Week 10

Day 63: Oct 12, 2014

Today was pretty great. It started out with coffee and conversation at our chalet. A bunch of people came over to talk and have snacks and it was quite nice. Many of us 20-somethings gathered on the porch and admired the beauty around us while talking about life with a three and ten year old. I was a great way to start a sunday. Mark came back today and brought his RC off-road car so we spent an hour in the afternoon just racing it up and down the road. I should explain a little- Mark used to race Rcs professionally (as in he won races and made money off of doing it) and so his off-road car can reach 65 mph. One of his other cars that he track races but did not bring can reach 120 mph. He was playing in the ditches and using them as ramps. We were using the wall that borders the road as a jumping off point and using the freshly packed road as a place to do donuts and generally a place to drive recklessly. It was nice to spend the afternoon outside even if we weren't on a hike. The fun continued through some Dr. Who watching with Mark and dinner.

After dinner, about nine of us- mostly 20-somethings but some high schoolers- gathered in our chalet to watch A Fault in Our Stars. I really enjoyed the movie because I just finished the book about two weeks ago so I had some of the other details in my mind as I was watching it but some of the others didn't understand it as much. I am turning into my mother though. During one part in the movie the kids are having a mock funeral for one of the main characters who is dying of cancer. His friends are reading the eulogies that they wrote for their friend and I lost it. Tears were streaming down my face and snot was flowing out of my nose. Crying work about as well as using a netipot to clean out my sinuses. Luckily, everyone understood that I was a little more connected to the characters than they were (I didn't tell them that I probably would have cried anyway but they don't need to know that right?) so it was understandable that I needed two kleenexes to clear out my nose after the movie. Even though the movie ended at 10:30/11 we ended up having a really good but fairly short chat about the movie afterwards. It was a nice way to end my weekend.

Day 64: Oct 13, 2014

So I trained Sam on the coffee cart today so he will be able to work on a few of the days while I am out of the village. Of course, it was a crazy slow day while I was trying to train him but luckily he has worked at a coffee shop before so that part is already in his mind, he just needs to learn the machine a little. I think he will be ok. It was so quiet, though, that I was able to come out from behind the counter and talk about the movie even more with Alex and Laura. Alex really was having a hard time with the movie in the sense that there were things that he felt should have been there and he was wondering if they were in the book. There were also a few questions about the character of the characters. He felt that one of the main characters was really cocky but when you read the book you see that the way that he is acting is more about how beautiful he thinks the girl is. I would say he was more cautiously confident than cocky. I don't know, you will just have to read the book and watch it yourselves to get the whole picture. In the afternoon I took my usual nap which was great. And the day ended in possibly the best way it could have- We sang Soon and Very Soon in vespers.

Day 65: Oct 14, 2014

Today was oddly quiet at the cart this morning, again. I am not really sure why but oh well, what are you going to do? Other than that the day was routine. Coffee cart and then nap. I did unload a kiln today which was kind of fun. I need to get down to the studio more often but I did have one piece fired. In the afternoon, Leah and I started watching a movie and Alex joined in about 10 minutes in. About an hour in the fire alarm in our chalet went off. Apparently, someone was showering and the steam set off the alarm. I was just glad that it wasn't a real fire. I am not surprised that someone didn't turn on the fan. It is kind of a pain to turn on because, at least in our bathroom, I literally have to stand on the toilet in order to reach the switch to turn it on. Oh well, we have put in a request to change it but I am sure it is pretty low on the list of things to do.

Day 66: Oct 15, 2014

The coffee cart was wonderful today. Not because of the actual work but because during one of the lulls, Leif (pastor's child, age 3) came over and played with me. We did the usual child pushes over adult, adult gets up and the cycle starts over. Once that got old we played a little Jenga which was more take two normal turns and then knock it over (he thought you won if you knocked it over and I wasn't going to be the one to break the news to him). It made for a great lull time. The rest of the day was routine until the staff meeting when I got excited about another 20-something coming and everyone thought it was because it added another boy my age to the pool. It lead to a great many laughs so I guess I wasn't too embarrassed about it. Of course, they gave him to me to welcome but he is coming on Sunday and I leave on Monday for an out so I will welcome him and then leave. The others promised not to tell him the story until after he actually gets to know me. I really don't care at this point but that may change on Sunday. We shall see. The day ended with two wonderful games of dominos, neither of which I came close to winning but that is ok.

Day 67: Oct 16, 2014

There was homemade baklava for dessert today. Need I say more? It was amazing! Other than that it was another Holden normal day.

Day 68: Oct 17, 2014

As usual, all of the fun and interesting things happen after work is over. Today, once everyone was done, a bunch of us gathered in Alex's room and watched Perks of Being a Wallflower. I really liked it but some parts of it were a little close to home (not that that is a bad thing). We sat and ate apple slices and popcorn and just enjoyed the movie. Some tears were shed (not my own) and conversations were sparked. I love movies that do that. For dinner we had pizza (we have it every other friday and it is never really that good). Now, there are some people here who are gluten-free and one of them actually needs to be gluten-free so the kitchen has to figure out something for them. This week they decided that if they could not use the preprepared crust they were just going to use meat. Meat is pretty much their go-to answer. So, the gluten-free pizza had a crust of ground beef. The pizza was literally ground beef, sauce, cheese, and toppings. Apparently you can't be gluten-free and a vegetarian here. After dinner, vespers and work I ran into a few of the twenty-somethings playing camp table games. In this case, one of them was a game where the person had to guess what the word that was picked was. If you knew what the “rule” was you would always get the word right. The idea is that most of the table doesn't know the “rule” and so it is amazing when the person knows the word. We soon tired of the game and so we retreated to the comfort of Alex's futon and watched some It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. It ended the work week on a funny and yet calming note.

Day 69: Oct 18, 2014

The fog was incredible this morning. It was hanging really low and it was a cloudy morning so the mountains were surrounded by clouds. It was stunning. Other than that it was a knit and nap day followed by some planning for halloween and some Arrested Development to close out the day.

Week 9

Day 56: Oct 5, 2014

I pretty much literally slept today away. I woke up for breakfast and then went back to bed until 1pm. I guess the hike really tuckered me out. Oh well. What else are days off for if not sleeping?

Day 57: Oct 6, 2014

I feel like all of the exciting things that happen in my life here happen after 4pm so that is where I am going to start this entry (the morning bits were the same as always and the afternoon was filled with knitting and a nap). Once I woke up from my nap I grabbed my knitting and headed out onto the porch. Sitting on the porch swing looking out over the village is hard to beat but it is made even better when friends join you. Today, I was first joined by Benji and we chatted until Alex came out. The chatter faded out as we sat and knit, admired the beauty around us, and read. This continued until dinner and after dinner we were joined by Riley and Leah. The reading ceased but music was introduced and so were the ten year olds- Jade and Flint. We quickly turned into a jungle gym for Jade and Flint has made up this great storyline for the village so we talked to him about it and about how he should write a little script for the upcoming variety show. It was so wonderful but vespers soon interrupted the wonder.

After vespers many of us gathered at chalet 1 for a birthday hootenanny. A banjo and guitar were played and songs were sung. It lasted for almost 2 hours and every second was enjoyable.

Day 58: Oct 7, 2014

A mouse definitely ran up and onto my foot this morning at the coffee cart. I may have freaked out a little and may have kicked out. Part of me hopes the mouse is ok and another part of me wants it out of my area. Hopefully it was fine but spread the word to stay away. Also, it was announced at breakfast this morning that two of our staff members got engaged. They told the story and everyone got excited. They even acted out a little bit of it. They were on a hike and he had hurt his knee so he had to awkwardly maneuver onto one knee so she knew what was happening before he got there. It was a surprise enough though because the ring ended up being too big. Once they were finished telling the story everyone started clapping and jumping up and down. The whole affair was adorable. Other than that the day was pretty routine- coffee cart, lunch, bus arrival, nap/Dr. Who, knit and porch sit. Not that that is a bad thing. I think my favorite part of routine days is the porch sitting after dinner. That is when all of the kids come out and play some form of tag and you get to see how good the high schoolers are with the young ones. It is like watching one big family play in the yard. When one trips others go and make sure that they are ok. There are rarely tears but every so often there is a game of keep away.

Day 59: Oct 8, 2014

I got to see part of the lunar eclipse this morning and I didn't even have to get up early to see it. I was at the ending half but really when you haven't seen the first half, the second half is really pretty exciting.

Other than that it was kind of a rough day. It is days like today when being so isolated is really hard. You find out news from home and, although I could make a call if I had to, it wouldn't do much good. A call can not fix everything and in this case probably would only make me feel worse about not being able to be there. I guess, at least here, there are people who care about me and can help support me when things bring me down but it isn't quite the same. I did make some cards to send out and that helped me to feel a little better but still. Just a note to my family: Even though I like doing arts and crafts and such does not mean that I want to make you a “Get well soon” card! Aka I do not want you to be sick or hurting or whatever! I love you guys and would rather send a “Hey, I am glad to hear everything is great with you” card.

Luckily, the day ended on a higher note. We did a clown worship service for vespers which is always fun. A clown service is where the leaders (usually camp counselors) dress up as clowns and put on clown face paint. The minute the white makeup goes on the clowns must be silent. The idea is that there is fun/calming music and the clowns act out the message of the day. It makes for a nice change of pace and is perfect for a vespers setting since the service is only 30 minutes. I tried to look up a good site to link you to for a better description but most of the sites were vilifying it, saying that clowning has no place in the church. While that might be true for a classic sunday morning worship (depending on the church), it is perfect for any place where there are large amounts of kids who might pay more attention or where the general population of the congregation is more open to a very untraditional service. Basically, Holden is a perfect setting for one and the service today was focusing on the Ten Commandments which makes it fairly easy to do without too many words. For this service there were two non-clowns who partook. One read the passage before everything started and one did a prayer at the end. That was really all that was needed. I got to be the sound technician for the service. Basically, my job was to press play, make sure the sound was coming out, and turn the volume down during the talking parts and then back up. It was a very important duty :) haha. I do what I can. After the service a group of us gathered to play some dominoes and it was so much fun. There were about ten of us playing so that helped to keep the game relatively short and kept conversation going in the right direction. Every time I feel a little down here there is always something to either distract me or help me up at least a little.

Day 60: Oct 9, 2014

Well, I thought I was going to has to write the happenings of the day tomorrow because my night went late but turns out my body is still not ready for bed so I figured I might as well write. The day was average but after vespers and a short stint at the bookstore I headed to the Lift (an awesome little performance area) for a birthday dance party. The theme was Stick It (a gymnastics movie) so people were dressed up in some crazy outfits and we dance for a good two hours. You would have thought that that would have tired me out enough to fall right asleep but apparently not. After the dance party a few of us gathered to rehydrate in the dining hall and talk for a little bit. We read the letter that Ellen, the birthday girl, got from her grandma which was fun because the writing was cramped and in cursive so it sounded like we were first graders learning how to read. I went back to my room at about 10pm and tossed and turned until 11:30 when I started coughing. I took some cough meds and went to the dining hall for some tea. That was where I ran into a hyped up Benji who apparently slept too much of the afternoon away. He was moving like a squirrel- lots of quick and tiny movements. It would have been really funny if I hadn't been so tired but it was nice to have someone to sit with while I waited for the meds to kick in. This was about perfect, I am done writing and I am starting to fall asleep. I have less than four hours until my alarm goes off....

Day 61: Oct 10, 2014

I really wanted today's entry to just be “boys suck” but since I do have something else to talk about I will refrain from a two word entry. Considering that I only had about 3.5 hours of sleep I was really not very tired today. Everything was pretty routine today. This evening while I was porch sitting a family of deer came up. There was even a two point buck who walked by and he had the best eyebrow markings. It made his expression hilarious. I just wish I could have gotten a picture.

Day 62: Oct 11, 2014

Today was so great! So after breakfast I went back to bed for a little while until it was bus departure time. This time, instead of waving goodbye to people, I was on the bus heading down to the lake. A group of us went to Stehekin, a small town up lake, for a little day trip. The ferry picked us up and stopped in Stehekin for 90 minutes and then was going to head back to Lucerne (our port) and Chelan. We decided to go this weekend because there is a world-class bakery about 2 miles from the port that is closing for the winter after this weekend. So we emailed the bike rental place to see if they could leave out some bikes for us so that we could make it to the bakery and have plenty of time there to enjoy ourselves. Well, when we got into port is was raining pretty bad but we had no other way to get to the bakery so we went to pick up our bikes. When we got there, the owner's wife was waiting for us in her van. She came up to talk to us about the bikes and it really sounded like she didn't want us to ride in the rain so we compromised. She drove us to the bakery in her van. We were going to have to walk back but hey, a free car ride is better than paying to ride a bike in the cold rain pretty much any day. Once at the bakery we bought some cinnamon rolls, pie, pizza, and some muffins. When it came time to leave, the local tourist bus had just pulled up. It was still raining so I decided that it was worth the $3 to hitch a ride back to the boat. I met up with one of the guys who came with us but didn't go to the bakery and we sat and chatted while waiting for the others to get back. The whole outing was so wonderful and rejuvenating. We were only out of the village for 5 hours but the excursion of leaving the village, taking a boat and going to a completely new place was really nice. Once we got back a bunch of us decided to watch a movie, Toy Story. I really enjoy watching movies here partly because people join in the watching as the walk by. At the beginning of the movie there were only two of us watching but by the end there were seven of us. Oh, also super exciting, when we got back to the village there was snow on the mountains that surround us. There was SO MUCH SNOW!! It was very exciting. This evening was spent setting up the coffee cart and getting ready for the coffee shop variety show. Before vespers I had to make sure that the coffee cart was warmed up and ready to go. After vespers I made a bunch of drinks and then went and enjoyed the show. One of the kids wrote out a story for a few of the characters that he made for some of the villagers. There were some jokes told by a first grader. A few songs written and played by villagers. Poems were read and improv was done in both song and acting forms. It was a wonderful end to the day. Even better, though, was when Benji taught Josh and later Andrew how to do some Norwegian folk dancing. Josh was taught on the boat and Andrew was taught after the talent show in the dining hall. I think today tops out as the most amount that I have laughed here so far. It was a pretty awesome day.

Week 8

Day 49: Sept 28, 2014

Damn it!! So last night was rough. I am pretty sure that I had a fever last night and it felt as though someone was pushing with all of their weight on my eyebrows. I woke up feeling a little better so I went to breakfast and made my lunch but as it got closer to departure time I began to feel worse. Hopefully there will be another chance next weekend but either way I think it would not be a good idea for me to be outside and away from the village for 12 solid hours. At least, by staying back, I will be able to rest and hopefully get better faster. I ended up sleeping for an extra 8 hours today and it was definitely needed. I will probably do the same thing tomorrow. It can't hurt right?

Day 50: Sept 29, 2014

An explosives truck drove through the village today. It was probably the most exciting thing to happen all day. Other than that I drank about 3 liters of water and hung out in the pottery studio for about an hour. It was a very chill day. In the evening a group of us watched a movie called It Takes Two. It stars Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen and I think that should tell you enough. It was funny and horrible all at the same time.

Day 51: Sept 30, 2014

I was exhausted all day. I almost fell asleep at the coffee cart in the morning (it is so nice and warm inside) so I decided to go to sleep right after lunch. The most notable thing today was when the transport came in. there were so many boxes that they had to put some stuff up on the roof. It turns out that the school doesn't know how to read when ordering things. They meant to order 12 hula hoops but, instead, ordered 12 dozen. We now have more hula hoops than villagers. It is pretty great.

Day 52: Oct 1, 2014

So last night I spent a good hour coughing. Luckily, it was still fairly early at night (10:30ish) so I didn't keep anyone up except for myself. It was one of those coughs where if you are sitting up or standing you are ok but as soon as you recline at all it comes back. I was able to take some cough medicine but then I still had to wait for it to kick in. So, I went and got some tea that is supposed to help and sat up for a little while. Other than that today was pretty normal. I took a nap in the afternoon and knit in the evening. I think I will take some cough medicine earlier tonight so I don't end up awake way past when I should be.

Day 53: Oct 2, 2014

Today was once again pretty average. Although, I didn't nap as long this afternoon which is a good sign right? Also, there was free ice cream tonight!! So, that was super exciting. Oh, and the Packers slaughtered the Vikings. It was one of those games that I really wish I could have watched on TV. I guess I will just have to get up early tomorrow so I can watch the highlights while the internet is fast-ish.

Day 54: Oct 3, 2014

A hiking we will go! A hiking we will go! Hi ho the hikeys go, a hiking we will go!! I am so excited because I am feeling better (I am at about 85%) which means that I can go hiking to Copper Basin tomorrow! So today was pretty normal, some long-term staff left which was kind of sad but that is how life is here at Holden. In the afternoon I made some sport weight yarn into worsted weight. I doubled it and then doubled it again. Because I started with a regular hank of yarn it took a while to double it the first time but the second time went quickly. I needed a navy blue for a hat that I am making for someone here and there was only one ball of navy in the Craft Cave (where yarn is free) so I am doing what I can with what I have. I think it is going to turn out to be a great hat but it did not start out easy. In the afternoon/evening I packed up my backpack for tomorrow and I sat on the porch and listened to music with Leah and Alex. Now it is time to go to bed early (9pm) so that I will be nice and rested for tomorrow when I have to get up at 5:30 ish. I am trying for my 8 hours tonight :).

Day 55: Oct 4, 2014

Today was wonderful. The hike up to Copper basin was rough. For the first half I pretty much walked on my own since I didn't want to slow the group down but they stopped for a little while at the lower basin so I ended up catching them then. The hike is about 3 miles one way but it is pretty much straight up to get there so it took us about 3 hours to get to the upper basin. We had to be out for a total of 12 hours just because of the construction. The fact that we were able to do this hike at all was kinda a big deal because officially the trail going to Copper Basin is closed because it is on the side of the creek with construction. There were times when I wasn't sure if I was going to make it but I am so glad that I stuck it out and made it all the way because it was so beautiful and such a wonderful way to spend a day. Because we had so much time to complete the hike we spent about 6 hours in the basin. Part of the time I was hiking up to a snow field that I saw and the rest of the time I was either hanging out in my hammock or sitting on the ground reading a book. I tried to nap but I think I was too cold. If I would have been in one of the two person hammocks I could have shared body heat with someone but I was still fairly comfortable on my own. There were eight of us that went today: Dennis (I think he is in his 60s), Jeff (the Chief firefighter who is in his 50s), and then a few twenty somethings- Jess, Ellen, Kari, Alex, Laura, and me. Four of us headed down a little earlier than the others partly because it was starting to rain but I went partly because I wanted to make sure that we had plenty of time to get back. I am much faster going down but I knew that I would feel better if I ended up waiting at the pick up spot than if I was running to get back on time. We all made it to the bus on time and we were able to get dinner without rushing too much before we had to go to vespers. It was a wonderful but tiring day.