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swuusi 1998 social

early Thursday 30 July 1998

Super tired waking up this morning but opening circle and then breakfast was good pancakes and stuff then I couldn't stay awake for Drake's Theme Workshop so I went back to bed.

Woke up for lunch around 2pm, missing "Whack The YAC" which I didn't entirely mind since I didn't want to get whacked, whatever that might entail.

Then the themed Gansta Lunch, serving Soup Doggie Dog, Method Manwich, Notorious BLT, and to drink Wu-Tang and Ice-T with Ice Cubes. I notice we didn't have any Vanilla Ice cream.

Then at 3pm we zipped off via buses to the main activity of the day, social action work at the city of Ardmore. I grabbed my towel and sunscreen and hopped on the first bus, which was pretty full, but Nathan motioned for me to come sit by him in Jessica's seat.

Sat and talked and played and the ride wasn't too far, but once we got to where we were going, funny was, "hey a train!" I yelled, referring to 1 engine with 1 car driving up to the RR crossing, causing the arms to go down and then it stopped and zipped backwards to pick up 1 more car!

My touchgroup's job (I haven't been to a single touch group meeting) was to help clean up behind a house thing with 30 years worth of debris collected behind it - car hoods, a car roof, a syringe, old birdbaths, bones, old carpet, fully intact fully rotted sections of fence, car engine parts, car tires and brush and trees up to about 4 inches in diameter plus 1 log about 8 feet long and 1 foot in diameter, so rotted that it was light enough for two people to carry...

And we saved the metal and tires and concrete birdbaths, but threw the rest away into a huge dumpster like 7 feet tall by 7 feet wide and 20 feet long (and started to fill another smaller dumpster.. We cleared about a 50 by 50 square foot section of land behind this place from all this overgrown craziness down to essentially bare dirt. Wow. Got into the local paper with pictures and everything.

Good hard work and carried away the trees that our leader guy chainsawed and it was all good.

Birdbaths were there because the building behind the building used to make them.

Cleaned up my hands and face and head and then piled back onto the buses to ride to Shoney's and sat by Shawn Oiler, then sat in the very back of Shoney's after being the first one to walk in, "I'd like a table for 80 please." "Go right on to the back," and they had a section blocked off ready for us.

I sat in the back corner and Josh, Jessica, and Laura sat with me. Jessica taught us a rhythmic cup clap tap thing and we practiced and learned it and will do it at the talent show tomorrow night.

We all performed the sufi dance from the previous night while waiting for service.

Lotta fun and laughs and sign language as Josh got jinxed and couldn't talk until someone spoke his name, but he was as expressive through sign language as anyone else might be verbally.

I ate four plates from the salad bar and Josh didn't get his food until it was time to go.

Back to the buses I sat in the back and bounced and played, "it's been 10 or 11 years since I've been on a bus! I'm sittin' in the back!" I exclaimed to Nathan who said something crazy like, "advisors don't sit in the back!"

Sat by Laura and we practiced the cup thing and re-enacted the sufi dance even again and waved to cars through the back window. That wasn't totally fun since it was too dark to see their reactions.

Back to camp and then worship was a Love Feast "the rules are you cannot talk, and you cannot feed yourself" and Jason fed me a marshmallow pile and I took forever chewing that. The worship was short and sweet and then it was time for me to rove again.

20 youth were playing Capture the Flag; 21 youth were at the lake; and various others were scattered throughout the camp and finally I accounted for everyone and found a youth who was not feeling too good. This youth suffered from a broken heart and I sat and listened to the story.

Then Travis asked if I would shave his head and I agreed (I knew from previously that his mom had said it was okay) and as we walked to the cabin to shave his head I was invited to play Silent Football. Cool.

So I carefully shaved his head and was certain to put shoes on before throwing the hair out in the woods. Then I joined the game with Nick Carter as Mr Dictator, who allowed individual players to slightly change their names, which got me 1/2 of a penance point as I called Sister Maia "Ms Maia" instead.

Kris Scott as "Father Scott" was hilarious acting all holy and righteous and stuff and Nick took two pictures of him during his righteous tirades. The game deteriorated as all kinds of rules were broken and I couldn't begin to keep up with everything and I was getting pretty tired, so I left the game around 5am to sleep.

Woke up before opening circle and wrote notes from the previous day and just now wrote all this during breakfast though I was really hungry and ready to eat.

swuusi 1998 visitors

7pm Thursday 30 July 1998

Wow holy cow went to breakfast and then Drake's workshop and back to the cabin and was just about to hop into the shower when someone walked in. I went to see who it was: a woman, a new face, so I said "HI" and then realized holy cow it's Karen!!

big big big hugs and we briefed one another on our respective weeks so far and sat down to talk and stuff and after about 5 or 8 minutes she said simply, "are you okay? you seem sad."

Now, she is the nth person to say this lately and I was all, "????". . . So I settled into my emotions and Manda came up. I would like to date her but cannot since she is dating someone else. I feel all confused and in love with Manda, but trying not to piss off Wende and I just don't know what to do. So we went for a walk.

On the way toward the main cabin I saw Janette (and her delightful braces), who I met and flirted with at the Young Adult retreat back in May. I told her I was going for a walk.

She attempted to acknowledge what I said, "do I wanna go for a walk?"

"No, I'm going for a walk," stab - twist - salt and then I thought oh god that sounded terrible and I didn't know what to say.

But Karen and I walked and talked and she listened well and I made the realization that I want to get married so the woman I marry can take care of me, instead of me taking care of myself.

wow. I replaced those thoughts with affirmations
I do not need someone else to take care of me.
I can take care of myself.
I can nurture myself and love myself.
I do nurture and love myself.

More big hugs and then back to the main camp where Janette was no longer. Karen asked if I would call her if I needed to talk more.. I said probably not, but I heard and appreciate the invitation.

Hugs and she left and I ate lunch. There I saw Jason Fricke's mom and told her how cool Jason was. She made my day, saying that I've really made a positive difference in Jason's life. Yay!

then I saw ohmygosh Colleen Crotty and Meghan Cusack and other junior high youth from the main camp, just over to check out the high school camp. I said HI to them and to Barbara, who said the girls now wished they had chosen the high school camp instead of junior high.

Some of the youth asked if I would go swim, and I readily agreed and went down to the lake. On the way there, Nathan tried to get me to lead a junior high pack of youth and I was all, "no way; I'm goin' swimming!" and he's all "what kind of advisor are you?" I immediately replied, "high school!"

Okay that may have been cold, but it sure fit.

At the lake, Wende rode around in the water on my back and then Jason was on my shoulders and we had chicken fights. He and I pretty much kicked ass many times in a row until I was finally too sore to keep it up.

After swimming we attended a workshop called "Power Shuffle" which, oh my goodness-- if you ever get a chance to do it, do it. Major major powerful emotions and tears and tears and love and a greatly tightened community at the end.

Enormous hugs to Anna to whom I had written a letter during Drake's workshop and hugged lotsa youth and then Amy Moran walked up.

"We found some baby birds and one has been injured."

Went to see what they had and it turns out they had found small ducklings that were plenty able to walk and squeak and take care of themselves... 'cept that there was no parent duck in sight. Hmmm.

I suggested leaving them alone so we did.

Now it's shower time for me. First time since Sunday morning.