{ year in review }

So I was going to try to do a blog post with just one photo from each month and I straight up gave up. It can't be done. This year... this year.

JANUARY

I moved to Guatemala. I know, right? Talk about overwhelming. I fell in love with my new city straight away, and I had the greatest group of girls at my side.

My first family were sweethearts. Flor, Brian, & Byron. They took such great care of me as I started to adjust to my new life.

FEBRUARY

Happy birthday to me, I got my face shoved in a cake!
MORDIDA! MORDIDA!

We also went to Tikal. Um, hello, adventure!

MARCH

Talk about beautiful. March was full of the most incredible views I have ever encountered.

Above is Semuc Champey, a trip the 11 of us girls (pictured) took alone, and below is Lago Atilán, a lake surrounded by volcanoes and famous for some of the best coffee-growing environments in the world.

APRIL

 April started out with a much-needed weekend away at Playa Quilombo.










 We also went to the Forensic Anthropology Foundation of Guatemala (FAFG) as a part of a very intense weekend, including in-depth interviews with individuals who work in one of the most dangerous suburbs of the capital, the cemetery, and the city dump.

I also spent a lot of quality time with my kids, whom I had fallen helplessly in love with by the time April rolled around (oh, and the puppies, they were pretty cute, too).

April was a hard month. My Spanish progressed by leaps and bounds, but I also had to begin to prepare for my return stateside.

MAY

 

In May, I said goodbye to Guatemala.

To Gloria, who was the most incredible teacher a girl could have asked for. She was patient, encouraging. She kept my goals in mind, and she pushed me every. single. day.

To Cindy and Anderson (and yes, even Leo) who became like family. I spent February through May with them, and every day held another adventure.

 Finally, we said goodbye to Antigua and to each other. Our "Guat Squad" was definitely something special.

JUNE and JULY

God said, "Go," so in June I went. June, July and August were passed living just outside of Indianapolis, Indiana and interning at Neighborhood Christian Legal Clinic in the Immigrant Justice Program.

God did a ton of work on me here, and I got to do life alongside some pretty great people.

I also spent a lot of time in that chair. It's weird, but that chair was where I always ended up sitting when it came time to call people. Talking on the phone, and doing so in Spanish, was something I had to get good at pretty quickly.

AUGUST

In August, I said goodbye to another city that I'd learned to call home.

My mom and grandma came for a visit, I established a list of my favorite few parks to run at, and Naturalization Day was my last day interning.

SEPTEMBER

 

In September, I returned to Spring Arbor for one last year of undergrad. I moved into a K-house with six of the most wonderful ladies I've ever met.

I think it's safe to say that we were all a little apprehensive at first, unsure of how personalities would mix and routines would get established...but they did.

God also did some pretty cool stuff in giving me a top-notch roommate. Lins and I had never met before moving in to the same little room, but from day one we got along and have only gotten closer since then.

OCTOBER

I didn't get many pictures of that day, but I got to go back to Indy at the end of October to be lead volunteer for Refugee Adjustment Day.

I became best friends with a two-year-old little boy from Egypt (his words, not mine), I got to sign the same piece of fabric that Bob Goff did (it's the clinic banner:), and my heart was so, so happy to be able to go back to a place that still felt like home.

NOVEMBER

November included a trip to surprise my little sister at her final cross country meet of the season (the only one I was able to make it to this year) with three of the sweethearts I lived with.

We also took a trip to Chicago to celebrate Syd's birthday!

DECEMBER

 December was dominated by a whole bunch of laughter, late nights, and memories as our house of upperclassmen prepped for finals.
Late night Just Dance, deep talks, and good food were regular occurrences.




On a sad note, December also meant saying goodbye to my four-legged child. Lucy was almost 14 years old and every time I left the house I told her that I loved her. Every time I left for school, especially the past couple of semesters, I'd sat that dog down and told her she had to stay her sassy, healthy self until I came back home. That she did.
The last picture I took with her was at the end of November on a walk around the block (about as much as her old little legs could handle).


All of the spare minutes in December have been designated to my honors thesis, which will be due towards the end of January. It's been overwhelming to really dig into passions on this project that I've developed all year. Since coming home from school, this little room has been thesis headquarters.






Looking back, this year has been absolutely incredible. It's been insane. It's been more than I ever could have imagined.
Doors have opened and closed.
I learned a second language, I lived in two countries and two states. I gained four more 'families' and moved something like 7 times between 5 cities.

Looking ahead, I'm not sure what all 2017 will bring.
If all goes according to the 'plan' in place now, I'll be finishing up my undergrad degree in less than 5 months. Graduation will be a whirlwind followed immediately by moving. Again. This time to either Indianapolis (to attend IUPUI and work at the clinic I interned at) or Northern Virginia (to attend George Mason or Virginia Commonwealth University).

It's scary and there are a lot of unknowns... but as I look back at how faithful God has been this year, I know that whatever comes next is going to be equally incredible.

I'm not dead!

I think I've forgotten how to words to some extent.
I've been moving from place to place, I've been switching gears and hats and mentalities and filling different roles. It's been crazy and overwhelming, but I'd do it all again in a heartbeat, exhausting and terrifying as it was.

So.
Basic summary of my life since January.

In January, I moved to Antigua, Guatemala. My first 3 weeks I spent with Florecíta, Brian, and Byron in the Hermano Pedro house on the south east side of the beautiful little town.
Then I moved to the south west corner of Antigua with Cindy and Anderson, where I spent 3.5 months. We were gone quite a few weekends, everywhere from visiting the capital to the ocean to the rainforest.
Then in May, I moved back stateside, where I spent 2.5 weeks or so in Michigan with my family trying to manage some crazy reverse culture shock and re-adjust to speaking English and driving cars.
And then I spent 11 weeks in Indianapolis as an Immigrant Justice Intern at Neighborhood Christian Legal Clinic, which entailed driving, translating, interpreting, note-taking, phone-call-making, scanning, driving, visiting, listening, question-asking, people-loving and making-it-up-as-I-went.
Return to Michigan for 2 weeks, where I unpacked from a semester of college, Guatemala, Indy, and then repacked everything for a semester. Oh, and worked for a week and a half.
Now it's back at the arbor, where I'm finally settling again.

It's hard to go back to being a student after living abroad and interning out of state. I have literally walked in the places that we're learning about in Latin American civilization (um, Mayan dialects? Ziggurats vs. temples vs. pyramids? corrupt governments? history? walked it, seen it, got the t-shirt) and I've implemented the strategies that all of my social work classes this semester are covering. (Practice with Groups? Practice with Communities and Organizations? Social Welfare Policy? Macro social work, guys. Macro social work. That's kind of what program management looks like. That's kind of what nonprofit life looks like. That's kind of what my summer looked like.)
I'm not saying that I'm somehow superior to other students, because we've all got a lot of learning to do yet, but it's hard to change my mindset back to that of a student.Especially when that student mindset means reading hours a week for each of my classes and sitting at a desk taking notes on lectures.

This last year is going to be a challenging one. I've got 15 credits this semester, one class plus hopefully registration for my honors thesis (a year long, 60+ page project) in January, and then a 10 credit internship, 1 credit internship seminar, 3 credit online class, and 3 credit Spanish class (17 credit hours of crazy, thank you very much).
Basically, the goal is to survive and graduate and in that process figure out what in the crazy world I'm supposed to do with my life after graduation. And that's a massive, already-looming question of applying to graduate schools, sending out job applications, and trying to line things up.
I'm not sure I want to stay in Michigan, but that means that I'm looking at schools in Indianapolis, northern Virginia, and can't for sure rule out anything in between them.

So right now, I'm making it up as it comes to me.
God has been teaching me some amazing things, and I'm thankful that He's doing it so gently and patiently. For the past 9 months, all He has done is carried me and given me just enough clarity to get to the next half step, commit to it, and trust through the whole messy process. So as I start on graduate school applications, pray over my future, and try to remain present in my final two semesters, all I can do is trust that He will continue to do just that.

Indy.

So Guatemala was Guatemala, but what now?

Well, I'm not taking it easy, that's for sure.

I got back in Michigan on May 12.
I spent 3 weeks with my family before making my next move for the next adventure.

Which brings us to what life is looking like now.


I'm an Immigrant Justice Program intern at Neighborhood Christian Legal Clinic (IJP, NCLC) in Indianapolis, Indiana.                                   (Mouthful, isn't it? But it does sound pretty official.)
Even when it's exhausting and terrifying and overwhelming and crazy, I'm loving every beautiful second of it. I'm using my Spanish, I'm getting lots of face-time with clients and prospective clients, and I'm able to actually listen to people in an office full of lawyers and other professionals. This organization is truly making a difference and I get to watch faces light up with little rays of hope for their situations.

A generous family offered to take me in, so my residence for the summer is a basement in a house about 20 minutes from the clinic and downtown Indy (all of the perks of a private apartment, all of the advantages of living with a family:).  Even Oscar, the cat, has been nothing short of welcoming.
I'm following leads for part time work so I have some income in addition to my 20-ish+ hours a week at NCLC. I've been there a week and already I'm assisting with intakes (that started on my first day!) and do odds and ends of filing and data entry (Joys of being a non-legal intern...I input data. They write official lawyer-ey things.)
Sorting through all of the emotions of reentry after my initial rough bout of reverse culture shock has proven to be more of a long-term process (I think I can safely say that almost, if not all, of us from the Guat semester are still dealing heavily with this) and there are days that still just feel ridiculously hard. But that's the reality right now. It's part identity crisis, part homesickness, part reverse culture shock, with significant shares of being easily overwhelmed, constantly exhausted, and always feeling like there's something missing.

There's an awful lot going on in my heart and my crazy little head. But it's all good things and I wouldn't have it any other way.

the 10-second Guat review

Now that I finally have a little bit of time to breathe and have started to determine some semblance of 'normal', I guess we're due for an update.

Guatemala was incredible. It was beyond words. It broke my heart in so many ways and left me feeling like my soul is spread into two different countries and, no matter where I am, I'm never really 'whole.'

It's impossible to sum up the trip in a way that's both meaningful and does justice to the realities of Guatemala, so, instead, here's some random pictures. For more detailed stories, my guatemala blog is still in existence.

The semester adventure crew, on top of the most famous temple at Tikal (Templo del Gran Jaguar, featured in Star Wars, lots of historical sight info...good times.) I'd say it pretty well displays our interesting personalities and sense of humor.

 

 Just, please believe me here...everything about Guatemala is beautiful. Yes, some parts hurt and you have to dig to find the hope and beauty there, but it's there. Even in the (surprisingly comfortable all considering!) traditional clothing.
We'd do just about anything to help out with each other at school, including being models for presentations.

This woman is a saint. Her name is Gloria and she's the reason I now consider myself as functionally bilingual. Her patience, humor, and genuine desire for justice spurred me on every day.

{Gloria, eres uno de las personas del mundo que ha enseñado y ayudado me lo más. Otra vez, gracias no esta suficiente. También, todavía, mi Español esta mejorando.}

These kids. Oh my heart. Semillas de Amor basically just gave me an extra mountain of little siblings that I'll love forever. Reading homework (plus any other homework that needed help getting done) four days a week with some of the silliest, most difficult, frustrating, beautiful, sensitive kiddos out there. When my return trip happens, seeing them will be on the itinerary.

{whoops!}

This semester has been one of the absolute craziest times in my life.
I've juggled stress and academics and faith and friendship and pushed through a lot of little things that very easily could have gotten me down.
I've had late nights and I've gone to bed ridiculously early on some occasions.
I passed Physiological Psychology with a B+ (which is not a small feat!).
[No, I didn't 4-point this semester because of that class; I am learning to be okay with that.]
I journaled a lot. I prayed a lot. I cried a lot.

But one thing I did not do was blog a lot.

Part of me is disappointed in this, as I don't have the photos and memories assembled so neatly as to be able to scroll through them and see the highlights of the semester. I didn't share what I was feeling in every given week or process through publicly everything on my plate. My plan to blog through my 20th year of life in photos failed miserably.
But I think, for once, that that's okay.
Life isn't something you can just effortlessly document and relive in any given situation. It's messy and confusing and there aren't enough words in the English language (or in the little bit of Spanish that I currently know) to portray things.
That's one of the things I guess I'm learning this semester; sometimes all you can do in life is just keep living it, through good days and bad days and long days and overwhelming days and hard days and days when you pretty much forget everything except your own name. It's life and you just have to keep going.



So how is life now?

Well, finals are rough. At this point, I have three finals down with one final and one (very large) research proposal to go.
I presented on "The Autonomic Physiological Effects of Non-Compulsive Self-Injurious Behavior in the Brains of Non-Psychotic Individuals" and I'm drafting a research proposal entitled "Effective Means of Improving Latino Client Satisfaction in Clinical Social Work Services." I've researched and studied my butt off.

Three days until I'm home free for the holidays, which will bring with them their own set of craziness and chaos, along with lots of coffee and cookies and memories. (And hopefully a white Christmas. As much as I dislike always being cold, which happens year round, Christmas just isn't Christmas without a foot of snow, and not having it right now is making me a little angry.)

Three weeks from tomorrow I'm getting on an airplane and flying to Guatemala, where I will live for just over four months / 17 weeks. I'll be taking a total of 22 Spanish language credits and auditing 3 or 4 cross-cultural credits (not 'work' heavy, but required experiences, including...) climbing volcanoes, swimming in the ocean, hiking ancient ruins, being a part of the world's largest Holy Week gathering, touring a coffee plantation (drinking LOTS of coffee) and living with a Guatemalan host family (along with so much more yet to be planned or discovered.)
I would be lying if I said that I was not absolutely terrified to the core of my being for this trip. I'm throwing to the wind all of the comfortable things that serve as lifelines for me: regular routine, comfortably, predictability, family, modern convenience, close friends, care packages and safe, hot running water. We've been prepared for a whole slew of potential circumstances that honestly I don't dare disclose because family members would have heart attacks and refuse to let me leave the country. I know what to do in almost any emergency imaginable, though, so no worries there. (And I will be INCREDIBLY well cared for. I can't stress enough the faith I have in Paul and Libby, two points of reference in Antigua, that will see to it that we're all safe and happy.)
But in addition to this fear is just a level of excited anticipation and peace that I never would have expected to find. I'm moving abroad and yet I have a level head and absolutely no question as to weather or not this is truly the right choice for me. I know that it's what I'm called to do and where I'm called to go for the next season in my life, and no amount of fear has shaken this confidence.
I'll probably update this blog another few times before I leave, but for my Guatemala experience I'll be keeping everything in one place at:
"Julia in Guatemala"
[click for link] That's where you'll find posts and photos and glimpses of life as I'm preparing for the trip and updates while I'm there. BONUS: If you're fluent / near fluent / speak any amount of Spanish at all, you'll get to laugh along as my knowledge of the language grows. Posts will be in both English and Spanish, so that (1) you know what's going on, and (2) we can watch my command of a beautiful language grow. Some stuff may only be communicated in English, others only in Spanish. Another piece of this is that the Spanish allows for my blog to be a teaching tool for students at Zeeland Christian School in their Spanish classes. This blog will help them connect language and culture, and the Spanish posts can be used for some of their homework. EXTRA CREDIT: If you DON'T know Spanish, make friends with someone who does and let them translate for you. Yay for new friends!!

two letters.

An open letter to a friend,
who will inevitably be able to identify herself after reading this post
{though maybe there will be some nuggets for the rest of you} --

I think I understand now, even if it's just a little bit.
It's not like I know everything, and it's not like I didn't notice before.
It's just...
You put me in a reflective mood today.

The way society says "this is your only option, to choose another will never work out."
The way you stood by the wayside when the spotlight was on everyone else.
The way you gave everything you had for a dream that so few other people saw.
The way you waited back and worked doubly hard for half of the applause.
The way you learned lessons from the school of hard knocks instead of professors.
The way you were the consistent one, always there to back people up, because they could always count on you to be around. I can't thank you enough for that, but I also promise to pick up my share of the dependability, the answering of desperate texts, and the offering up of chick-flicks and ice cream.

You dreamed bigger dreams for yourself than we ever imagined, while the rest of us poured ourselves into studying, dreaming of a degree and the 'real world' in which you were already living.

You waited so patiently, served so diligently, planned so wholeheartedly, with so much faith.

Go, pretty girl, chase your dreams. Live the life you have always imagined.
Be vulnerable. Be sassy. Be brave. Be fabulous. Be yourself.
Make a home for yourself wherever your feet carry you -- and may they carry you far.
And know that I will always be waiting for you on our dock, whenever you're ready to come back and visit the place you called home.









An open letter to the rest of humanity,
who sometimes need to be reminded of things
{and props to you if you already know them} --

There is no one way to do things.
There is no one path to life that's cookie cutter fit for everyone.
There isn't a "this is how to make it through your 20's and live a fulfilling life" manual,
because dreams look different for everyone.
So applaud the people whose dreams look different than we expect.
Applaud the people who are doing exactly what you expect.
Better yet, just applaud everyone,
Because literally everyone you meet is fighting battles you will never know the extent of.
And though we deny it, us 20-somethings long to hear "good job," "you're doing it right," and "I'm proud of you" as much as we ever have, if not more.

Be an anchor. Be a place to call home, a place to run to.
But don't sink the ship.
Let go, let us launch...no matter how normal or weird launching looks.
Maybe it's what you would do.
Maybe it's something you'd never do.
But it's what we're doing. It's how we're living our own lives.
We're creating beautiful lives, and we'd love to keep you in them, but we're also learning how to let go of everything that holds us back.

Spiritual Life Retreat

This is the highlight of my past week...quite possibly a semester highlight as well.

This is the group of us that went on the 44th annual SLR (spiritual life retreat, although we don't like that name particularly because it makes it sound like all we do is get up early, sit in silence and read our bibles like monks, eat rice and beans, and then have theological conversations long into the night.
Yes, this is a conversation we had.."the connotations of 'SLR'" :)

We took off from campus on friday afternoon, and spent our weekend just doing life together. Worship, meals, four-square, naps, hikes, teeter-totters, homework, devotions, bonfires, canoes, donuts...you name it.
I got quite a bit of homework done, which was nice, but the fresh air and emotional space were very, very much what I needed.
I didn't know all of these people coming into the weekend. I don't know all of them incredibly well now. But I did get to meet a couple people, and I did get to worship alongside each of them. Stories and testimonies were shared openly, transparently. It was honest and beautiful and probably the most real, grounded weekend I have had in a very long time. I think it was 18 people that ended up being baptized in the lake on Sunday (there may or may not have been tears).

I'm so thankful that I get to call this campus home, that I get to live and learn and worship with these people on a daily basis. I'm glad I was able to go to my second SLR, and I look forward to next year doing the same(:

how to love this college student: a step by step guide.

Being away at college is a wonderful and beautiful thing.
I love it here, it's where I'm supposed to be. My heart is full of joy and my head is (sometimes a little bit too) full of knowledge. There is no doubt that Spring Arbor is the place I'm called to call home for the time being.
But yeah, it can be a little weird. You feel like you have two separate lives in two different places, and trying to balance responsibilities as a daughter, sister, resident of Zeeland, etc., alongside those of a student, friend, and individual..it gets a little hairy sometimes, especially when the demands here at school can be a lot more intense than those at home.

I HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN HOME, I PROMISE!
It's just that here is where I get to be physically, where I live my life right now.

Want to help bridge the disconnect?

Words are my biggest love language, followed by time and gifts, in that order. Facebook messages are nice, sure, but I love getting letters and packages so much. It's a reminder that people back home still take the time to think of me, to make me a part of their lives, even while I'm at school.

How to prepare an AMAZING package:
(1) write a letter. tell me what you're doing. share a bible passage. tell me something stupid you did yesterday. share your favorite quote. color me a picture. I don't care, just keep it real.
(2) knickknacks! YAY!! As nice as it is, sometimes cash and huge gifts aren't what I really need (and, let's be honest, where's the fun in that?!) Some random, fairly inexpensive ideas of things that are super helpful are gum, nail polish, washi tape, dried fruit (current obsession, actually, the stuff is AHHHMMAZING), stamps, sticky notes, photos, tea, and the like. Just little stuff that you encounter while you're out and about that just kind of scream "I bet Julia'd love that!"
(3) Pack it. UPS has those flat rate boxes, which I assume help if you've got something randomly super heavy? But the more decoration the box has, the more fun it is to open. My family sometimes wraps boxes in newsprint paper so they can color all over it. It's just the little things that scream 'I took the time to do this for you because I care!'
(4) I try to make a point of thanking people and telling them when their letters or packages arrive, but it's not exactly one of my strong points. Please don't hate me if I don't get back to you or don't share a long, heartfelt reply. Life is crazy, and I truly treasure every little letter that I get, but life is crazy here, especially with the academic demands of this semester and all of the preparation I have for this spring.

Send your little letters or packages to (yes, packages can be sent to a box number:)  :

      Julia Klynstra - box 403
      Spring Arbor University
      106 E. Main St.
      Spring Arbor, Michigan
                              49283

water leaks!

Well, there are currently four maintenance men in our little dorm suite. Thanks to random mini-flooding twice in 14 hours and an air conditioner that I can't use because it smokes up the room and makes the whole hall smell like death, they're spending some pretty significant time around here.

Out of respect for them and the crazy chaos that's happening, I'm not running around and taking pictures right now, but I can show you the aftermath:

We've been running these noisy fans for 48 hours straight, trying to get the carpet all of the way dried out again. (We're still not there yet...)

In their leakage investigation, they took out a cinder block from one of our walls (sledgehammers and picks, whole nine yards), pulled out some piping, put some PVC in, and did their best to cover it back up with a grate.

While we were getting the whole water leak figured out, we also threw out the fact that somewhere in the pile of maintenance requests on their radar was the fact that my air conditioner is unusable due to the fact that turning it on fills my room up with smoke and makes the whole floor smell like death.




Basically, this has been an exercise in patience and the ability to laugh at my situations. God's got things under control, and He throws me for a loop sometimes to remind me to rely on Him.

photo update!

It's pretty much impossible to sum up my last week of summer in just one photo, so you're getting three.
My last day at the factory was super anticlimactic, running around covering breaks and making people happy and just thankful to know it was almost done.
My last meal was chinese takeout with my father from Mr. You's while we snuck in our last two episodes of Grimm because, let's face it, we're obsessed and we do our best to watch all of them together.




I house sat at two different places, one of them back at the corgi, the other snuggling with a super personable plott hound and a cat who sort of thinks that he's a dog. That house is more like a second home to me and those animals are almost as much fur babies to me as my own, who was obviously pretty not happy about my leaving for school, either.

She's super smart, and once my plastic tubs came into the living room, she knew what was up. I insisted on our ceremonial 'last goodbye for a while' photos, and she was more excited about bolting out the door, attacking my stuff in the truck, and generally getting the focus back on her silly sassy little self.
















The dorm room is back to being 'home,' though for the first time in my entire life I have my own room. Half of a suite in the air conditioned basement that I can say is 'my room' and no one else's. I have two lovely suitemates, Corina and Megan, who make this experience all the more enjoyable, as well as a portion of my group of friends living just down the hall.

Finally, we have this past week. The six of us girls in the picture were the brave ones that decided to adventure up north and go camping for a weekend. Tent, outhouse, campfire cooking, almost-freezing temperatures, the whole nine yards. We had so incredibly much fun, even though we were perpetually cold, unable to start a fire the first night thanks to everything being damp, and a little bit freaked out by all of the wild turkeys (that we found out roosted in treetops overnight. who knew?!).

All in all, a very worthwhile weekend getting some quality girl time in before it got super cold and our schedules all got even crazier.

welcome home.

I am so very thankful to be back on my 'home turf' here at the arbor.
After a summer of lots of work, a fair amount of crazy, a few naps, oh, and more work, I am back to the place of color-coordinated schedules and school supplies running my life.
I'm one of those crazy people that just genuinely loves school. I love the routine and the learning and the being pushed by profs to really reach out and make myself better.

I'm taking 'just' four classes this semester, though each of them will be challenging in their own way and they bring me up to 14 credits, near the crazy busy end of 'full time student' classification.

• Physiological Psychology
  This is the class that terrifies me slightly. I'm not going to lie, the professor is intimidating. This class has a reputation for being one of the most difficult classes on campus, but I'm going at it full force. We'll be studying brain physiology and it's implications on psychology. We'll be covering everything from sexuality to schizophrenia to prescription medications and how each topic occurs within the brain and body at a neurological level.
  It's no secret that science isn't always my strong point. However, knowing that (1) I'll be able to apply it in my career field on a daily basis because (2) I really am leaning towards to working in a clinical setting. This will be day-to-day stuff for me as a working professional. Overwhelming, but also oh so exciting!

• Statistics for Behavioral Analysis
  Math, the other of my less-than-favorite subjects. However, the prof is the single sweetest grandmotherly type woman I have ever met. She's 67 years old, intent on retiring after this year, and also a genius. This is another class that's going to take a lot of work for me to do well in, but it's all work that's going to be able to benefit me after I leave the arbor for 'work world.' A lot of it will be directly applicable to understanding how research studies are conducted and the implications of such methods on interpreting studies.
  Social work application? Reading study after study of new research, medications, and hypothesis on human behavior in order to better serve clients. Right up my clinical social work alley.

• Research Design
  As it turns out, I haven't actually had this class yet. We'll meet every Wednesday night for three hours. The prof is my academic adviser, who's a sweetheart, but relatively new to the teaching portion of our social work department. However, I'm confident that she'll be amazing. Research design is the practical, hands-on side of stats, where we'll really be working on decoding (and possibly conducting?) some research in order to better understand the process and validity of findings and such.

• Core 300
  Oh, the COR program. Core 100 is Spring Arbor's freshman orientation type class. I opted out of Core 200 because of my Spanish minor (and because I have NO wiggle room in my schedule for fun stuff beyond a one credit here and there, which I prefer to think of as nap breaks in semesters instead of holes to fill). Core 300 is officially entitled "Christian Faith: It's Practices," but it's always just referred to as Core 3. The class is up to a lot of interpretation based on the professor that teaches it, but all center around faith formation and personal faith development.
  Ever since hearing Dr. Laura talk at a chapel last spring, I've had the desire to figure out a way to take one of her classes. However, she's a youth/camping/general ministry prof...not exactly room in my schedule. When I found out she taught Core 3, it was one of the first classes I plugged in because I knew I was going to find a way to take it. She's just the kind of person that you want to be around and soak up their wisdom. I have so much respect for her and am looking forward to listening to her lecture and talk with us.
  (Also, one of our assignments is to take a bible, journal, and food with us to someplace completely quiet or isolated in nature and hang out there for three or four hours and just practice listening for God. This is so right up my alley!)

So that's what my semester is going to look like from an academic perspective. Honestly, this will probably be the most challenging semester of my entire academic career. I'm excited for the challenge, anxious for the work load, and basically just all around ready to give it my all and see what God does on campus and in my life this semester.

WSPW '15.

I interrupt this usual blog stream of photos and life updates to talk about a cause very near and dear to my heart.

This week is World Suicide Prevention Week.
Weather or not people know about it, take it seriously, or realize the scope of the issue, suicide is something that is very, very real.
WSPW, then, is a chance to talk openly and honestly about something that affects each of us in some way.




Can I throw some stats at you?

• Someone dies from suicide in the US every 13 minutes.
• This comes out to 38,000 lives per year.
• Not including the 250,000 yearly survivors.

• For people in my age group (15-24), suicide is the second leading cause of death.
• This number is more than those who die of cancer, AIDS, heart disease, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia, influenza, and lung disease COMBINED.
• Over 80% of those who take their own life at this age show clear warning signs.

I could go on, but honestly, if this doesn't hurt your heart then I don't know what I can do to make you understand how very real this is.

I have almost lost two people very close to me to suicide, one about a year before we became friends, and one with whom I was close at the time. And these are just the individuals I know about.

In serving in a position of leadership last year, I handled the topic of suicide with numerous different individuals on countless occasions.

I can honestly say that there were chapters in my life that I wasn't so sure I was going to make it through alive.

Now can I take a hot second to dissipate some myths?

• People who commit suicide are NOT inherently 'crazy'. 
• They may suffer from very real medical conditions and chemical imbalances, be going through unfathomable amounts of emotional turmoil, or have any number of other factors lingering just beneath the surface.
• Talking about suicide will NOT an individual more likely to make an attempt.
• Honestly, if you have reason to suspect someone may be suicidal, the likelihood is that it has already crossed their mind. You're not giving them ideas. Instead, you're giving them a safe space to process everything they're dealing with.
• People who talk about committing suicide are NOT always just looking for attention.
• A vast majority of those who end up making a suicide attempt have exhibited clear warning signs. Knowing the warning signs and trusting your gut when you're speaking with the people you care about could very easily save a life.

One of my favorite nonprofit organizations, To Write Love On Her Arms (TWLOHA), does a campaign every year for WSPW.

This year, the slogan is 

"We'll see you tomorrow."

Can I tell you how much I absolutely love this?

So many reasons, so much good, wrapped up into a simple, four word statement.

It establishes a personal connection between the speaker and recipient (We'll see you), it gives a concrete time (tomorrow; insinuating that 'you don't have to hold on for forever, one day at a time'), and it tells the recipient that they're not in it alone, that they are surrounded by a team of people who love them without limits, who need them in their lives, and who will fight alongside them.

The campaign then challenges you to find your own reasons to hold on.

I'll see you tomorrow because ___________________________ .

Why will you all see me tomorrow?

Because my story is not over yet. Because there is so much more I have been called to. I have not been so much 'pulled from' death as I have been 'redeemed for' life. Because I have chosen to fight every day, to have honest conversations with those around me, to spread awareness and bring hope in my own subtle ways, to use my voice to build others up, and to always believe in the promise of a better future.

I'll see you tomorrow.

And every tomorrow, Lord willing, for many years to come.

Because hope is real, help is real, and each of our stories carries so much importance.

BOOKS: my first love

This week's photos are brought to you by my first true love in life:
BOOKS.
I go through phases of reading a lot, and then not reading a lot, and then having to read so much for school that I never want to read anything ever again, and then I'm back to spending every spare second with my nose in a book because I love it. Well, this week I've fallen back in love.

First, <<<<<THOSE books came in the mail this week. Thank you, thriftbooks.com for potentially being the death, bankruptcy, and ruin of me.
{5 books, $15 = HAPPY JULIA!}
All of these are books I've been encouraged to read by business partners and mentors to work on personal and business development. Um, YES!


Then THESE>>>>> beautiful babies are part of what can only be described as an overwhelming pull back to the arbor. I am so ready to go back to school. I'm ready for the schedule and the routine, the checklists and late nights and homework and papers and activity and bustle and friends and just the way that life has unfolded for me there. My family knows that I love them more than words, but that right now, Spring Arbor is just my home, and it's where I want to be more than anything.
I am seriously SO blessed to be able to have found a community that makes me want to go back so badly.
Anyway, these are textbooks. Yeah. Devotional Classics, Mudhouse Sabbath, Life You've Always Wanted... textbooks.
{Along with Clinical Psychpharmacology Made Ridiculously Simple, obviously.}




I'm just really ready to go back. We start late in comparison to most other schools, and for the first time, I'm not moving in early (because I'm not a freshman or an upperclassman with a leadership position on a freshman floor like I was last year.)
Two weeks of work left, then a couple of days to pack and sleep and spend time with the people that I love, and then we pile everything in a truck and make the trek.

We had a 'last day' party at work for the summer help today. Maddie's last day was today, so they decided to just do both of us at once. Costco cake with our names on it, gourmet cupcakes for each of us, whole nine yards(:
Honestly, all of them are just sweethearts. Both last summer and now this summer I've been placed in work environments at Royal where I've meshed well with personalities, picked up on things quickly, and even managed to have a little bit of fun while getting paid to do work that a monkey could do.
Ideal? No. Would I do it again? Absolutely. Though I don't know what next summer holds, I do know that the past two years have been a hoot and a half out in Hudsonville.

the past month in photos

Ok, long story short, we had major laptop issues. It crashed without explanation and eventually we discovered that this laptop, that we bought 'new', had a refurbished, off-brand and semi-functional hard drive. This hard drive jostled and everything stopped working. We made some new friends at the tech place in Zeeland and some lifelong buddies at a repair center in Grand Rapids that got everything replaced for as little cash as possible.
So, with a non-functional laptop, blogging fell to the wayside. For over a month.
Then I wrote this blog post in its entirety and had the second half of it deleted sporadically. I was very very much not a fan.
So now, all at once, here's some pictures. They might not be exactly one a week, but they cover the month and a half that we've missed. This post will consider us caught back up on the 'photo a week for my year of being 20' escapade.
Deal? Deal.
So sit back and enjoy my summer!!

The kid and I ran the Zeeland Zoom 5k in late June. She kicked my butt, as was thoroughly expected, but I took all of 6 whole seconds off of my time from last year's race and came within a minute of my goal time. Am I incredibly proud of this fact? No, not really. But we're choosing to stick with the positives. My legs work. My lungs usually hold up pretty well. It's a good deal for all involved.

This picture was taken circa 4:30am on the fifth of July. I spent the 4th with my second family and a new amigo, Jake. After backyard fireworks, laughing until we cried, and listening to a lot of music, we tried to go to Taco Bell. All of the T-Bells within a reasonable radius were closed. Then we went to McDonald's. We discovered that McD's does NOT have ice cream OR french fries in the wee hours of the morning when all normal people obviously want ice cream and fries. However, we laughed a lot and took pictures and laughed some more and drank frozen strawberry lemonade. It was great.

These are my people. These two. I don't even have words that accurately describe how much they have and are continuing to change my life. They see the seeds of greatness in me, they nurture them, and they pull them out of me. I flew down to North Carolina for the second time to attend a business conference, this one significantly smaller than the last. A few thousand people, a weekend of incredible service and inspiration, of building dreams and laughs and so much good.
My heart was so full coming out of this weekend. So much changed in me for the better that I can't fully put into words. One such example of this is the story of how I got home. My plane left early, without me, from Charlottesville, Virginia. Instead of having a full blown panic attack at 6 in the morning with no clue how to get home. They gave me a ticket from VA to Chicago, but had no seats guaranteed from Chicago to home. I called home, I called the airlines, I handled an inability to transfer money to my debit card-so I was essentially broke, but I got the tears of stress out in about a five minute window and got back to thinking rationally. I grabbed Chickn' Lickn' with Hope, the woman in the center of this photo -- my business partner, coach, mentor, friend, and host -- before getting back to the tiny airport on a later flight. I prayed my way to Chicago, doodling and journaling and just doing life, miraculously without a major meltdown.

It was on this flight that my new mantra got solidified:

the cross before me; 
a team beside me; 
my past behind me

I was terrified, but I also have never felt more alive.
So I land in Chicago and make a beeline for the first airline desk I see. I briefly explain the situation, I ask if there are any flights available in the next few hours. The stewardess looks at her flight board and tells me that the only one leaves in five minutes. I panic slightly. Chicago O'Hare International Airport is a huge place. Unlikely that I can catch a flight in five minutes. So I ask the stewardess about it. It had been delayed for between 20 and 30 minutes. Now we had a slice of hope. I ask her where the flight is boarding... and it's at the gate RIGHT NEXT TO the one I just got off. I take a deep breath, preparing for her to ask me for my debit card, which has nowhere near enough cash on it to pay for the ticket according to the airline price earlier that morning. Ready for this? MY FLIGHT WAS FREE. The airline acknowledged that leaving early and without a passenger was their mistake more than mine, and I boarded the plane after a very brief, but stressful wait on flightside to see if seats were available. I sat next to a pilot on his way home to see his kids, and I was back with my family before supper. Relieved and HOME.

Whistlepunk Pizza of Muskegan. My family has a knack for finding the most hidden away, homey, beautiful places with incredible food. Whistlepunk was no different. Probably some of the most delicious pizza I have ever tasted...it was way out of the realm of 'normal' pizza, but it was worth the drive. My personal favorite was the Bull Cook. As it may or may not be known, I'm a pseudo-vegetarian. I have no problem with eating meat IF I know where it comes from, if it has been raised and killed ethically. So locally funded sausage and pepperoni, made from scratch in their kitchen, was phenomenal. Took the trip out with them, ordered three pizzas for the four of us, ate them all, and even played a game of classic operation in there.

It happened. The day came. My baby sister went to college.
There were a lot of feels, but no tears, so we'll chalk that up to a successful move out for her. My kiddo is now a resident of Lawrence Technological University, studying architecture and running cross country. She survived camp, and right now she's hanging out in some very posh and spacious temporary housing. Not even kidding, there's more square footage in her apartment than my parents had in their first house...for just three girls. Two bedrooms, two full bathrooms, full kitchen, living room, front-loading washer and dryer... the kid is living the high life right now while the BRAND NEW freshman dorms are being completed. I guess you could say she picked the right year to start college, because everything is lining up in her favor right now. I remember all of the feels of my first year at the arbor very clearly, and I can only hope that she finds herself a community and a place to call home there like I have at SAU.

Finally, we have the picture from this past weekend. Momma and I took a trip up to Lake Leenauau to visit her parents, who get to hang out up there and camp for three weeks. Usually we have one of those weeks, but due to the chaos of said kiddo moving in to school and everything else that's been going down lately, they volunteered to take that week off of our list of things to do. Instead, momma and I visited and crammed some of our favorite things into about 38 hours or so... shopping in two little towns, a campfire, coloring, lots of coffee, and ICE CREAM AT OUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM PARLOR IN THE HISTORY OF EVER. Blue Moon Ice Cream in Cedar, MI. If you ever find yourself in the remote vicinity, it's worth the trip. {Leah was a chaperon on a middle school youth group trip this summer and made them drive 45 minutes to go...totally worth it.} Mom and grandma got Jacked Up Tennessee Toffee - their unquestionable favorite, and this is the only place we've ever been able to find it - and I got my go-to bowl of happiness: Ashby's Amaretto Cherry.

It's just an all-around beautiful place up there. It makes my heart so happy, even if there are a million other things going on and the weather is questionable and people get crabby... even then, it's still someplace so special to me.


{This is my camping mug. It has been my camping mug for the last few years. No one else drinks out of my camping mug. Only coffee goes in the camping mug. I take the camping mug with me all day and take pictures with it and just live in my element. HAPPY CAMPER!}

...whoops...

Summer -- the time when all of your days start to run together because adulting is exhausting and if you're going to keep up with blogging you need to invent a way to get more hours out of your week.

Apologies, but oh well. Here's the past two weeks in weekly photos.

First, the Pendinator. Gosh guys, this little corgi totally stole my heart and could totally work her way into even the most angry, dog-hating soul. I am not kidding, she just radiates joy and energy and trust and this crazy, total, unapologetic love of life.

So while her rescuing humans were gone, we took naps and went on walks (and she even took me on a run:) and made a trip to the weekly church league softball game, where she unofficially became the good luck charm and team morale booster in about .2 seconds.
This was the last week her humans were gone and the last week that I could just go hang out with her on a whim whenever I felt like it. It was good stuff, and the softball game was just the icing on the cake.

Running...ohhh, running.
So I may or may not have (ok, yeah, I did) gotten talked into running a 5k this upcoming week, which means last week training had to really kick in.
I'm still perfectly comfortable with little one or two mile adventures, but this day (Tuesday I believe it was) was the first 'long' run in quite awhile. [I don't know if 3.25 miles really constitutes a long run, but compared to what I've been doing, we'll call it that. Tonight the kid and I are trying to go four, so we'll see how that goes.]
This run was at one of my favorite places to go adventure running: the Zeeland Wetlands. A mixture of paved, gravel, dirt, and boardwalk bridges that has me running in lots of little circles, but I don't even care. It's beautiful, it's quiet, and it's usually pretty empty.
Mentally I had to get my stuff figured out for this run...and I was reminded of my 'thirds' mentality that keeps me going on longer runs... the first third with my legs {because I can run, gosh dang it!}, the next third with my head {because shoot, I've trained for this}, and the last third with my heart {because I want this and I refuse to quit}.