Week 41

Day 280: May 17, 2015

So, apparently if you have the epidemic that is going around the village, it is ok to lay on the couch in the public living room all day. She complains if any of us are sick and out of our room at all but then lays on the couch with the stomach flu. There are very few things that really make me angry but this is definitely one of them (it doesn't hurt that she is already the person that does the most to get on my nerves).

Day 281: May 18, 2015

The boys' bathroom has been fixed and painted!!!! If they are in there too long right now they may die or get high from the fumes but, hey, it is way better than what they had. In fact, it is beautiful! Otherwise, my day was pretty boring broken up with a game of Forbidden Desert.

Day 282: May 19, 2015

It was an early morning. I woke up wide awake at 4:00am. So, I decided to take a shower and get going. It ended up being a good thing. The high schoolers made a dinner for everyone as a final yesterday so they moved the coffee cart out of it's spot. They moved it back but there were still things that needed to be put back and organized. It didn't take long but I was still glad I had the time to do it.

Day 283: May 20, 2015

Well, today we added two more people to the Holden character list. Both have moved into my chalet so we now have 14 people living in a 10 bedroom, 6 bathroom, three story house. We added Lindsey, who is going to be the next bookstore coordinator and Levi, who is going to be working on capital project stuff (the new bridge, hooking up buildings to the new electrical lines, putting in the new communication lines, etc.). We had staff safety training this afternoon there were a few different time slots that people could go to since everyone had to go. We had a porch “bitching” session where we complained about the housing shortage and how they seem to be targeting the longer term 20-somethings to take on the brunt of the roommates. There are a few older folks who have roommates but they just came into the village and were told ahead of time that they were going to have roommates. I am lucky that my room is not really set up to have more than one bed frame on the ground and that I have such weird working hours. When they were first talking about the roommate situation I went to my manager and pointed out that a roommate would not appreciate the alarm clock going off at 4:30 or the fact that I will be in bed before it is dark. Luckily, my manager is in charge of housing and he said pointed out that it wouldn't be fair to me to have someone walking in at midnight. See how I played that though? I said nothing about personally not wanting a roommate, I went straight to talking about what would be best for the newcomer. That way it wouldn't sound like I was complaining or weaseling my way out. Everything I said was true, it just so happens that it would also benefit me. Apparently, we are scheduled for adding at least three more to our numbers in Chalet 3 before mid June. According to what they have been telling us, it will get better from there. Who really knows, though. Transparency in matters that affect everyone does not seem to be a priority to certain people in “power”. People are not finding out about the fact that they are getting roommates until 2 days before the person arrives. Levi's roommate, Jesus, had less than 24 hours. There are wonderful things about this place but some of the employees (not volunteers) have made the last few weeks much more hectic and stress filled than they really had to be. As my neighbor would say, “it has been a clusterfuck”("clusterfuck": commonly used to descriptively generalize any situation with a large scale of disarray).

Day 284: May 21, 2015

After about 2 hours of work, I started feeling really sick. I was shaking, felt weak, and broke out into a cold sweat. I wasn't really sure what was going on but since the stomach flu is going around, I decided to have someone take over for me and I went home. After sleeping for a few hours I felt a lot better but I still laid low the rest of the day.

Day 285: May 22, 2015

As I walk into work the smells of spring transition into diesel which is quickly overpowered by the stale cigarette smell wafting from the smokers porch. All of these smells and transitions happen in less than five seconds and then I am back to the aroma of freshly ground coffee. This is what I wake up to in the morning (well, first I have to grind the coffee).

Tonight, I prayed for healing. Healing for our world, for our world relations, for the relationships between world leaders, for physical healing for friends and family, for emotional healing for those around me, and for the healing of relationships between family and friends.

Day 286: May 23, 2015

Boom! Crash! A crack of thunder wakes me from my nap. I don't care though, I am just glad I woke up for it this time. There was no lighting but the crashes seem not too far away. We are supposed to have vespers outside, around a campfire tonight to celebrate Pentecost. If it keeps raining though, we will have to go inside witch would be a drag. Following vespers we have a variety show which I decided to sign up for this time. We have been talking a lot about the prayer of good courage (Oh God, you have called your servants to ventures of which we cannot see the ending, by paths as yet untrodden, through perils unknown. Give us faith to go out with good courage, not knowing where we go but only that your hand is leading us and your love supporting us through Jesus Christ our lord.) so I decided to share a different version of the song that I sang when I was in a choir in high school. My version is less acoustic guitar and more piano in style but I am going to sing it acapella tonight. I have sung the song in my head so much in the last year that the notes are pretty much ingrained in my head.