Sabbatical: At the end of it all

My sabbatical is over. I'm at the end of my journey. Tomorrow I'll be home.

It's weird to think that practically a month has gone by. Time moves too quickly. I just got here. But practically a month has gone by and now it is time for me to leave. I wish I could tuck the wee one in my carry-on luggage because I am going to miss her terribly. I'll miss the toddler as well but not the abuse. Dangit, I'm going to miss my sister and Hobear too! Can't they all just fly back home with me?

When I got here I didn't really know why I had come, other than I had an opportunity to. I felt I probably had something to learn here, but I didn't know what. Maybe these are some reasons why I came. . .

• Volunteering with the American Red Cross in the Katrina Relief effort
• Playing ultimate with Hyzer Soze -- not only did I meet some awesome people, but they needed me to play in that Sectionals Tournament in Austin pretty badly!
• Babies
• Learning from other people's relationships -- before I say yes to any marriage proposal, I will make sure to ask such important questions as "what are your feelings on tepid water?" etc.
• Missionary opportunities -- maybe Don was placed in my path for a reason
• Reality TV! I think I'm all caught up now and won't have to watch tv for the rest of my life! (especially children's programming!)
• The appreciation of vast expanses of open sky and flat plains
• Many many more valuable lessons that will help me in the road of life. . .

So with that I encourage everyone to take a step back from their daily routine and go on their own sabbatical of sorts. Sometimes you don't even have to travel very far to realize that everything you love is close to home; but that the great big world has a lot of amazing things to offer as well.

Felines make for great traveling companions

The Austin Roadtrip 2K5 was a lot of fun. Thunder Jones and I sat comfortably in the back while Don drove and Colby played navigator. We played the Who-is-this-band-and/or-artist game, and a few missed turns later we eventually got to Austin.

We didn't get much sleep on Friday night. We rolled into town late and had to be at the fields early the next morning. I'm just glad we got to stay at Don's Dad's house. Though I hear that the people staying at Mike's parents had a hot breakfast in the morning and his mom made them dinner as well. But what can you do? He did buy us all Gatorade, which was pretty nice of him.

After a full day of ultimate, we went back to the house sweaty and stinky. We took showers and then went with Vijay and Lars out to eat. We went to Chuy's, a fun mexican restaurant with sanitized silverware and blessed food. Afterwards we went and rented Memento from Blockbuster and vegged out on the couch. That's pretty much all we had energy for. I had a lot of fun hanging out with Don, Vijay, and Lars, though. (Colby was at the UT football game with his cousin) They're pretty funny guys. Then by ten o'clock we were all in bed. It was a pretty wild night! I guess I didn't get to experience all that Austin has to offer. Like 6th Street with all the bars. Maybe next time... (or when I'm 76 and going on roadtrips with my sister in her motorhome!)

We had another full day of ultimate on Sunday. We were all planning on only two games, but we surprisingly won the first one so we got to play a third. I'm glad we lost that one, though, because I can tell you right now I didn't have a fourth game in me!

After the tournament we went back to the house and showered before we headed out of town. Since I was with a bunch of boys I had to sit there and watch football while everyone took turns showering. Not so much fun. But then we got to nap. So much fun!

Don and I were conspiring to either ditch Colby or just hijack him and head for the coast. I thought it was a really good idea until I found out it was just the Gulf and there aren't any big waves in the gulf which means no surfing. It just wasn't worth the extra three hour drive (one way) for no waves to play in.

So Austin is a pretty cool place. I really liked it. If it weren't so bloody hot and humid I would probably live there. Or I would just deal with the heat and humidity and hopefully get used to it. But I'm not looking to move to Texas anytime soon, so...

Destination: Boston 2006

Last year I got a crazy idea. Why not try and qualify for Boston? I mean, my PR is only 15 minutes off the qualifying time and that's when I wasn't even really trying. (I swear it was the plyometrics!) So 2005 was going to be the year to do it. I would have two chances: Salt Lake in the spring, and if that didn't go well then I'd shoot for St George that fall.

Well, Salt lake didn't go well and now here we are three weeks from St George.

I started another blog earlier this year dedicated to my Boston efforts. I wanted to take my training seriously. But with chronic injuries Boston kept feeling out of reach. I wasn't getting those quality workouts in that I knew I would need to get me where I wanted to be. There were no speedworkouts. There were no hill repeats. There were no plyometric jumprope routines.

So I was left feeling discouraged. There would be no way I was capable of holding the pace I needed to qualify. It was such a big dream that it scared me to think about it. But was my fear of failure holding me back? Were my chronic injuries manifestations of that fear? I suspect the mind-body connection is a lot closer than we let on sometimes. But maybe I've been capable of doing this all along, and I just need to push past the negative energy. Besides, frisbee has been my speedwork, and carting kids around a pool all summer has been my plyometric exercise. I think I'm closer than I know.

A few weeks ago I ran my best race to date. It completely rekindled the dream! If I can race like that in St George, then I am Boston bound. I'm still scared but I've found that excitement and anticipation that had been lost for a while. Without that mix of feelings I'm not sure it would really be worth it.

So come October 1st we'll know if next year is my year for Boston. If not, I will refocus on my goal of the Fifty States Club, and there will always be other years and other races for qualifying.

You never really know how you're going to feel on race day. I'm just counting on adrenaline and gravity to pull me through.

Montana has nothing on Texas!

They say that everything is bigger and better in Texas. If by everything they mean the sky, they're right on.

When I came here to West Texas, I traded in my mountains for a great expanse of open sky. At first I missed my broken skyline. I missed the safety I felt as the Wasatch loomed over me. But now I'm starting to appreciate the flat. The big bowl of blue. The large sunsets that encompass every piece of sky.

Japanese Princess

I found out a few days ago that my roommate, Rui, was bucked off a horse and kicked in the face. No neurological damage but she did break her cheekbone and her jaw is completely off-line. Supposedly she's having reconstructive surgery sometime today. Natalie said when she went and saw her at Mckay Dee Hospital the other night she was sad and anxious and upset. Her family is in Japan, so that must be hard. I hope she is alright. I've come to the conclusion that horses are evil.

throwing the plastic, as it were

I was supposed to toss a disc around with this guy from frisbee today. He called and we set it all up. We'd meet each other at Frank Higinbothum Park a little after 5 o'clock. So I go over to the park and wait. I try and look for him from my car and then realized if I couldn't see him he certainly wouldn't be able to see me. So I get out and find a nice shady piece of grass out in an open area of the park. I wait some more. No sign of the guy. I'm pretty sure he hasn't stood me up because he seemed pretty animate about throwing a disc around. I'm guessing he has some other interest in me other than frisbee, if you know what I mean. But that is only speculation.

Finally I give up waiting and go home. I ask my sister if he called while I was gone. Twice. So I called him back thinking I was clear of this whole thing. Well, I was except for the fact that now we're going to have dinner tomorrow after practice. I am too nice and agree to things even if it might be against my better judgment. And besides, I might be taking things out of context. Maybe he does just want to eat with me. It's not a date, is it?

I can't just assume this kid wants to kiss my face off. Hopefully he doesn't 'cause I don't want to go breaking any hearts while I'm here in Texas! And I wouldn't want things to be awkward as we drive to Austin together... with his cat.

Volunteering

Yesterday (was it just yesterday?) I volunteered again with the Red Cross. I went to Reese at 1:30 in the a.m. I was helping out with Mass Care which meant I got to stock a table full of food for the evacuees in case they wanted something to eat; there were other tables with supplies, clothing, etc. But when it is the wee hours of the morning nobody really wants food, supplies or clothing. So we sat. And slept. And pretty much did some more waiting.

Around 7:30 a.m. there was more for us to do. I started helping out at the volunteer check-in table and was a gopher for a bit. This other girl and I had to go over to the dining hall to get a contact number for the person in charge there. I got to see some evacuees. They all seem so nice and grateful. Well, the few I actually saw.

So that has been my experience with volunteering for the Katrina relief effort. I should probably call the Red Cross and see if they have any other shifts available.

and after all the waiting I just wanna come back home again

The day consisted of waiting... and eating food. Then waiting some more. Then eating more food. Then waiting.

There was a rumor circulating that the planes were arriving at 11 o'clock; they'd take them to Reese first and then the overflow would be brought to us at the Coliseum. We had everything set up and ready to go. As the time ticked by we heard that the planes had been re-routed and were headed to Chicago instead. It made no sense. We had the resources, we were willing, and we were able. Why re-route?

Our supervisors at the Red Cross didn't have any answers either. They barely had communication in regards to the planes. It was all a waiting game.

But when you think about it, we didn't have it too bad. Yeah, we waited all day with nothing to do, but we had our needs met. We had shelter. We had food. We had running water and bathrooms. We weren't climbing onto roofs just to survive.

I'm volunteering again, this time at Reese. I'll go back tonight from 1:30am-9:30am. At least I know I'll be put to some use instead of waiting.

Evacuees

Three planes of evacuees flew into Lubbock today. Robert was at the airport doing triage, assessing them as they came in--sending the one's who really needed it to the hospital.

Ever since last night I've had the feeling that I needed to help out. Today in sacrament meeting they asked for volunteers for the Red Cross. We left church after the meeting and went over to the 58th Street chapel to watch the training video and get an assignment. I was scheduled for the 10:30pm-7am shift doing registration.

So when I got home from filling out my volunteer paperwork at the local Red Cross chapter, I ate some food and then went to my room to sleep so I could be up all night helping hurricane evacuees.

At around 7 o'clock I got a phone call saying my shift had been cancelled but I could volunteer tomorrow. So now I'm working from 6:30am-3pm. So much much for sleeping all afternoon to be up all night! Now I just have to wake up extremely early!

I'm going to be a Team Leader for my registration shift. What that means exactly, I'm not sure. Tomorrow should be an interesting day.

Please read my sister's posts for more insight on the situation:
Here come the 'Fugees
Correction and update
Update again