Some things I've experienced so far:
- 1st day of camp we were blindfolded and led into the middle of the woods to the high ropes course where I was suspended 40 ft in the air. This wouldn't be too big of a deal except for the fact that on my list of Things I Hate The Most, Walking On Ropes comes in third right after Lasagna and Wave pools (The Nashville Zoo jungle gym freaks me out, it's one of those little kid fears that I never grew out of).
- One of the goals of the Deer Run Staff is to destroy my fear of heights that as I have been forced off the ground an unholy amount of times.
- I live and work with some of the greatest 14 people in the world. We work great together because we're usually laughing about something and really live out 1 Corinthians 12
- Usually the first thought I have in the morning is: I AM SO SORE--thanks to the high ropes course, rock climbing tower, Leap of Faith (basically climbing up a 33 ft. tree and simply jumping down--while harnessed of course but still), and simply climbing into my bunk bed.
- I have gained a ridiculous amount of bruises and cuts.
- I don't wear bug spray anymore because I'm pretty sure that I now just sweat bug spray and mainly because it doesn't work out here
- Therefore, I wake up every night around 4 a.m. to routinely scratch my bug bites
- Unless I'm sleeping in the rustic cabins (basically like a tent but with a wooden floor and bunk beds), then I wake up about three times a night praying to God that I don't wake up with a spider crawling on my face.
- The 1st camp we had was an overnight camp with 3rd-5th graders
- I was in a cabin with 23 little girls and 4 other female staffers
- Not too much bothers me anymore--one night I woke up to a little girl telling me she had wet the bed. Yup had to clean it up. Awesome.
- The best question a kid has asked so far: "What does cir-cum-scise mean?" from the cutest 8 year old girl ever. Not asked to me but a fellow staffer--her answer? "It makes little boys holy." If I had answered, I don't think that child would have innocence anymore.
- Our staff cabin has the best view overlooking a lake ever.
- Our lake not only has a zip line where you can fall into the lake but a blob. Like the one in the movie Heavyweights.
- There's an albino deer at camp. It's completely awesome to spot it.
- Aslan came to camp with me.
- One day the director's son, Seth, came up to me and asked me if I wanted some of his chocolate ice cream. Because the ice cream is brown and so am I. That's when I realized I love my life.
- Almost every night I stare at the stars in pure darkness and gaze at their beauty, thanking God for this opportunity.
- This past week we had a mission camp where teenagers who have lived hard lives came with the Boys and Girls Club to camp and I had five awesome middle school aged girls in my cabin.
- One night I was able to take them out to look at the stars, something some of them have never truly experienced because they live in inner city Columbia.
- One of them accepted Christ into her life. I shared Christ with her in a canoe.
- Also thanks to my canoeing awesomeness, I have now earned the name Pookahontas
- One of my goals this summer is to catch a fish with my bare hands.
- I catch fireflies every night at dusk.
- At mission camp, I have successfully learned to pronounce ghetto black girl names like Kadeesha, Tajmah and Neeisha due to the fact that there was only one white camper.
- Mission camp was also the only camp where I wasn't asked if Pookie was my real name. It was probably accepted as fact because a camper was signed up to come whose name was Tookie. True story.
- The camp food isn't bad, except for the cheese omelets that look like narsty tacos. And the fact that we eat the same thing every week.
- Some kids made a dance/song with the name Pookie which is now sung constantly.
- I know the Hannah Montana Hoedown Throwdown--little girls idolize me.
- I love my job.
