Remembering

Flags, hats badges, and notes left
at the Flight 93 temporary memorial  

 Since the anniversary of 9-11 has been set aside as a National Day of Service our Habitat for Humanity office spent today on a team-build working at one of the houses. Service seems to me like a fitting way to recognize the day. Like nearly everyone else I have my vivid memories of the morning itself: the cloudless blues sky, being a just-turned-12-year-old-in-brand-new-school-clothes, finding out over aol instant message to turn on the news, seeing the second tower hit on live TV, and sitting in my friends' backyard that afternoon watching for the occasional military plane in that clear blue sky.
The crash site of United Flight 93 in Shanksville Pennsylvania became a National Park just 6 weeks after Sept 11. A sort of spontaneous memorial began as well as people began to leave candles, notes, and flowers - much like they did in New York. But since the site is in the middle of a field instead of a city, the temporary memorial in PA continued to grow for the past decade. The park opened the official memorial last year and it's peaceful, beautiful, and well done. And the archive of items brought in to be protected from the rain continues to grow. One of my history classes went up to see the temporary memorial and the amount of things left by visitors was captivating.

Lessons from Wildflowers

The field at camp = guns, bows and arrows, slingshots, tomahawks, campfire, flag, and games.
This field at night = tons and tons of stars, shooting stars, and the milky way.                                                         Photo Credit: L.A.Birdie

Being on staff at camp you learn a lot. Ten years of staff teaches you a whole-lotta-stuff. I can organize super-exciting games, or wash a few dozen dishes before the soundtrack to Prince of Egypt finishes, and I'm decent with a range of random weapons (though I still suck at tomahawk). With only a few prompts I could sing roughly 2gillion-hours of silly songs for campfires or van rides (to say nothing of the hymns). I've also got a good repertoire of skits involving good morals and/or dog pee. This summer's DaddyAndDaughter camp taught true fatherly love is expressed when wearing a lopsidedly-bedazzled-cowboy-hat. And every summer Mss. Posie/Cheif instills some of her wisdom and staff-isms in us, concepts like: "Hard fun" and "The night is a whole 'nother day" and "John-boy --What a man!"

Here (in no particular order) are some lessons of a summer-camp-staff-girl:

Showers are not entirely necessary. At a certain point you are coated in enough sweat, soot, sap, and dirt that being one with the earth simply ceases to phase you. Around that point you may be serenaded with "Little black things" more often, but right up until you really really smell bad (or rather smell worse than everyone else) showering is not entirely needed. Especially since jumping in a salty/chemically Pool/Ool is a nearly equivalent to bathing, right?  It rinses off poison ivy and leaves you less dirty, that counts for something.

To follow that up though, showering is a wonderful, blessed, exciting, rewarding thing to do every now and then. You never take a hot shower for granted at camp and any shower over 3 minutes is particularly gratitude-worthy. (As is an extra 7 minutes of sleep). Showers are few and far between, and the chance to shave your legs even more so, but that makes it one of the most amazing feelings when you can finally have smooth-non-tarzan-legs for a few days. Everything is more exciting at camp, even the everyday: hot showers, cold drinks, sleep, food, clean clothes, all those rare wonders we happy-dance for at camp. Real life could use a little more of that gratitude and excitement.

Camp is for the campers is practically a motto of staff. We hear and say it all the time as a reminder. It's simple, it's obvious, but it's also important. I've been a part of other ministries where this guiding principle seems to have been forgotten, where those they are suppose to serve were not the top priority, instead of being there for those they were aiming to serve the organization itself took center stage, or the staff, or a concept like "God's will". (And while I fully support God's will being central, you are not running a ministry for it, you are ministering to those who need your ministry.  If you forget that camp is for the camper, or your group is for the students, or your organization for those in need, it never turns out as well as it could.

"God Does Things" is painted above the door in the dinning hall at camp, three words to sum up why the staff subject ourselves to blood-sucking-bugs, nearly no sleep, very few showers, and endless piggy-back-rides when our backs and bodies would honestly just prefer a nap. Because at camp it is so much easier to see God do things. I've seen him do things the rest of the year too, but everything is more intense in the wilderness. Everything gets louder and you have more time to marvel at all that God does. The same God who lead the Israelites on dry land across the Red Sea and keeps campers safe playing in the creek, He provides comfort, healing, strength and courage, sends rain and rainbows. He does things.

Gopher Guts

 I got home from camp a week ago, so I've enjoyed a whole seven days of air-conditioning, internet, car, cell phone signal, regular showers, and not-waking-up-before-6:30am. Being home is quite snazzy, but there is a ton to miss about the land of mountains, creeks, french-braids, giggles fits, campfires, and campers
Every week of camp has tons of memorable, precious, exclamation-point-worthy-moments. Here are a few of the highlights from this summer. Ask me for more and I'll talk your ear off.

Adventure Course has pretty much always been my favorite rotations and now I'm one of the over-eighteens so I'm certified for the zip-Line. While I was in the crow's nest, one camper in particular was frightened to tears being so high. Talking her over the edge was incredible. Lots of deep breaths and each small step taken one at a time. Despite her nerves she held on to the tether tight and rode the zip-line. You could see her smile the whole way down. When I saw her afterwards she ran over and gave me a huge hug, she was beaming with excitement and pride. She was gushing, "Even my mom didn't think I would do that, cause I'm scared of heights! But I did it! I was so frightened but I did it anyways!" I love that camp is full of those moments when you learn you can do the impossible and that makes you mighty.

Joys of Moving in July

There are a few things that I would generally advise against and strongly encourage you to avoid.
Such as: stepping on an upside-down pin cushion, eating a twizzler dipped in nacho cheese, moving in July.
Particularly moving in July in Maryland.
During a record breaking heatwave.
When the house has no power.

Not that moving in July during a record-setting-heat-wave when the house was air-conditioning-less wasn't a brilliant way to spend a week, I just feel the need to keep all that fun for myself and spare you.

Chinese take-out eaten picnic-style on the floor
because you've already moved the table and chairs
might be the best perk of moving

In addition to the joy of having the unique sensation where you're carrying boxes of books upstairs and everything including one's knees, eyelids, and ears sweating, moving in July did have its moments.
The highlights or moving included the opportunity to defy the laws of physics that theoretically govern our planet, by having the amount of stuff (stuff = books) that fit quite fine in a technically two-bedroom-apartment somehow cover every surface in a practically four-story-house. It was honestly impressive to see. Apparently when you box things up they start taking on characteristics of tribbles and you are quickly overrun (although with less cute squeaks and fuzziness).

So much stuff.
Every (much-bigger-than-the-apartment) room in the house looked like this.
So much stuff.

Blogging from my phone

Jamie and me in Philly - photo credit to my mom

I'm currently in the car on 95 heading back home from Philly, my mom's driving so don't worry this blogging is not currently endangering my life.  Although I suppose I am slacking off from my navigating duties. She'll manage though. A mini-road-trip was in order since I've been away and after all that travel, I wanted more travel when I got home. Plus Jamie's bright green bag needed to complete the one last leg of its adventure from home to Germany to Galway to Dublin with Jamie, then to Cork with random-ditzy-Irish-strangers, then back to Galway and home with me, and finally many moons later back to Jamie in Philly.  It was a beautiful day for a drive and we got delicious dinner in an old-bank-turned-church-turned-restaurant. Philly is a great city with all its liberty and freedom and I like Delaware's "It's good to be first" and it's nice to be back in Maryland cause it's home even if I miss Galway a bit.

Hiking and Hitchhiking

"Do Not Climb on Wet or Foggy Days" yeah...but this is Ireland

Before leaving Ireland I figured it would be fun to go on a hike.

Avengers Assemble

Lucky Star stealing a kiss from Hawkeye over there

Irish Family in Limerick

Me/Megan, May, Niamh, Jimmy, Aj, Tim/Dad, Dan, Ning

Oysters of awesomeness

At the Museum Cafe with cake and salad, a well balanced meal.  

We started out the day by getting breakfast at Griffins Cafe and it was delicious. This was a theme for the day, food which was delicious. Sadly the hard-core-Ireland-cough-germs started to get the best of my lil-bro and my dad so they headed back to the hotel to rest up, while my big-bro and sis-in-law and I headed back to the Galway Museum since it was not Monday and therefore it was open. We checked out the exhibits and then got super-duper-delicious snacks from the Kitchen Cafe downstairs of the museum.

Good Day, Bad Weather

After the Aran Islands with Jamie and Jessie, it seems like a fun trip to go on with my family guests as well. The forecast for the entire week was heavy storms, but we decided to chance it. The weather got the best of us in that wager. It started out with extremely choppy water all the way over. On the ferry to Inis Mor we confirmed that McCormack-genes do not come with sailor-stomachs standard issued.  Having already taken my turn with puking on the ship, I braced myself by the railing with the sea spray while everyone else fought or gave into the puking. At least the little boy sitting behind us enjoyed the ups-and-downs-and-side-to-sides with glee-full-giggles and happy little squeals.

Lovely day for a Guinness

Friday the 13th

Last time I visited Dublin with Jamie and Jessie it went ...so...so...well. Therefore I returned to Dublin visit with my brothers and sis-in-law and all on Friday the 13th, a day known for it's luck-y-ness right? No? oh... dear me.

Regardless, after my day of rest on I got up early on Friday and took the GoBus back to Dublin were I met up with everyone at the hotel. We got some fish and chips for lunch and headed to Trinity College to see the space-alien-sphere and the Book of Kells. We stopped along the way at the General Post Office where the 1916 Easter uprising started.

The Book of Kells s quite impressive and it makes me wish I had handwriting that nice.  I've decided that if I could just move in a back corner of Old Library to live, I would be quite content for the rest of my life. So many rows of gorgeous books! And beautiful  arched ceilings! And slidy-beauty-and-the-beast-library-ladders! And spiral staircases!!!  On top of all that amazingness there was even a book on display from the 1600s with a picture of a Viceroy Tulip that pretty much made my day. (Yay for Fault in Our Stars!)

Break Day

Trains, Planes, and Automobiles

Star's face is cause she is in the middle of
Looking for Alaska, Monique's is cause
 we've been traveling a lot. a lot a lot. 

The five of us spent one last night in in mega-bed. Then we had a wonderful breakfast with our splendid hosts Wednesday morning. It was quite sad to leave them (and Italy as a whole as well.) We packed up all our stuff (plus a handful of new scarves) and hit the road around 12:20. We walked briskly, but not full-on-panicked-ly to the metro and then took that to the Turino train station, Porto Nouvo. Having mastered the ticket machine in Rome we quickly purchased our ticket and were able to board at the very closest platform (karma was trying to make up for Rome).

On our first train from Turin to Milan, the Italian girl across the aisle from us was being bugged by two gypsies and it turns out they stole her wallet and all out of her purse which really sucked. But I have to say that the half a dozen guys who jumped up to defend her pretty much made my day, the guys also helped her out when she realized she was robbed. It was really nice to see them help her out. I had a slight run-in with a meany-pants-train-ticket-guy who charged me for having my feet on the seat across from me, just because he could (sticky out tongue face)

Tuesday in Turin

Turino

We left Florence around midnight on Saturday. After a long night of traveling, with 3 trains, a little too much time in Pisa's station, a pickpocket-attempt involving dirty socks, a couple of movies on my laptop, not much sleep, and a lot of giggles we arrived in Turin. The Grove City girls here have an adorably Italian apartment with 100 year old wardrobes, chandlers, very tall ceilings, and tiger-print-blankets to boot. It is quite exciting to visit them. Last night we went out to Superga -- a beautiful hilltop with an amazing view of the city. We took the last bus of the night up the windy-road; but walking back down was completely worth it since we arrived right at sunset and enjoyed our Easter-dinner-picnic while watching the sun settle behind the mountains.

Firenze Day Two

*side note* A few of my friends and a handful of the You Tubers I love do BEDA (= Blog Every Day in April). This year I’m traveling and then will have visitors for the majority of April. Kind of a good reason to skip BEDA, but on the other hand it’s also the type of month I’ll want a record of, so I’m blogging everyday-ish in April. The internet is not always available, but I’ll post all the days eventually. For example, this post I typed up on the train north from Florence late Saturday night.

Best ever place to read, and Song of Myself makes me want to re-read Papertowns 

Friday in Florence

Non-zoomed-in-photo of the red roofs of Florence 

Rome -> Florence

We started Thursday with a delicious Italian breakfast of cappuccino and fresh pastries (significantly different from a full Irish Breakfast), then the three of us stopped by a few last sights in Rome. Such as the Pantheon, Trevi fountain, Piazza Novena, and the Spanish Steps—with daylight, and then we tried to see the bone church with the capuchin crypt, but when we found it the 11:30-3:00 lunch hour foiled those plans. But hey, you have to leave something to see next time right?

After finding a store for lunch and snack foods, we took the metro to Termini to catch our train to Florence. The board listed platforms for all the other trains departed; all except our train, of course. That’s where the adventure comes in! Our train to Florence departed from not one, two, three, four, or thirteen, but from “ES2”. I asked the nice Tren-Italia-man what that meant and he said that ES1 and ES2 are the platforms all the way down past all the other platforms, and then to the right, and all the way down past trains at the very end. We had time to calmly stamp our ticket and board the train, if our train departed from a normal platform. Instead we got to briskly-but-not-quite-full-panic-ly walk from one corner of Termini to the farthest possible point of Termini, completely with a short more-like-panic-full-run at the end which got us boarding the train at exactly 3:13 for our departure of 3:14. It’s not nearly as romantic as all those movies make it seem to hop onboard right as the train pulls away, but that could just be because there was no rain, dramatic music, or beautiful boy waving goodbye to us as we left him behind.

We very much enjoyed resting on the train and then we arrived in Florence around 7pm. Star’s friend from Grove City met us at the station to show us back to their flat, which is up so many steps it makes one appreciate the “Mt Everest of stairs” up to Star and Monique’s room in Galway. We enjoyed the sunset from the roof with a sea of red terracotta roofs all around us, quite a wonderful spot to sit. For dinner we got heaping servings of amazing Italian anti-pastas and pastas galore. It was family-style loads of food for 15 euros, including really nice house wine too, so it was very much worth it. Plus there was a quick stop for gelato on the way home, of course. Although it is always sad to leave the Eternal City, Florence is great as well. 

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One last Old Bridge Gelato before we left town

Highest point of the smallest country

Today we spent the majority of the day at the Vatican. First we went into the Vatican Museums and saw the Sistine Chapel.  Although there is far too much to see in one day, we looped through most of the museum rooms to see an abundance of icons, paintings, sculptures, and all sorts of impressive art and artifacts. While in the courtyard for a snack we were highly entertained by a couple of Japanese boys who just hopped over the chain-fence-ring-thing in order to spin the alien-sphere-with-in-a-sphere-thingy. The Italian security guards disapproved in a "Hey don't do that, but, you know, stop whenever you want, no rush."   Even better, was the Japanese girl who sat down behind me on the bench really fast while her boyfriend snapped a picture of her with my hair. Red hair is apparently a bigger deal for Asians than it is for the Irish.

In addition to the wonderful tourists to watch, we loved all the art and especially the Basilica of St Peter's. As soon as I caught sight of the inside of the Basilica my pulse started pounding like crazy with excitement. I was just as impressed by St Peter's as I was the first time I saw it -- if not more so.


I spent a good deal of the day recalling as much as I possibly could from our amazing tours with Dr Connell and Liz, during my semester in Rome. A couple of my favorite facts are that there is actually not a single painting in the St Peter's Basilica, they're all mosaics. (In large part, because mosaics are easier upkeep and the Basilica is built to last until the end of the world.) Most of the mosaics are so incredibly detailed that it's really hard to tell they're not just painted on canvas. Once you are in the Cupola on the way up to the top of the Dome you are right-up-close-next-to some of the mosaics, which one would swear from farther away are carved and 3D.

After a full day exploring the Vatican and a short fight with numerous ticket machines at Termini, we took the bus and tram to La Fate's for dinner. Our food was yummy, but the best part for me was definitively catching the Erasmus students coming to dinner so I got to see Dr Connell and Miss. Bonifield again. That was really really wonderful, being back in Rome does make me miss my Thomas Morons a lot. Back at the flat we enjoyed more yummy food along with wine, laughter, and to top off the amazing day: tiramisu.