Summer Thoughts

Seven days ago I was sitting at the Mexico-United States border, waiting for about three hot stinky hours to be let back into our country to embark on another great adventure: 2L.

It's strange to think the summer has ended. A few months ago I was emailing dozens of strangers, thousands of miles away, praying that one of them would be willing to let me come and live with them in Moscow. A short time later I was in a gorgeous city, visiting churches, praising street bands, eating vafly, and helping work through legal issues for a world-wide organization in multiple eastern European countries. Then it was off to Ukraine to see some people and places that I have missed for several years. Back in the states I started working on a treatise for practitioners providing information on religious litigation. The job search for next summer began and took me to Washington DC. Shortly afterwards it was off to Mexico to see Uncle Will for a little over a week. And now, 2L has begun.

This really was my greatest summer. I changed a lot and grew during these three or four months. I became more confident and sure than I've ever felt in my life. This summer put a lot of things in perspective for me; I've decided to not worry so much about so many things that aren't really important and start focusing on things that really are. I've decided to be more grateful and have more faith. I started the "charmed life" campaign a few months ago where anytime I start to feel stressed or overwhelmed I stop and say to myself, "you have a charmed life. Everything always works out the way it should." I then remind myself of all the reasons I have to be thankful for both the blessings and the trials. I encourage you all to adopt the campaign; it's worked wonders on my quality of life. While I think I have more now than ever before to feel anxious and worried about, I've never felt more positive in my adult life.

And now here we are; one week into school. One long long long week into school where I'm finding out what it means to overbook myself. And I'm really pretty happy.

~It Just Gets Stranger