Earth Shaking

I have had my first earth quake experience!

I was upstairs in my room, reading an Agatha Christie book (surprise, surprise) at almost 2:00. Without warning, the house started...well, I'm really struggling to find the right word to describe it. Jumping? Shaking? Rattling? I guess what I really think of is 'jarring', which is an adjective, not a verb. It's hard to say exactly how it felt, but it was kind of like being in a dream. You know, when there's something happening that seemed completely random.

For about five or ten seconds I had no clue what was going on. Then my mind flashed to how all the mess in Japan started, and I threw my book down and rushed into the hallway.

Everyone downstairs was just as confused as I was. Our mortar-and-pestle fell off the stove with a crash, and that didn't really add much clarity to the situation.

Then, just as suddenly as it had started, it stopped. Mom flicked on the radio just as Galdor began to cry in his room and Dad rushed up from the basement.

The earthquake left us with this 'whoa' feeling. When you're in an earthquake you really don't have any control over what's happening. It's not like other emergencies that I've been in, when you can do something to make it stop. You simply aren't in control.

But I suppose I'll seize the opportunity of an otherwise quiet day and tell you what's been happenin' around here.

So. Let's rewind back to Thursday.

Have anyone ever heard of Institute for Cultural Communicators? It's an organization that trains young people to be effective public speakers, with the main objective to be able to talk about your faith. Every year, they tour around the US giving Communicator for Christ Conferences.

That's where we were Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. To tell you what happened each specific day would take too much time because each day was absolutely jam-packed, so I'll just tell you my thoughts about it.

• It was one of the highlights of my summer. I learned so much and was so encouraged to speak out about my faith more and to be friendly and conversational.
  
• It really made me think on the power of communication. For example, I'm one of those people who, if I'm having a bad day, can hide it if I really want to. When I'm around my friends, I'm usually bubbly or happy or cheerful on those days, but when I'm with my family I become a real bear. But what am I communicating to my family when I do that? That I don't care about how they feel?
  
• I SOOOO admire the interns. The interns are teens who have graduated from the curriculum and are the ones touring in the conference. They teach all the labs, organize the activities, and do other things like that. They are all so fun to be around. Seriously, they really make an effort to have conversations with everyone in attendance.
  
• It was really busy. We were getting up at 6:00-ish in the morning and coming home at 10:30-ish at night. I was running on caffeine for a little there. =) Yes, it was very exhausting, but it was definitely worth it.
• You should go sometime. It was fun, encouraging, and I made a lot of friends.

And now the summer is almost gone and school will be starting. Autumn is definitely in the air today. It's so sad in a beautiful way. *sniff*. Only authors and poets would ever say that.

Izori

Night is for Sleeping (as I try to convince myself)

I am a night-owl. Officially, I go to bed at about 9:00 to 9:30 at night. Unofficially, I crawl into bed at about 10:30 PM. I don't know why, but I don't like to go to bed early. I will avoid it for all I'm worth: I'll read a book, I'll knit, I'll draw...I'll even do algebra! (I know something's up if I'd rather do algebra than go to sleep!)

Basically every single night last week I found some excuse not to go to sleep. Books, schoolwork, stuff like that. It was even worse than usual; I was getting into bed at...oh...about 11:00 PM or later.

I'm so glad I have a good Heavenly Father who is always looking out for my health. I have a job babysitting/walking some girls up to the bus stop, plus the time when I teach piano to one of my students has been switched to pretty early in the morning. Because I have to be at the house of the girl that I babysit at 7:30 AM (!) I've actually been forced to go to sleep earlier out of necessity.

Of course, staying up so late repeatedly last week has taken its toll. I am sick. Sore throat, cold, general feeling of washed-out-ness. I guess it's my penalty for avoiding sleep. *sigh* I've never been a morning person, but getting up early with a cold is sooooo hard.

Speaking of procrastinating and 'sooooo hard', I'm starting to tear my hair out about something. I participate in a public speaking club, and about a month ago I was given the assignment of doing a humorous interpretation of a book or poem. Now, the last assignment I completely put off until it was code-red urgent, and so I told myself I was not going to repeat that. So the first chance I got I went to the library and got out one book.

After I had spent about a week working on a piece from that one book ('By the Great Horn Spoon' by Sid Fleischman) I decided that it wasn't funny enough. You see, there are some super hilarious parts of 'BtGHS' but it's about the goldrush and so there's several mentions of cigars, fistfights, guns, and stuff like that. (It's not really that bad, but my teacher was hoping to have me perform the interpretation at a library children's hour or somewhere like that, and I don't think telling jokes about cigars would make a great impression) So then I had to go back to the library and gather up a multitude of books. Again, I spent another week preparing an interpretation, only to realize that it mentioned Hell. 'Hell' as a place, not swearing, but once again it wouldn't make a good impression. I honestly don't want little five year olds slinging that word around.

So, it's less than a week before our club meets again and I just picked out my interpretation. It's Winnie the Pooh. You just can't go wrong with Winnie the Pooh.

The whole point of that long, rambling story was to praise God that I didn't procrastinate in that situation! Can you imagine the chaos and turbulence I would be in right now if I spent a week experiencing the above story instead of a month?

No, wait. I don't even want to think about it.

I suppose I should follow my own advise about procrastination and go to bed now. Adios, amigos!

Hugs & Blessings,

Izori

P.S. Guess what! I get to make up my own fairy tale and write it in Spanish! I am soooooo excited. =) It makes me feel accomplished. =)