The Christmas Season

Tonight we spent the evening with our support family and the Jesuits sharing tea and sweets (not very vegan friendly, so I had self-restraint) and great conversation. The one amazing thing about the Christmas season in the JV house is that since it cannot revolve around physical gifts of any sort, it revolves around the gift of spending time with one another.

Our JVC Yakima gift to one another is a Murder Mystery party that Sam is throwing this Friday night. We will all be given our prospective characters on Friday after work. It is a shoot-em-up Texas classic, so Sophie will be cooking dinner and we will be preparing our characters. I can't wait!

After we go to Seattle on Friday and say our Christmas greetings with our friends at the other houses, while our challenge this week was to cook with only what was in our fridge, we are returning home on Sunday for a week of beans and rice. We are limiting ourselves to only beans and rice for three meals a day... that is until I fly out Friday for NYC! I can't wait for the challenge, I'm sure my digestive system will not be too stoked about it, but I am excited to take it on. And, plus, it is not all that different from what I am eating on a poor-man's vegan diet anyhow!

Merry pre-Christmas!

Merry pre-Christmas! The holiday season has arrived full-speed ahead in Yakima! We spent this weekend in town and went out to a rural town on Saturday night for the world-famous LIGHTED FARM IMPLEMENT PARADE. Yes, that includes pitchforks, tractors, wine-pickers, plows, hay thrashers, etc! It was simply stunning.

-Work is still great, I love the clinic! I am in the middle of applications to schools next year for post-baccalaureate pre-medical programs so I can finish my requirements before applying to medical school (surprise! I want to be a doctor!)

-The community is still going well, a bit cold though. Our house is kind-of an ice box and our food stores are a bit unvaried, but overall life is good.

-I am now a vegan. I did Vegan 'Vember and have now moved onto Vegan December...or at least until I get home and my mom makes her chocolate cake...or until I see a delicious burger...yumm... Being vegan is tough on a tight budget, very very tough, but it has really given me a great perspective into how much we rely on meat, eggs, and dairy products, all of which contribute greatly to our greenhouse gas emissions and are extremely detrimental to the environment, never mind the inhumane treatment of these animals and the chemicals they are pumped with that runoff into our water supplies, etc.

-I am coming home on the 18th! Or at least I am coming to NYC, then coming home on the 20th. I can't wait! I miss New Hampshire and Boston and maple syrup.

-That was a cliffs notes version of my current life. Again, still no computer, I am holding out for Christmas!!!

FINALLY ON A WORKING COMPUTER!

HI!

It's been a while since I have had both internet and a working computer, so my updates are very few and far between. Fall in Yakima has been a lot of fun, full of wine tasting, corn mazes, foliage, RAIN (a little), arguments about heating, sealing windows, and settling into our jobs. My work hours are still pretty long, but we have all gotten into our work routines and begun sticking to sane sleep schedules, kind of like 75 year old women.

My spanish is improving slowly- I have to use it all the time and my patients are generally not shy about correcting me at every opportunit!ty

Next weekend we all head to Portland for a weekend of Halloween debauchery at the JV house over there- I can't speak for everyone in my house, but I am seriously looking forward to seeing other people my age who speak my language. There aren't too many people in Yakima who are our age and/or have a college education, so it will be nice to see some friendly faces in Portland. I am also really looking forward to going to the city and checking it out- it is supposed to be AWESOMEEE. I think Allison, Patrick, and I are leaving Thursday night and while Allison visits a homeless shelter for the day on Friday, Patrick and I are going to go to a few breweries in the city and check out the scene. SO EXCITED!

Chris' parents are coming into town this weekend (aka we get a dinner at a restaurant and wine tasting tomorrow!!!). It is always fun to finally meet the parents of our housemates, because I feel that at this point we are getting to know each other very well, and meeting parents just gives us a broader perspective of where they come from and who they are at home.

On Wednesday night for our community night this week we all sat around in darkness and read scary stories to each other, which was a blast - and then last night, we WATCHED 1.5 HOURS OF TELEVISION. It was insane. I went to bed feeling guilty for watching for that long- haha that's JVC for you.

Last update, Grace is currently at home with swine flu, and Allison is getting sicker by the hour- so keep your fingers crossed that living in an intentional community does not mean getting the flu together...

until next time!

Last week my housemates and I embarked on a five-week spiritual retreat in Ignatian spirituality called Spiritual Exercises in Everyday Living. The retreat runs every Saturday morning for 5 weeks and requires 20 minutes of intentional prayer every other day during the week. The retreat works to integrate the spiritual/religious aspects of our lives with the everyday mundane happenings of everyday life. It focuses on seeing God in everything, and having spiritual experiences outside of church. The program is really amazing already, and encourages candid conversation about our spirituality, where we have come from, and where we hope to go with it.

Through this past week, everyone in my house has spent a decent amount of time in private reflection and prayer, and I think we are all looking forward to tomorrow when we can start our second session.

Work this past week was busy and a bit overwhelming. This was the first time so far that I have had no choice but to work up spanish-only patients. At first I spoke very quietly and mumbled the little bit of spanish that I speak, but by the end of the week, I was more confident in my questions and ability to understand, and communicate on some level with my patients.

Last night I went out to an 80s night with a couple of my co-workers and my housemates. Besides my experience the other day of seeing my patient sleeping on the sidewalk when I was walking home from a late-night coffee run, this was the first time so far that I have looked across a room and seen many of my patients out in public. The 80s night was an eclectic mix of Yakima's best.

This afternoon one of the custodians from work is taking me to Costco because he wants to buy us some meat to eat- for no other reason than out of the goodness of his heart. I can't wait for our little road trip!!!

Lastly, the past two weeks I have spent a lot of time contemplating the idea of voluntary simplicity, and how refreshing of an idea it really is. It is truly amazing how little you need to be happy. Besides a few crucial outfits (for me: gym shorts and a t-shirt and my work scrubs), food, and a book, there is just not that much more that I need to live on. I can easily go a week without checking my email, days without my phone, over a month without turning on a television, over a month without meat or luxurious food, and over a month without taking a car to a destination within 2 miles from my house. These don't even feel like sacrifices as much as they feel like liberations. It is an amazing feeling to sit around on a porch and listen to music together and play cards together and debate exestential questions without having to be connected to the world outside. Granted, i do use my computer and phone to keep in contact- but the idea that I don't need either is an amazingly refreshing feeling.

hmmm cute guy at the coffee shop two weeks in a row. note to self: 10am on Friday mornings- start showering and putting on non-oversized clothing when getting coffee.

I'M A LOCAL!!!

Today I came to the local coffee shop I really like and I had forgotten my wallet, and the barista (is that masculine? I want it to be) gave me a free 'usual' aka small black coffee!!! it made my night. that, and the package my parents sent and the ab workout Jaime just put me through!!!

last weekend rivalled the one before - sorry I can't write much recently- my computer, Boo, is broken, so I'm writing on my itouch- but the blog is blocked on the work network so I can't even publish anything via work wireless. Moving on- Chris Cassidy, aka God, aka the international man of mystery, brought us white water rafting. UNREAL UNREAL. and that's just about the ride, not even including the men. soooo cute! soooo much fun. pics to come. Chris also cooked us a feast that night and bought us coffee that morning. he is Also the man who gives us free season lift passes all winter at white pass (the amazing ski mountain about 45 minutes away)...and he told me he knows a Dr. who specializes in ski-day related doctor's sick notes...

Either way, can't write too much until I get a computer again, but having a blast- hopefully going camping on the river this weekend (possibly toga party with the rafting instructors...?) for my birthday- but only with Grace, Jaime, and Sophie this time. Should be a blast to be in a smaller group. I can't wait!!!

www.myfootprint.org

check it out- more on this to come...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY PATRICK!!!

The Catholics Are Here. The Lutherans Will Be Here At 9. The Mennonites Should Be Here Soon.

This past weekend we embarked on our first house visit to another city. This weekend the city of choice was Seattle. After relaxing all day on Friday, the five o’clock bell rang and the crew returned home from work. The house turned into complete chaos as the eight of us showered, packed, figured out food for the next three days, made mix CDs, and filled the car with our stuff. Trips in this van, not fit for 8 grown adults, have always proven adventurous. The people stuffed in the back seat are too cold, the person in front likes Dashboard Confessional, the people in the middle are hot and hate the music, and on and on and on. The growing tension in the car can only be relieved by two things: Werewolves of London and Tiny Dancer - our two go-to house songs. We arrived in Seattle around 7:30, throwing our hosts COMPLETELY off-guard. Nonetheless, the good sports that they are, they started the party right away. There are 8 of them as well in the Cherry Abbey House, so it was really fascinating to compare notes, gossip about house drama, and see all these vaguely familiar faces from orientation. After a long night of cheap beer, Carlo Rossi, Simon & Garfunkel, The Dead, and the Allman Brothers - we passed out. Very, very happily. After waking slowly the next morning we strolled around Seattle, detoxed, saw some of the sights, napped, ate falafel, bought Travels with Charlie for $3 (yep- I haggled it down from 3.50 by pulling out the v-card ...volunteer) and waited for the bigger party on Saturday night.

Saturday night rolled in and so did a four other JV houses from Seattle, Portland, and Gresham, as well as some Lutheran Volunteers (LVs), and a few Mennonite Volunteers. There was a delicious keg donated by some FJVs (former JVs) and a lot more catching up to be done. The night flew by. Needless to say, we didn’t end up leaving at 8:30am as we intended. We rolled out of Seattle around 11am in the pouring rain (MY FAVORITE WEATHER!!!!!) and headed towards Whedby Island, where our landlady, Patty, and her husband, Pat, were waiting for us. They immediately took us out for DELICIOUS pizza and wine tasting. We came home after the wine tasting and 6 of us crawled onto the queen-sized bed and passed out in a nice little Yakima-spoon. When we stirred once again it was time for charades, bottomless wine, an enormous feast, and more conversation until 2am. Sadly we went back up to the garage apartment only to find that my hiking pack was sitting on a scorching heater, had melted completely, and that some of my clothes inside the pack were burned through as well. RIP my favorite bag in the world.

Sunday morning we awoke to another gourmet feast, went on a gorgeous hike over the Puget Sound, followed by another delicious meal of fresh fish and guinness(!!!!!). By the time we began our 5 hour drive home the 8 of us were pretty much DEADDDD. Finally home, we all passed out around 10pm, stuffed with food, flooded with beer and wine, and with huge smiles on our faces.

It was an amazing weekend. Thanks to the Seattle JVs, Thanks to Pat and Patty, and Thanks to God we made it home in one piece!

ps- pictures to come!

The Good Life. Like college, but no homework.

I have uploaded photos from our hike near Mt. Ranier- as well as others from the past month- but here is a quick preview:

Allison, Patrick, Grace, Chris, Jaime, Sam, and Mt. Rainier
Mt. Rainier being gorgeous
Christmas card? ...probably
we do other things than just volunteer and hike mountains...we just don't take as many pictures of it... (note Rufus in Sam's cup- he's a bit wasted at this point in the night- giraffes have low tolerances I guess)