Day 148

consistent rain in the northwest is no surprise, but it has definitely put a halt on the solid flow of work i had available outside. the hill's just too steep and wet now to be able to work on, let alone stand on.

i wish i had an awesome story to tell of a new street corner or sunset, but i don't. not from today.

on days like today, i remember phrases still fasted in my memory from high school composition- also ones that i've probably quoted earlier before.

"
the day is cold, and dark, and dreary;
it rains, and the wind is never weary;
the vine still clings to the moldering wall,
but at every gust the dead leaves fall,
and the day is dark and dreary.

my life is cold, and dark, and dreary;
it rains, and the wind is never weary;
my thoughts still cling to the moldering past,
but the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast
and the days are dark and dreary.

be still, sad heart! and cease repining;
behind the clouds is the sun still shining;
thy fate is the common fate of all,
into each life some rain must fall,
some days must be dark and dreary."

henry wadsworth longfellow

Day 137

grey rain filtered from the sky as i woke up and made a bend in aluminum blinds. they snapped back into place and i continued to see that fall is all about the heavy drizzle here. no work outside today.

as i checked emails throughout today, i was surprised at the mass of personal messages. from real people. sent just to me. i've never had so many emails in one day that weren't just newsletters and subscriptions.

i don't know how to put it out there, but i want to. the whole canada work permit situation and ideas for direction has been on my mind much lately. with no real work to do and a quiet morning, i turned from the fridge and put back the last burger i'd eyed. for the first real time in my life, i've started a fast. i'd decided to commence last night and, after the confirming cheeseburger denial at breakfast, i spent the morning reading and praying and such about the future and next steps and life and people. this site helped me get started, as i was kind of new to the whole big picture. i'm a very hungry person, it should be known, and now with an hour left before midnight, i am almost finished with my first twenty-four hour fast.

throughout the day, i tried to stay off the computer and did a lot of reading and praying, but i did check back on a correspondence i'd started with someone in fernie. she'd talked to two employers for me and i have their email addresses now for contacting them directly for work. this was encouraging. also, i heard back from a speaker/magazine editor/teacher i'd met over the summer at camp and who, nearly out of the blue, shared "i do know that when you trust Christ entirely in each situation that you will end up in the exact place that He wants you to be regardless of where (geographically) that place is." good timing.

then tonight, parker and i went to help at the high school youth group. afterwards, we chilled with the youth pastor in his office and the guy gave us some cool books about prayer and sharing faith in everyday conversation we'd been looking and talking about. the david crowder book i'm currently reading that i'd linked in a post the other day is ironically based on the death of the pastor and author of that prayer book.

as much as stuff didn't happen today, much has happened indeed. and there are plenty of links to explore now if you so desire.

i've got one more solid hour left.

Day 133

rain today. the grey skies popped for a little this morning and i still went out to mow the lawn. i wore the north face rain jacket- the coffee sleeve still in the pocket. the rain stopped soon and there were some people who came over. parker's dad has a stone pizza oven from italy in the backyard and we made pizza. i even made one. bbq sauce instead of tomato sauce, then chicken, cheese, hard pepperoni and some bacon. it was amazing. since it was wet outside and overcast and there were people over, we didn't do much work today and it was nice to have a chill day after i'd worked so hard to get the mulching done before the first rain.

Day 108

the days go by fast. very fast. i've started the process of packing already so that when youth camp ends and the momentum of the summer marathon and sprinting finish falls to the ground, i'll be prepared to move forward.

in the meantime, the week has grown consistently rainy and cool. hoodie season is here. west coast by coconut records is stuck in my head. all day. especially the line about rain.

i've been appreciating the mountains and water as much as possible this week during my daily coffee gathering at the balcony. i wish i could stay with the horizon forever.

Day 102

the rain stayed last night. and today. grey skies and heavy rain accompanied cool weather. soggy socks and shoes are gonna make the kids' cabins smell sweet tonight. i was assigned to do cabin cleanup supervision for this morning. all i had to do was show up to an assigned boys cabin and hang out and make sure they cleaned up their cabin while their counselors were in morning staff meeting. it was really fun and i made some new friends.

there's a video guy from last year who's come to counsel for youth camp. he came up a few days early from seattle to chill and help out with any video needs. here is my first real new american friend of the summer. being the american video guy i was when i first arrived, everyone compared the two of us in similarities, mannerisms, and appearance. we do actually look alike though and now that he's here too, everyone's asking if we are brothers. when we walk around, the other staff are amused. we've started telling them that we are brothers. i should put a picture up. maybe later.

the heavy rain and cold day made it hard to do any good shooting this afternoon, but we had some chill time and compared and shared music. i love broadening musical horizons. there's a free program called 'simplify media' that makes it possible to share itunes libraries over the internet from anywhere in the world. no common network required. if you wish, set up the quick account name and let me know your name and i'll share mine with you.

Day 18

tragedy. the footage from yesterday isn't capturing on the computer via the firewire. i'm not sure how this is going to turn out; i've been working on it for several hours in between things today, but i'm going to be really salty if the lack of audio doesn't get balanced with the footage and then captured to the computer. we'll see.

today began as another work day, but the head photographer asked if i would be his assistant to help with some shots needed for a slideshow/video thing for a future presentation. i left the office for the afternoon and went with to the top of the mountain in the rain and then across the water on the ferry to operate the reflector circle, held under the models' faces, for the lighting of several portrait-style pictures. good times.

its gotten cold and blustery suddenly tonight and we've been too tired to jam, so we raided the kitchen for rice krispie treats and have chilled around the staff lounge and listened to music all night. it's awesome to get new stuff from new zealand and canada and the places in between.

finally, this mountain-top pose picture at the beginning of the post, taken by dave, is going to be used for part of a logo for the camp's summer leadership program. i was told today and, even though its kinda random, its kinda cool that a good thing came out of messing around with our cameras.

there's never really been a dull moment.