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I woke up early this morning to go over genny stuff with the guys. I found out yesterday that Gil and Lynda aren't coming back today like we thought they were. Means that there's no one left who can run the gennys lest the Hydro should go down again once Brian leaves. Eric was supposed to go out tomorrow with the other three to meet up with everyone at the PNE. Would have meant that I would be here all by my lonesome until someone chose to come back. We hit the Hydro powerhouse on the other side of the inlet only to find out that the door had been locked for some reason and we didn't have a key. So then we went back and we tried to figure out how to get the cameras across the way to read on the shop comp. We figured it all out with a phone call to Peter Talbot. For the rest of the day I did some watering and had lunch with Christy, Eric and Tyler. I have some thoughts about work here in the shoulder season. It's not like anything around here is all that difficult, it just needs to be done and you need to keep up with it or it gets all out of control. I made dinner for everyone. After cleaning up we watched about 6 hours of Lost. We're all totally hooked. It's quite ridiculous and totally out of control. What stuck with me tonight, it's what's been on my mind lately, is enjoying the space where you are for the time you're there. We don't know what's around the corner. If we're in one space we need to be comfortable, make ourselves comfortable and aware of where we are and draw from it, because we don't know when we won't be there. If we're there for a long time (even if we hope it will be short) we need to be there. If we're there for only a short time (even if we hope it will be for the rest of our lives) we need to learn from and enjoy in the space that we have for the time that we have it. Life is not meant to be consistent day in and day out, at least not for most. It breeds complacency. It's like people just convince themselves that they're happy in the same place in and out because they believe that they're supposed to. That's what life is supposed to look like, right? So now that I have a job and a place to live and whatever, now I'm supposed to be happy because this is what life looks like. I just don't buy it and I think that most, not all, but most, are just lying to themselves. up |
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I had a beautiful morning. I went out and watered all of the Lane in my skirt hiked up and my bathing suit top. It was great. We all (minus one) made lunch together. Guacamole and randomness. We watched one episode of Lost, and they all set out. So now I'm here all on my own. I thought that I was going to be alone all night as it's 10:30 and Eric still isn't back. I just talked to him on 16 and he'll be here soon. Wild being here on my own. I got to throw a bunch of stuff in the garburator trying to get the kitchen cleaned out and free of flies. I went to Chilkoot for dinner and to watch some tv once it was starting to get dark.
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I had really vivid, weird dreams last night. Mostly about Tili, bears and rodents. I woke up to something in the night. I think it was just a bird or mouse outside my window but I could hear things rustling and it sounded like it was in my room. Freaked me out a bit. Checked messages and did some watering in my bathing suit top in the morning. Relaxing. The Fuller's are back so now there are four of us. I made dinner for two of us. Then we just sat and chatted, then threw the rest of the Free Corner food off the corner of the Dining Room and into the Inlet. I throw like a girl. Couldn't hit a seagull with a moldy cinnamon bun to save my life. I hope that it would never come to that. What would be the circumstances that would necessitate such actions? I was reading Matthew 5 last night. Just after the Beatitudes. I was confused by one sentence. Jesus is talking about being the fulfillment of the law and that nothing should be taken away from the Law "until everything is accomplished". At the end of that paragraph comes this (5:20 from The Message) "For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven." I need to sit on that for a while. Particularly when paired with Matthew 23:13 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pahrisees, you hypocrites! You shut the kingdom of heaven in men's faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to." The Pharisees went beyond what the law asked for so that they wouldn't even come close to breaking it. They were self-imposed rules by man, set up as boundaries so that the line of the law couldn't be broken. Interesting thought. Maybe we all need a little more distance from the lines of the law in our lives so that we don't have to always come so close. To surpass the righteousness of the Pharisees. What was their righteousness? It was for show. It was not a matter of the heart. The thoroughness of what they were doing should be taken into our minds as a tool, but the centre, the reason, the soul of what they were doing needs to be surpassed. Interesting ideas about the Law. Jesus came to fulfill the law, as He said. Some think (resulting in the catholic view) that He gave Christians a greater distance to go, start here with the Law and then add on to it. Others go with (Protestant) the idea that He was the Law that had always been there. Still others (Anabaptists) think that He came to abolish the old law and set up the new. What I don't get about that view is that He said that He didn't come to abolish it. up |
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Another thought about my topic of righteousness from yesterday. Brought on by Philipians 3:9. "...not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ--the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith." Our righteousness must be greater than that of the Pharisees but not based on the righteousness brought by following the law, but it is greater because it does not come from us, it comes from the Lord through faith in the blood and the Truth. I found a study by Dave Barnett that he made for the Summer Staff of 3rd session. Last night I read the one for July 28th. He quotes from Pennington in 'O Holy Mountain!', "I find myself asking what I am getting out of this experience, but I realized today that it is the wrong question. This experience is not for me, but for Him. It is to give Him, at least for this little while, the fullest attention and love that I can, freed as I am from many other cares and concerns that ordinarily clutter my life--a chance to live out a freedom..." He then goes on to ask three questions to ask of yourself. What are your greatest passions in this world? What are the things that cause concern and clutter in your life? When do you feel the most rested? Renewed? Freedom? My thoughts that stem from the questions but aren't necessarily bound by them, or even answering them. I want to see people challenged in their world view, beyond their comfort zone. I want to live in the space where I am. I want to be. I don't want to press the challenge, to constantly be striving, not looking for the next great thing. "How can I be better, how can I change?" shouldn't be at the forefront of my mind, but to live what comes up and to BE there. I want more of "What is going on around me, what can I give, what can I learn?" to be in my mind. I have a passion to see people interact with their surroundings and not to just walk by and ignore it, walk by the people in your work environment, walk by your kids, walk by your neighbour, just because you're too unsure of yourself and scared to go beyond what you think you want...to look right and as if you've got it all together. I feel the most renewed when I have a purpose. When I have work that means something to me and that isn't for a paycheque. It helps to have a paycheque!!!! Don't get me wrong. I'm not moving to a nunery or taking a vow of poverty. But I don't want that to be my reason. I thought I did, in that, I thought I wanted a job that I minorly enjoyed in order to be paid, in order to live in the place where I want to which, at the time I was most set on it, was Victoria. Which is still in me. But I don't want that to be the focus. So I feel renewed when I have a focus, a purpose, something tangible and also minorly physical. I feel renewed when I know that I am in the space where the Lord wants me and I'm able to connect with Him through His Word to me. I feel rested when I'm able to do work with out stress or pressure. I don't think I would feel rested on a cruise ship. I don't want entertainment just for entertainment sake, to block my mind from what stresses I have in life. I feel rested right now, watering (from the Pool to Treehouse), cooking dinner, cleaning the odd thing up (like an industrial kitchen), folding some shirts (about a hundred of them), killing some ants (in the fountain machine), doing some writing and reading, sitting in the sun by the pool. They're good days right now. With camp in, they were still long days, 8 am to midnight or one, but they were good days and not stressful. I feel the most Freedom when I'm aware that the Lord loves me, when the people around me allow me to be my stupid self and love me for it, when I can work without stress, when I don't feel like I have to prove anything. Feeling pretty free right now. up |
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Everyone came back today. Or at least the Staff and a bunch of the Interns, and some other girl. They're all back and life has gotten back to working for most of the day again. It was kind of cool to go and do my thing in the Trader for Terri and not have to think about what anyone else is doing, in that I know that everything's now covered so I don't have to feel like something's getting lost between the cracks of having no one around. I think the words came out right. I'm not sure. It's that I was concerned about something getting forgotten cause the people usually responsible for it aren't around (folding laundry, garbage, making sure camp doesn't burn down, making sure camp isn't carried off by a swarm of either fruit flies or seagulls...take your pick). It was nice to get in the store and just fold stuff and move stuff around and find and label sizes. It's official. We're done. Eric, Tyler, Christy and I finally finished the second season of Lost. We're going to go crazy now that we have to wait between episode and have to watch commercials like the rest of the world. That's just pooey. We finished up tonight just past twelve. It's been fun, but I'm also really glad to be over with it cause there really are better things to do with my time than sit and watch some stupid tv show for hours at a time with some terribly cool people. We have such an opportunity to interact in one of the most beautiful places in the world. It's an amazing communal situation that often goes un-potentialized. I can make up a word. It's my perogative as a native speaker of the English language to slap on those derivational morphemes to use the language creatively. It's not being incorrect, it's been creative. So yes, I feel that I'm often not able to interact with the community here to the fullest potential. We're content to sit in front of a screen together. And I've done it for the past week and a half, and there it is, I won't be ashamed. It's my sin against the community here and I claim it. I'll try my best not to repeat it. It was fun. We had some excitement tonight. Or rather, Gil and Harold had some excitement. We just had a bat in Big Squeeker while watching Lost, which was quite enough excitement for us girls. Gil was in Egmont today fixing the steering cable on the Skook that broke when Beyond was taking the boat down to the Landing with their gear. He was heading back up when the steering mechanism thing, not the cable, seized on him. He was by the Fish Farm and Harold had to set out just before 8 in the Laker to go get him. They got in at like 10:30 with the Laker towing the Skook. It was very, very dark when they got back. Thankfully tonight is amazing. It's dead flat out there and there's a big old almost full moon out. Maybe tomorrow or the next day it'll be full. The whole of Jervis is all lit up. We can actually see the outline of the mountains, like the Zion route peak, not just a black blob where we know a mountain should be. The hill right behind us was all lit up as well. It was wild to be able to actually see the different grooves and cracks in the rocks, again, as opposed to just a giant black mass behind us that we know is a mountain. I could actually pick out clumps of trees against the colour of the rock. It was pretty darn cool. Harold and Gil had the best possible night to have to deal with the Skook rescue mission. up |
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I am totally confused. I don't really know which way is up. I keept trying not to pay attention, but it still affects my brain and thoughts for the day. That's all I have to say about that. I worked in the Trader all day, it looks pretty good in there, but I know that it will be a huge mess within the first day. I would do it over again because I want to do it well, even if it will get messed. I had a good talk with two very cool people in the back office today about going out into the world. They're both being drawn to work out in the world. One's going to Uganda next month to work with Restore International (the rescue mission that the Goffs work with) and the other person and spouse are feeling like when they leave where they are right now they want to go into relief work. I can't understand, nor can they, how people can become aware of the hurt in the world and then be able to return to their "normal" lives with their cars and their lattes. How do they justify it in their minds? How do they block it out and continue along as if none of it exists? I'm astounded that in this past day I've been able to see all those around me are seeing the world in the way it should be. One feels called to the less fortunate and knows that moving to the Seattle area will not be permanant but a transition between now and when she will be sent out to the world, possibly Alaska. Two friends are sitting across the room from me right now talking about L'Abri communities and looking stuff up on the web about different living communities. One's looking at going to Uganda to get hooked up with people about teaching in the area. Two others are training in Florida to be sent and to send people into the world to boldly preach the Word. This totally cool family is working with Restore International to get kids out of the sex trade. I was so discouraged in the last few years that most people I came in contact with seemed to be content to keep living their lives according to their own terms, in their own comfort. I can see the comfort and the apathy of the Christian culture around me and was totally pained by it. It made me want to scream at the top of my lungs but knew that I couldn't because I would be swept under the carpet as being self-righteous and no one would listen. I had to sit back and hope and pray that they would come to see that life isn't about blending in with the rest of the minions. Today has been a blessing for me to see all this around me. The Spirit is working and is calling people out and...even better...people ARE listening! Hallelujah. After dinner, I went to finish up in the Trader. I stepped outside and noticed that there was still plenty of light and it was a beautiful evening. I had lots of things whirling around in my brain and I stopped and thought, "I want to go for a run". So I did. I was going hard and had things all whirling around and just going and not paying attention and I got to the end of the Zip Line to turn around and then I thought, "What am I doing?? I'm in the most amazing spot. I'm able to run down one of the more beautiful paths, and I'm all stuck in my own head!! Take a look around, dude. You're living a moment." I hadn't noticed where I am. Even just the places in Victoria where I was able to ride my bike, or the neighbourhood in Japan where I ran or rode to school, at times I would stop and take it in. This past year and a half I have definitely done it more and more often. I now start to notice when I'm NOT in the moment, as opposed to noticing when I AM in the moment. It used to be that I would have moments of, "Wow, look where I am". Now, like tonight, I notice when I have to stop myself and re-attentify myself. (Like yesterday, I'm making new words. It means 'to make oneself attentive to something, again') I still don't know where I'm going to next. I need to settle my brain down a bit. It's all a bit wingy right now. I've really enjoyed interacting with people, but this evening, I had to notice that it's been a while since I've gone to be quiet. Two months ago, that's all I was doing was being quiet and had to work at interacting. The odd time, I'll go sit on Flag Point and watch the rapids, or something like that, but it's usually to go and think and mull not to be quiet. I miss sitting in my living room, staring at the wall. Those were good times. I can't seem to bring myself to stare at the wall here. Too many fun things to do (like restock shelves or kill ants!), too many cool people to interact with, not enough time to take it all in and enjoy to the max the place where I am for the time that I have. Not feeling the balance...I need both. up |
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I don't even know where to start. My brain is all a-whirr with the day. I'm feeling a little bit like fried chicken. The women arrived today. Yesterday, I was reminded why I always said that I would never do a Women's Retreat ever again. We had six women on the Leadership team come in. I love some of them and know the odd one. I will say again, I was reminded why I said I would never do Women's Camp, and why my mother was so floored when I told her I would come up to help on Main Street. Now that today has hit though, I have to say that I have had the best first day of a Woman's Camp that I have ever had. I don't know if it's just that I'm able to continue on doing what my responsibilities are right now with minimal actual interaction with any of the women, or if it's actually easier. I think it's the lack of contact, personally. I got to drive the Avon for the welcome. Good times in little boats. We got rocked through the rapids and then had to go full out (putt, putt, putt) down the Jervis to catch up with the other boats for the Welcome. I got to the meeting space and didn't even slow down, just headed right out in the procession. It was kind of fun. I ran off to the Inn to get it open and discovered that I had no staff. I got the guys set up in the Inn as quickly as I could, once they actually arrived, and then got the request through H to go help in the Trader cause they were so slammed. The guys were really great about the training as I had to fly through it as quickly as possible. I walked in the door of the Trader and the first thing I saw was the display in front of me of fleece jackets that had been completely ripped apart and was sitting on the first shelf in a heap. Welcome to Women's camp. So most of my day was spent prepping the Inn for opening, dealing with the drama that is the Trader when Women's comes up and all the extra stuff that we need to do, and generally trying to keep my wits about myself. I haven't felt overwhelmed at any time. It's been busy but I've enjoyed the faster pace of everything. It really does help that I don't have to really deal with any of them (ie women) and the drama they create in their worlds...like not having a schedule. I just have to answer the odd question here and there about sizes and such. It really, really helps that I spent Tuesday re-organizing the shirts in the store room and labeling what sizes we have available. I have a really good sense of the stock now and I feel way more comfortable in being able to answer questions quickly and correctly. Makes the difference. I like being prepared and it makes for a much happier Michelle. up |
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My image for the day. I was sitting up on the rock over-looking camp and the Inlet. It was dark with the bright, full moon hiding behind the mountain, shining off the puffy dark clouds and this tremendous wind. I was with two other lovely ladies and they were talking about the transition time that they're both in right now. One was talking about going home that she didn't know what she was really going to be doing or what life was going to look like but that she was glad to be in the midst of the unknown. I had to stop for a second cause just earlier today it had dawned on me. This guy working in the Inn with me (I shudder to think of him, creepy) asked me "So what do you want to do when you grow up?". To which I had to reply, "Well...[shrug and grin] I am. I am grown up and this is what I do." So today I was finally able to put it into words and then when she said that she didn't know what her life would look like, I had to say, "It's being where you are. This IS what your life looks like. You're living it right now". What a freeing space to be in where I can finally look at what ever it is that I'm doing and say, "This is what my life looks like." What a sigh of relief my soul can breath when it doesn't feel like I have to keep searching for this image of what my life is...this IS what my life looks like. It looks like going to Japan for a year. It looks like being in love with an incredible boy for six years (and then recovering from that for a further two....or six...however you look at it!!!). It looks like being a receptionist for a car salesmen training company. It looks like living in Egmont for five months. It looks like going to University for six years. It looks like working at the Oak Bay Beach Hotel in whatever capacity they would pay me for! It looks like....[blank to be filled in come October 1st]. This IS what life looks like. Later that night, I had an interesting talk that doesn't matter about and on a rather random subject, but it got me thinking about other stuff and about rejection (no, I wasn't rejected, it was a completely different topic, it just branched in my head into this topic). It's easier when you have remained closed and you haven't put yourself out there because then you can justify it in your brain or explain it away when someone doesn't want you or to be friends with you. You can say to yourself that they don't really know you. But if you have put yourself out there (even if they think you haven't, which I'm discovering in the last year is rather more common than anything else, I seem to be hearing that I'm a closed person and that I don't share anything while I'm feeling like I'm going way out on a limb) and they either reject you out right or just not persuing any kind of relationship or friendship, then it's soul defeating, straight up rejection that you can't explain away. There's no saying "They don't know me" or "I didn't try" or "I shut them down" cause none of that is true. Then you've got nothing to go back on but straight up "They don't want to be with me". up |
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The women left. YEAH!!!! I spent the rest of the morning after the Princess left and after dinner till about 9 doing deposits. I counted $481 in coin just for the scholarship fund that Bob & Alda set up. Today is Sharon's birthday. Brian and I spent pretty much the whole afternoon making her a cake. It was a beautiful cake. We surprised her. I think that she was more surprised by the fact that Brian baked than by the surprise factor of us doing something for her birthday. We had hats too. And the two of us had pretty pink and tinsel wigs. Then Gil told us stories of Comb Overs. up |
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I did some stuff around the office first thing. Then I got inspired to get rid of the crap in Tili. That took a full Clydesdale. Bins and bins of shampoo and hairspray and Lost and Found. Then I decided to keep going. So I went on to Chinook. I worked on hauling crap out of there for an hour and a half before lunch, then did just under another two hours after lunch. That was just hauling crap out of there. Actually, the after lunch stint, I did do the Chinook laundry room for about half an hour of those two hours. So much crap. Clothes and shaving cream and moldy food and radio parts and drill bits and just randomness. Got to go swimming in the inlet today. Canoeing is interesting. I know it can be done solo, but it's an interesting thing when done with someone else. We were paddling, . Once we got the rhythm of each other I found that I wasn't even paying attention to the sound of the dip of the other paddle. I don't know if it was different from the back of the boat, but from my point of view at the front, I was just dipping in time without even thinking about it anymore and taking in the heights surrounding me and gliding over the barnacle covered boulders lying in the water where they reside now after sliding at some point in the last thousand years from the cliffs that hovered above our heads. Sometimes we'd get a glimpse of the forest behind the rocks. There were these groves of giant, moss covered cedars and firs, hanging with light green Old Man's Beard, growing up between the boulders that had come to lay on the ground and hadn't made it to the ocean. These are the landscapes that I had had dreams of while surrounded by the concrete in Asia. The lush greens of the forest, the vastness of the cliffs and mountains, the refreshing dampness of the ocean. Makes me breathe deeper. I will store away the images for the next time I'm parched and dry with the impeding concrete. up |
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Watched the Scorpion King with the guys in the Floathouse. Seeing shoulders in the movie sent me into this level of insanity that used to be the daily norm but that I haven't existed in for a while. Went to the office. Looked online for some jobs in Russia. The shoulders are not in Moscow, Michelle.
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Brutal headache today from last night. I spent the morning working in the kitchen. The inspector is coming soon and we had the Malibu Yachts crew up so there were a lot more mouths to feed for lunch. The afternoon was going to be spent a bit in the kitchen and then out at the Lodge with Ter, but instead I worked on my resume for pretty much 2 hours all this afternoon and that was pretty much my whole day shot right there with all the randomness that just came up. Had a good convo after breakfast with some friends in the Dining Room. Interesting topic and I think that we're all of the same mind set although varied slightly. Good to hash it out in a safe place with people who love you and who you love. Got into my theory of socially acceptable sins within the Christian community. Started us off on a further thought of letting all sinners in the door, whether they choose to repent or not. Those who repent are a no brainer, let them in. It's the unrepentant, which of course we all are in some regard, but to what extent and who chooses that extent. If we say this one (greed) is okay to be unrepentant about and we'll let you in the church, but this one (child molestation) isn't and you can't come in, then you've put a value judgement on one over the other. Of course there needs to be lines, particularly in the latter case, but it just raises some interesting points and questions. How far can Grace stretch, or does it only stretch as far as repentance will allow it to? Where does that line exist for you? Can you think of yourself in the same light when your bounds of what would be allowable in your world are stretched and tested? Where does that line exist for God? If we're all sinners and in the same boat and we all have sin that we're unrepentant of, then why not let a hit man sit next to you on the pew? What's the difference between him and you? He kills people for money and will continue to do so. Your neighbour's kid is killing in Afghanistan and will continue to do so. How do you justify it? Can you keep your own conscience clean by justifying it to yourself? "Oh, it's the intent. The boy is killing 'bad people'", well the hit man may be paid to kill a rival gang lord, a 'bad person'. Who do you sit next to comfortably in the pew? Once you've resolved that, take the example up a notch to where you're totally uncomfortable with it. Where are your lines? The point isn't an answer, the point is to continue asking the question and the process you go through as you never reach a possible answer. Thoughts whirl around in my brain. Words don't come out right. up |
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This morning we had the inspector guy in. Pretty uneventful. I hung with Terri in the Trader for a bit. Moved some crap with the guys out of Little Squawka for a bit. Got to be there when they discovered the hardwood flooring under the carpet, that, by the way, I knew was under there. It was under the staircase, of course it�s going to be all through the room. It�s all through this camp, some of it is just really beat up and patch worked. But what do I know. I hope they�re able to build a whole wall of good cabinetry for in there to put all the sound equipment in and all the Program stuff and babysitting stuff so that the whole room can be stored away and kept really clean. Maybe then people can actually use it as opposed to it being the giant pit of crap and filth that the Program guys usually make it. Did some moving around in the Trader again after Terri and Harold left. Took some guys from Vancouver on a really long tour. They were really interested. Then it was dinner. It�s pretty usual for here. Days are kind of random and I get some stuff done, but nothing particularly monumental, and then it�s dinner. After dinner is all of us not really knowing what to do with ourselves, so nothing really happens, then we go to bed. I was hoping to play some ping pong, but no one else seemed really into it. Had a great convo with two friends instead. Talked a bit about relationships, good mixed convo, not just one sided complaining about the opposite sex or anything. Talked about the Catholic faith cause one of us is Catholic and the other two aren't. Very interesting and enlightening. She said that it was really hard being here sometimes and being Catholic because through the summer people gave her a really hard time about it. Interesting. I don't think that it would ever occur to me to give a Christian a hard time about being a Catholic Christian. I'm interested in her take on things and on the things that may differ in what we think. I want to ask questions and talk about it but I find that the same in talking to all Christians and it's not a value judgment. That division point is an interesting one to me, the division from Catholic to Protestant at the Reformation. Why people make such a big deal out of it (making it a judgment point I mean, I think that the Reformation had to happen because the track that the Catholic church was on wasn't a good one, but as Brian said, "No need to throw the baby out with the bath water"), I will never understand. If it's a big deal to you (meaning that you believe that either Catholics or Protestants are completely wrong), will you please write to me and tell me why, cause I want to understand your point of view. Ah, bastions. I currently hate bastions and all who are content to live in them....even though I include myself in that. But then, maybe I shouldn't, cause I don't think that I'm actually content with my bastion, it's just survival. So, okay. I can currently hate fortifications and all who are CONTENT to live in them...and not hate myself cause I'm not content, in my fortification that is. Although, it's not so bad here. There are really good parts to it. Like the cannons. My favourite part of that link? Yup, right here, "The ditches and walls channel attacking troops into carefully constructed killing grounds where defensive cannon can wreak havoc on troops attempting to storm the walls, with emplacements set so that the attacking troops have no place to shelter from the defensive fire." Excellent, excellent, good, good. [said in the evil voice while tapping all figers together successively] Wreak havoc. Killing grounds. Yeah!! It's a party in Michelle's head! up |
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This afternoon, four of us went for a lovely game of Frisbee Golf. It was great to get out in the green and away from camp and laugh together. The sky and the air were clear. We were up around hole 7, or was it 8??, and I had to stop for a moment and take in the grass beneath me, my new friends just down from me walking and joking around, and then to look up and see the towering trees above me with the blue sky behind them. These are the moments that I dream about, that my soul aches for, when I�m surrounded by the concrete and the metal and the noise of the cities of the world. I had to stop and take a mental picture in my mind so that I could hold onto it and keep it close for the next time when I will need to take it out and look at it.
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The motto of today comes from Christina. "I never thought of the power of twigs in great numbers." They�re just twigs. They�re just small. What can a twig do to you?? What a fabulous day today!! It was bright and sunny and lovely. It kinda sucked that I woke up at 5:45 and couldn�t get back to sleep. Put me in a bad mood and thinking of my day yesterday (or rather, my evening) put me in a further bad mood. Despite the bad mood, it was time to go hiking. Katie had been wanting to go up to McCannel Lake for quite some time and someone had to go up to shut off the intake valve on the Hydro dam so that we could drain the pen stock to put in some new (or re-do?? I don�t know) screens for in there, so Gil decided to send Brian up with any of us who wanted to go for the jaunt. It ended up being me, Katie, Christina and Brian. We had a great time. An adventure for sure. If I was in a really good writing mode and didn�t feel guilty every single time that I use this computer here at camp, then I would fully write an Adventurer story about today. We totally got off the "path"(please note that I use this term in the loosest possible understanding of the definition) and ended up fully bush wacking for the better part of an hour. It was pretty tough to get through, but at the same time completely exhilarating to be surrounded, pressed up against, by the fresh green of the forest and bushes. There were times when it was so thick that I just had to put my head down, put my arm up and keep pressing forward through the bush. There were the odd berry stops for blueberries and salal berries. It was steep and wet and dirty, but none of them were to an extreme so it was all the best aspects of all those things that were just to be taken into our souls and enjoyed for the delightfulness that they captured of the Creation around us. Breathe deep, and you�ll choke on a bug. I did. I breathed in a bug during a 2 second �breathe deeply to restore your soul� type of moment. And I choked. There was one time when it was super thick and I finally just had a bit of a giggle fit. I had to get it out of my system, the ridiculousness of what it was that we were doing had gotten to me. So we�re trying to get around this big stump where it�s too thick and steep on the uphill side of it but to the other side of it was a nice little drop off that we couldn�t really see well for all the bushes in the way. So I�m trying to reach my legs around this stump to get to the spot where I could climb up the hill further. I�m holding on to one branch and I have to go Indiana Jones-ing (did I just say Jones-ing?) on it to swing to the other side of it only to grab onto what ever branches are there and cling to the side of this lush hill that looks like a tangle of bushes and no ground is to be seen as it�s so dense. And as I swing over and adhere myself to the mountain side, oh, lo and behold, right next to my mouth is a big old wild blueberry. �Well, hello blueberry. I�m going to eat you.� But my hands are not free to move at this point as I�m gripping tightly to all the bushes to keep from falling into the inlet that is actually, by this point, no where to be seen and hundreds of metres away. So, gulp. I eat the blueberry that is sitting right in front of my mouth, right off the branch. And then I start to giggle at the complete ridiculousness of my situation and at what I have just done. A few more �hand holds� of branches and I�m up into a �clearer� spot [read: place where you still can�t see your own legs, but you might actually be able to see the person in front of you] next to Christina and I'm giggling away and she's wondering what lovely things I have found in the bushes that would make me giggle that way. Wild blueberries. How fucking great is life! Once we reached the top, us girls anyway cause Brian had taken off once we found the path again to make up for lost time as Gil was waiting for the dam to get shut off, we bunkered down for our several-hour stop over. We rid ourselves of our vast and wet clothing and basked in the sun for just a bit before putting back on a layer or two because the sweat was cooling our bodies and, despite the sun, the elevation was enough that we were getting kind of chilled. We sat on the dock for most of the time, eating our bits of lunch and talking. Brian went out in the canoe on his own for a little bit. We all really got into this great convo about the state of the world. Christina had brought up her book of essays by the lady who wrote the Poisonwood Bible. I, evidently, without ever reading a word of her stuff, adore her. Brian had read some of it and read a section of it out loud. We talked a bit and then Christina read some more as well. It was mostly about how the world works at screwing the less fortunate over and destroying the physical planet while they�re at it. That�s about the simplest, most optimistic way of putting it. Ah, optimism. So misguided!! Mostly it�s that none of us can really understand being aware of the way that the world works and yet still consciously deciding to not pay attention and to go on living in a world of luxury and convenience. That�s where most people reside. Through our conversation we essentially came to a point where we�re able to say that we all need, as individuals, to be making the daily decisions to live with integrity and intelligence. �How can I make a difference? These problems are so huge that there�s nothing I can do.� I get to that point pretty much on a daily basis and I want to not care because it all seems so big. Live-able habitat is dwindling and the human race is sucking the life and resources out of every pocket of the planet with the intention of lining their wallets with greater comforts and �convenience� (aka laziness!!) It�s too big. There�s nothing as an individual person that I can do to counteract the actions of the thousands of people in my neighbourhood that are making horrible, misguided, selfish, destructive decisions on a daily basis. But really, there is a lot we can do. We can make a vote with every single dollar that we spend. We can be informed. We can question how we live. We can question our smaller units of government (like municipalities or, what are they called?? Counties??). We can be twigs. �I�ve never considered the power of twigs in great numbers� says Christina. Well why can�t we be twigs, stopping up the movement of all selfish corporate and world domination attempts. If the four of us, sitting on that dock, can get fired up with one conversation, what impact can there be if we share with four more each. This is our generation. This is the generation of the kids who in the 90�s were appalled if our schools didn�t have blue boxes. We are the ones who decided to forego the giant hair and bring it down to a two inch mane above our foreheads because we weren�t going to use the aerosol hairspray anymore. We are the ones who cried out that we didn�t want to inherit a planet from our parents where we wouldn�t be able to go outside because there was no O-Zone layer left. Why the heck are we now content to buy our kids nothing but plastic toys and drive around in our SUV�s with the air-con blasted and consume at a greater rate than our parents ever dreamed possible? Of course nothing is going to be perfect. I can moan and groan away, typing on this very plastic and metal computer using technology that probably goes against everything that I believe in, but there are other things that I can get right. Enough of that for now. It was a great talk and we came from it a bit more inspired. I know I came away feeling comforted that I�m not the only one who wants to rail at the night, at the apathetic, at the comfortable, at the lazy. I often feel like people just listen to appease me and then go on living as they do with no positive impact coming from my words. Today, I heard the same coming from others and it brought me joy to know that there were others that thought like me already. Be a fucking twig, damn it. We headed back down the hill and made it home safe and sound. We managed to stick to the trail the whole way down, although there is the part where we first lost it on the way up that it was really hard to find again. Brian did find it, but it wasn�t quick. Coming down was harder on me than going up. It�s hard on my knees. It was a lot more log walking, which I totally hate to do. Slippery. No control. I hate heights. It�s a beautiful hike though. Coming down the last portion was so cool. It�s big and open all through the trees with really thick moss under foot. I don�t remember most of that part going up, I don�t know if it�s because we were off the path by then?? The trees are all really tall, but not very large around. It looked like a bunch of match sticks all around us. There isn�t really a path there, you just have to pick your way down the very steep incline in whatever way is going to be most comfortable and try to head in the general direction of the next flag marker. It was really dark under the canopy, but it wasn�t late and we could see the perfect blue sky out before us. We were just on the dark side of the mountain and under thick cover. Brian wanted to just leap down on the cushiony soft moss. He jumped around a bit, Katie thought he looked like an 8 year old, but he can go so fast that he got way ahead of us within seconds and had to stop. Poor boy. Getting held back by the girls. We got back into camp and found Mum and Dad out at Hamburger Point. I was waving at them from the boat to run in to camp. Dad pretended to run quickly, without actually gaining any distance, and Mum pretended to try and walk, all hunched over and holding her back. They then disappeared together behind a tree, ran to the next and disappeared behind that tree, then ran to the next...yeah, you get the picture. They�re funny people those, people. So they�re here and so are Chris and Heidi. We all had dinner and I went over to Chinook and got to chat with Heids for a bit and tell her the story of how I came to be here, and not be in Victoria. I laid in bed and kept thinking of the hard parts of the trail and the twigs coming at me and the hills around me. Then I remembered the convo from a few weeks ago. I have control over my dreams. So instead of freaking out, I imagined myself floating over things and bounding over logs and when I slipped I could kind of fly. It was cool. up |
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After dinner I thought of the wood pile in the fireplace in Little Squawka. Fire for the evening. So I ended up gathering the folks and the Frenchs. The fire got a little bit too roaring and we had to get the fire hose out to spray down the roof cause there were all these sparks coming up out of the chimney, and then being redirected by the chimney topper to the cedar shake roof. Smart! Now that�s a design to be proud of...or to burn your house down with. One of the two. I�m not sure which one yet. Once we got the fire dampened down, which we did by literally dampening it with water, we could sit and enjoy it and talk in the glow on the original hardwood floor that Ian just discovered under the nasty carpet last week. We talked about Italy and former Communist regimes in the area around Croatia and the old Yugoslavia. A nice chill night, once we had the fire brigade duty done.
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I�ve been really out of sorts today. I have a bad headache and I can�t seem to wrap my mind around what is going on. Dad didn�t sleep all last night, neither did Mum, so they came to find me this afternoon to have a talk. For them it isn�t the teaching thing, it�s all about Russia for them. I�m leaving it to be shot down by the school over the passport thing. I have no hold on this. At first I was a little bit whatever about it because it�s a point of pride for me. �What will people think cause I�ve told them I�m doing this, and now I�m not.� But really, I�m okay with that. I just don�t know. Mum did have a fully valid point, being that of spiritual strength in me right now. She was concerned that I�m not strong enough. I hate that. I don�t ever want anyone to say that I�m ever not enough for whatever it is. Talk about taking me out completely. Well then. I�ll just sit here and waste away because I�m obviously not enough to do anything else. I know that�s not what she�s saying, but that�s how it often feels. It all still comes back to me opening up my emotions just a little bit this last year and now it�s like any little thing throws me completely off kilter. I hate that. I hate that I can�t handle everything. I hate that something would be too much for me to handle emotionally so I break down. Not something that Michelle would ever believe possible in herself. Tool & Tackle arrived today. I don�t think that I�m in a space where I want to be patient with any of them right now. Everyone is up in arms over name tags. Completely ridiculous in my world. It�s not my deal. Both Eric and Harold have said not to worry about it. So I won�t. I just hate that it puts me in a space of being the bad guy cause I�m not doing anything to appease this little old biddy who seems completely crushed that she doesn�t have a name tag and that other people do. My feelings for the day. Who cares? It�s a freaking name tag. Tell people your name. Get over it. Feeling a little bitter today. Oh, I probably haven't mentioned it yet. I have a job offer in Moscow to start in the end-ish of October. up |
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Counting, counting, counting. I counted the whole Convenience section of the Trader. Took me a while as I was trying to balance Monday morning in the Malibu office and talking to Alexei in Moscow with actually being productive in the Trader. Plugged in my iPod so no one would talk to me. Was a total b*** to a friend today in the office. I just couldn�t talk. There�s just too much. Talked with Mum tonight after she walked me home. It was good to share with her again. up |
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More counting. Counted stickers today. Didn�t get nearly enough done. I�m totally just barely interacting with the T&Ters that are here. I just have no interest in talking to many of them right now. I�m far too selfish and I�m too wrapped up with what is ripping around in my head. I found the girls outside of Squawka tonight. There we all were, and Lynda even came by. So all five of us headed to the DH to hang out. We talked about where our families were from and touched on some of the war, particularly in Germany. Sharon talked the most, mostly about her family in Germany. Her aunt owns Carlsberg brewery. Sounds like she has a castle for a home and a table that seats 100. I�m just sitting there going, �Who are you??? Who are you that is best buds with Joni Mitchell and your aunt owns Carlsberg?? I mean, come on!� It was cool to just sit and chat with these women that I love and adore. I�m enjoying so much more listening to those around me than actually talking. It seems pointless to learn about people who I don�t really care for all that much. I would much rather put my energies, that lie outside of my own selfish thoughts and dramas, into knowing the people that I already do, better. I�m not paying my attention to the regular people around me. Kind of cold and harsh to say, but it's honest. I'll still think it even if I don't say it, so I could just keep it from people and allow them to think that I don't ever have a selfish thought, but that wouldn't be true. So, may as well put it out there. up |
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How did my life get so incredibly fraught with drama? I was a simple girl. I kept things simple. Kept people away. Didn�t get all caught up in the drama of life and love and separation and heart ache. Kept it all inside so that it didn�t get dramatized on its way out. Somehow I�ve managed to become a drama queen and have decided to bring all those around me to come and watch it. I need to get my bearings tonight so that the next few days that I�m here I can be a normal person who doesn�t get all moody and dramatic and intense and closed and all that crap. Interesting thought for the night from a friend Heaven and hell are the same thing but different for different people depending on whether that person knows Him or not. They are both the presence of God. up |
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I declined the job offer in Moscow today. I finished inputting the inventory in the Trader yesterday. Today I flipped it so we've started a new year in the system. Terri and I did the happy inventory dance in the Trader and then broke into laughter. I love her. Had two really great conversations with two amazing women. I'm blessed by the people around me, by the love they give me and the love they allow me to bestow on them. up |
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Reading for today in the Brothers Karamazov "So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find some one to worship. But man seeks to worship what is established beyond dispute, so that all men would agree at once to worship it. For these pitiful creatures are concerned not only to find what one or the other can worship, but to find something that all would believe in and worship; what is essential is that all may be together in it. This craving for community of worship is the chief misery of every man individually and of all humanity from the beginning of time. For the sake of common worship they�ve slain each other with the sword. They have set up gods and challenged one another, �Put away your gods and come and worship ours, or we will kill you and your gods!� And so it will be to the end of the world, even when gods disappear from the earth; they will fall down before idols just the same. " up |