spoke with the guys that had come.  About two minutes into the conversation, of the women asks to pull one of us aside so she can talk to us.  Admittedly, I was fairly wary of her.  I had no idea what she was going to ask me or how I should respond.  I'm almost ashamed of that.  But, I stepped aside with her and asked her what was going on. She told me that the girl with them, who referred to herself as "Sweet Pea," had arrive from Atlanta two days ago.  She was sixteen.

Neither the other woman nor the man who accompanied them knew her story.  They didn't know whether she was a runaway.  Not knowing what to tell them, we advised the two to talk to the police or someone at a homeless shelter or the food kitchen.  Oddly, a police car drove by a few minutes later and stopped, offerring to talk to the three.

We took this as our cue to leave.

And we did. We left. And returned to our daily lives.  I'm answering emails for work, sitting under my fan, in my air conditioned house, about to start studying for the LSAT.

I'm blessed.

Good Quotes

“Listen to the MUSTN’TS, child,   
Listen to the DONT’S     
Listen to the SHOULDN’TS    
The IMPOSSIBLES, the WON’TS           
Listen to the NEVER HAVES       
Then listen close to me—             
Anything can happen child,        
ANYTHING can be.”
-Shell Silverstein

“stop talking yourself out of the life you want most.”

Things I'm loving today: My bed & afternoon catnaps.  We had a blassst last night, but 9:30am came way too early this morning, so I spent my 1 hour lunch break in my bed.  In my wonderful, all-to-myself, queen bed with three inch mattress pad, seven pillows, pink sheets, and poofy comforter.  Um, hello heaven.

Things I'm loving right now...

1. Zac Brown Band, "Free"

2. This:

3. This quote: Where ever you are, be all there.

4. The fact that I can wear JEANS to work today instead of business casual! YESSSS!*

5. The fact that my hours are going back to (sort of) normal-people working time.*

*Unfortunately, 4 & 5 are the result of something VERY sad... the end of Institute! Eek! I can't believe it's over!

Speaking of things being over, so is my break! Back to work... :)

"Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained."

- Marie Curie


(I stole this from a friend's blog because I love it THAT MUCH!)

The day I met Betsy Ross.

So last Monday, one of my roommates and I decided to spend our morning off as tourists of Philadelphia.  We set off nice and early, ready for an adventure.  We got into the subway station and BOOM, it started to pour! Luckily, we had brought our umbrellas, and decided that we had already gotten up and ready pretty early (we left at 8:45am after having gone to bed around THREE, per usual), we would brave the storms.  When we got off the subway, though, we were pleasantly surprised, as the storms had turned into just regular rain, and then just a drizzle.  By mid-morning, the rain had worn off, and as an after-effect, it wasn't quite as hot as it had been the past few days!

Our first stop was to get our tickets for a tour of Independence Hall.  Here's the rest of the day in pictures...

(PS, everyone who knows my directional abilities, or lack thereof, should be incredibly impressed, because we walked around a good bit of Philadelphia using just a MAP to get to where we were headed.  No GPS. That's what I call growth.)

The Liberty Bell

Betsy Ross' House, where we met the real Betsy Ross.  Ha.

This was obviously a children's museum.  So, we acted like children. :)

To finish up our walking tour of Philly, we stopped at Jim's, home of THE BEST Philly Cheesesteaks.  They even had a vegetarian option for me! It was every bit as good as we had heard!

This is in honor of...

This is in honor of Kelley, who brought me a Diet Coke tonight and saved me from my exhaustion-induced headache.

This is in honor of Sona, who showed me how awesome the Office is.



This is in honor of my incredible, amazing OOT team member Marquita, who always plays "Hey, Soul Sister" when I'm not in the best of moods. :)



This is in honor of my sweet (sometimes) sister, who turned SIXTEEN on Sunday.

And this is in honor of all of the incredible Corps Members I've gotten to know over the past 5 weeks.  And of course, the Ops team :)

Be kind.

Always, always be kind.

(ps, this use of "kind" is dedicated to Stacey, who has single-handedly brought the word "kind" back into my vocabulary.)

Seven courses of awesomeness.

Marrakesh lived up to every outrageous, outlandish statement we had heard about it.  The atmosphere was incredible, the food was even better.  To set the scene, Stacey, Sona, Virginia, and I headed off in our own cab to meet the others at the restaurant.  As if an omen of the wonderful night to come, I found a heads up penny on our way out, and saw a spectacular sunset as we drove through the streets of Philly.

Part of the incredible-ness of Marrakesh is that it is tucked in an unassuming alley off of South Street.  Our directions were literally to look for the green awning and knock on the door.  And so we did, of course, eagerly anticipating the magic that awaited us.

The woman who opened the door led us past tables surrounded by carpets, pillows, and wonderful food, up a tiny staircase to a room where the rest of our group was waiting.  Marrakesh is one of Philly's many BYO's, meaning you can bring your own beverage of choice.  We all chipped in and brought various wines for the night to enjoy during the dinner.  

We all crowded inside what I can best describe as a big, round booth (think about a booth sized for about twenty people) with tapestries and pillows and dark lighting until the last stragglers of our group arrived. Once our group had all gotten to the restaurant, about seven of us split off to a smaller booth behind the big booth (but still in the same room) to make room for all of the food to come.  Here's our menu:

The Three-Salad Platter- Cooked Eggplants in Tomato Sauce, Cucumbers and Bell Peppers in Mediterranean Seasoning, Oasis Carrots with Cucumber.

The B’stella- Layered pie with chicken, assorted nuts, almonds, eggs, parsley and onions, topped with confection sugar and traced with cinnamon

The vegetarian version of this was made with egg instead of chicken, although I'm pretty sure that it was the same spices.  It was a surprisingly delicious mix of savory and sweet (literally, powdered sugar on top!).

Main Dishes

Chicken with Lemon and Olive & Spicy Chicken in Cumin Sauce

The main dish for the vegetarians was a spinach pastry thing which was ALSO incredible--a close second to the eggplant dish, in my opinion. 

Second Main Course

Tajne of Lamb with Almonds and Honey & Lamb with Chick Peas and Onions

I can't remember the vegetarian option for this.  But I promise it was incredible.

Third Main Course

Couscous Grand Atlas Topped with Vegetables, Chick Peas and Raisins

Desserts: 

Basket of Fresh Fruits, Hot Mint Tea with Moroccan Pastries

We ate everything with our fingers, using the bread (which was like pita bread) to grab meats or soak up the delicious sauces.  My favorite by far was the eggplant in the 3-salad dish.  It almost tasted like barbecue sauce with a twist.  Holy deliciousness, I'm getting hungry just thinking about it.

And the baklava.  Ohhhh the baklava.  Holy honey and pastry deliciousness.  I actually ate TWO AND A HALF of these huge pastries, which were dripping with sugary honey.  While some people just couldn't handle all the sweet, I feel like these were made for me.

(I also felt like I was going into a food and wine coma after this incredible meal, but that's the price you pay for such a glorious, out of body experience, right?)

Proof that this has happened.

So this summer, we've actually been really good at taking pictures of EVERYTHING.  We've had adventure packed weekends, really making Philly ours.  It's been fun.  Here are some pictures to prove it, from where I left off:

(PS. One day I will ACTUALLY finish my 4th of July post.  It's too epic not to finish.)

So like I said, last Saturday, we explored the South Street area of Philadelphia.  But first, we had quite the subway adventure.  There was a man hustling everyone on the subway.  Of course, he headed over to our area of the subway. It was me, Sona, Stacey, Virginia, Jace, Luciano, and Luciano's friend from Duke.  He came up to each of us, of course allowing us to win the first time, and then shoving a $20 bill in our face and saying, "Showing me $20, and you can have this!"  We all told him we didn't have cash.  All of us mostly ignored him.

Mostly.

Two of us, who shall remain nameless (Sona and Jace), decided it would be fun to give him FORTY DOLLARS (hence the title of that post: Give me $40).  And decided they could beat him.  Um, no.  While one of the innocent suckers was distracted, he switched the cups, and asked for an answer before any of the  wiser crowd could let her know.  And so we lost $40.  But it was worth it.  It was HILARIOUS.  We're pretty sure 2 of the other equally sketchy looking men were in on the gig, especially when one told Jace to give him MORE money so he could win back his money.  Because, yeah, I'm sure he would have played fair this time.  Not.

So we actually ended up getting off a stop too late because we were so enthralled with the game.  So we walked through Philly, went past one of our boss' high school (the one she went to, not the one she teaches at) and some other cool places (for more pics, see the Show me $40 post!)

We also got our first Philly cheesesteaks at Ishkabibbles (the line at Jim's was too long!), although those who had been to Jim's confirmed the rumors--Jim's is the best.  We also walked past the magic gardens (pictured above, which Stacey and I went back to yesterday afternoon before work!) and saw some more of Philly's great murals.  We headed to the Philadelphia Academy of Art, which had been the point of our trip, but arrived only 15 minutes before the closing of the exhibit, and spent some time in the gift shop instead :).  All in all, a successful afternoon.

We headed back to 1300 and freshened up (aka took naps until 5 minutes before we had to leave...) for Marrakesh.  Marrakesh is a Moroccan restaurant where you are served traditional Moroccan food in a traditional Moroccan atmosphere by waiters dressed in traditional Moroccan garb and... traditional Moroccan belly-dancers. Our fellow interns from UPenn, Steve and Cristina, had RAVED about this place and its 7 course meal.  That the food was TO DIE FOR (seriously, not joking here).  Could it live up to their words?

IT. WAS. INCREDIBLE.

Unfortunately, I've run out of time yet again.  And let's be honest, a meal that epic deserves its own post.