conflicted

For the first time in my life, I have no idea what I want. See, growing up, I always had my mind set on one thing or another, but it was always one thing at a time. For example, when I was little, I wanted to be a vet, when I got older(and really into horses) I wanted to be a jockey, a little bit older, and I wanted to do therapy with Horses, and finally in high school, something with ASL. Last year was horrible, and although it seemed like CSUN was the best place to achieve the ASL goal, I hated the school, and it's philosophy towards hearing people/interpreters/etc. So I switched to Biola. I thought I was okay with not really being able to do ASL, because if God was calling me to Biola, then it must not be in His plan right now for me to pursue Sign Language. However, I finished up ASL 3, because they offered it, and I had already taken 1 and 2, and 3 finished up my requirement. I also wanted to take it. My original goal was to take through level 5 and be done. Then I met the ASL 3 teacher. She is amazing, and really helped me to see that I didn't HAVE to drop ASL because there's a community college nearby that offers a REALLY GOOD interpreting program. So I worked out all the details, and enrolled in two classes. The problem started when the 8 am class just became too much for me to handle. I kept skipping because my schedule requires me to be up late most nights and operating on little to no sleep just doesn't work for me. So I struggled, and was doing ok, but not very well, and finally just got so discouraged, that I dropped the classes last monday. Here's where the problem arises. I'm happy that I can sleep in, and that my schedule is remarkably freer, but I feel like I'm letting go of something that is really important in my life. At first I was okay with it, but I have a friend who is taking an interpreting class at another community college right now, and I'm kind of jealous that she can do that so easily. Bottom line is, I really want Torrey, and I really want ASL, but apparently I can't do both at the same time. For now I've chosen Torrey, but I'm not sure how I'll feel if I wait until I graduate Biola to pick ASL back up again. I'm worried that I'll be so worn out by school that I won't have the energy to continue, that I'll just want to be done. I worry that I'll never have the ability to really make myself go to a class that starts at 8, so that I have to get up before 7 in order to be there on time. Thew problem was not that the class was too hard, it was that I did not have the will power to get up in the morning, knowing that it would make my normal tiredness just that much worse. Granted, usually when I get up and get going it wears off a little bit, but not enough for me to be okay with it when I could sleep till 12 otherwise. I really want ASL, but I want Torrey too, and I don't know how to reconcile the two. They seem to be conflicting interests simply because I am inadequate to do them both, and that really makes it hard for me to know what is right. Was God, in calling me to Biola(and it seemed like a pretty clear call to me) telling me that ASL was not what He wanted in my life? But if so, then why did I meet Koreen, and why did it seem possible, only to become not possible because sleep rules my life? Was it His way of telling me to grow up and deal with being tired all the time? That it doesn't have to rule my life, and it's ok to be tired because I'm doing what He wants? It just doesn't seem like there is a real answer. Either me allowing myself to sleep is a sign of immaturity that God was trying to get me to work on by giving me an 8 am class, or He doesn't want me to do ASL, one of the biggest passions I have, or I was confused about His desire for me to be at Biola, or Biola is only supposed to be temporary, to get me from place to another, and I'm supposed to go back to ASL(either at CSUN, or at Mt. SAC, either way)because God just needed to get me back on track instead of continuing to run away. Problem with that Biola only being temporary is that I don't feel the desire to leave. I still wanna be here, I am slowly making connections with people, and getting a great education. Which also cancels out my being mistaken about ever coming here to begin with. Which leaves either I'm supposed to drop ASL for now, it's God telling me, not yet, or I'm supposed to grow up and push through being tired. Seems like the latter is the right answer, but at least right now I don't see how that is really possible. It's all so confusing.

UCLA festival of books

Told you it was coming soon :). On Sunday, April 26th, I drove up to Northridge, picked up Lizzie, and off we went to the festival. We went last year too, so it's kinda becoming a tradition for us. :) We met Sam, one of her friend's from high school, that she introduced me to last year :), and began exploring. For the first few minutes we browsed the children's books and just walked around until Sam got there. Then we went in search of comic books. The most amazing thing happened on our way to the comic books. We passed by the LA Times stage, and who should be speaking but Marlee Matlin! I didn't recognize her at first, just saw that there was someone on the stage signing, so I stopped to watch for a few minutes, then they said her name. I was soooo excited. Apparently she wrote a book, and autobiography, and was talking about it. We were headed to hear Ariana Huffington(sp?) speak, and when that didn't work out we were able to go to Marlee's book signing. :) It pretty much made my day.

Getting ready in the morning


Car ride over(I promise, the car was stopped at a light when she took the picture:) )


Right after we got there, a nice lady asked us if we wanted her take our picture, so she did, then we took her's and her friend's. :)


Marlee Matlin, at the LA Times stage, her book, and getting to meet her. :)


"Longest" story in the world, a conglomerate of different people's ideas, all written down on slips of paper, makes the story 130 some odd feet long. :) Sam paid a dollar and I got to add a sentence.


Sad faces when we couldn't find funnel cake at the end of the day.

coming soon...

when I get the time and energy to upload pictures, I will blog about my day at UCLA'S festival of books. Lots of fun, but it's late, and I have a lot to do over the next few days. At least it is something to look forward to though. :)

free! free! free!

Alright, it took me a while to do this(sorry Emily, but at least I'm doing it right? :P) but, here we go.

I like giving things to people, so here's the deal. Emily participated in a giveaway and I thought I would too. The first 5 people to respond get a really cool gift from me. Sounds fun right? The only catch is that if you respond you have to give something away to someone else. Doesn't matter how many people or what it is, as long as it's something. you also get to choose how to advertise. I also make no guarantees as to what I will give you, because I don't know who will respond yet. So start responding. :)

fun times :P

I got called in to work tonight, so I told them yes, cuz who would turn down the chance to make money right? I had nothing going on tonight anyway. :) I got a parade shift, which basically means that I got to stand somewhere and tell people which direction to walk, while being yelled at by those same people because they want to walk the other way. Not too bad, my voice is almost gone from all of the yelling, and one of the other cast members was flirting with me the entire time. It was actually really funny because I wound up trying to explain my Torrey paper to him, and thus Torrey, and how we read all this classical literature and then discuss it. When I mentioned Aristotle, he said "Oh Aristotle, he was the guy who invented the telescope right?" and I said, "nooooo, Aristotle was a philosopher" his response? "But he was in Astronomy too right? He was the guy that discovered that everything revolves around the sun." I'm having a really hard time not laughing at this point, trying to explain who Aristotle was, and that it was actually Galileo who discovered that everything revolves around the sun. It was kinda cute though, cuz I think he was trying to impress me. Gave me entertainment for the night anyway, until he asked if I had a boyfriend. I was actually smart this time and just said "it's complicated" but still, why is it that all of the guys I might be interested in at Biola I don't have a relationship with, and every guy I'm not interested in is so curious to know if I have a boyfriend or not? *sigh* life can be so frustrating.

ahhhh Northridge :)

I got to go up to Northridge again on Friday and hang out with Kate and Johnny. It was a lot of fun, it was like everything we did last year all over again. Good times. We went to In-N-Out, and then to the Porter Ranch Starbucks deaf coffee night. I got a lot of practice reading what other people were saying cuz we met a lot of people that Kate and Johnny know, but since I didn't know them, I just watched. It was good practice. Then we went to a deaf club in LA (free entry, what's better than that?). I got to meet their friend Hudson, who is also deaf(that's how we found out about the club), and when we got there hung out with Kate while Johnny and Hudson socialized. We got to dance a little bit, but mostly watched everyone else dance(for those of you who are wondering, they turn up the bass really loud so that you can feel the beat). It was pretty amazing, they had one of those dance off kind of things, where everyone gets in a circle while two people are in the middle and doing different dance moves, and trying to better moves than the other. The funny part was that at the end these two guys started acting out parts, so that one was acting like a girl while the other was the guy and they were sort of telling a story with the dancing, like he was chasing her, trying to get her attention, and she's not interested. It was a lot of fun. When we got back we watched Watchmen online, and I got to spend the night. Awwww hooray for old times and slumber parties :). Sorry I don't have pictures, I am chronically bad about remembering to take my camera anywhere.

general updates

Thanks to Dr. Henderson, I am interpreting the High school Sunday school class for a girl named Louise. It's pretty exciting. The biggest problem is that she only knows SEE Signing(signed exact english) and I'm learning ASL. Two totally different signing systems. SEE signs use a lot of initialized signs, and some of the signs that aren't initialized are the same as ASL signs, but have different meanings. The sing for "sin" in SEE signing is nearly the same as the sign for "argue" in ASL. I'm a little bit worried. The biggest think I'm worried about is, obviously, that I'll confuse the two, and start using SEE signs in a conversation in ASL(Louise's parents said she knows enough ASL that using ASL signs with her is not a problem). The other problem is that SSE signing is looked down on in the deaf community because it's not a "real" language like ASL is because it's taking English and conveying it with your hands, whereas ASL has it's own sentence structure, and grammar, etc.

Aside from that,I have now had three days of training at Disneyland. I get to operate Star Tours, which is kinda perfect, cuz I love Star Wars. :) The first day was called Traditions. It was basically a big overview of general instructions. Day two was "guest interactions" day, where I walked around the park with my trainer and got used to talking to the guests, pin trading, and answering general questions. I also got to spend a couple of hours reading the general Operations Guide for park emergencies, and parades, and the codes I need to know, etc. When we were done with the training part we still about an hour and a half left before we could clock out, so we went on some of the rides(well, actually only space mountain and Sleeping Beauty Castle walk through) and got to see how the Star Tours shuttle moves(we got to go into the pit and look at it from the bottom. It's pretty intense) Today was actual ride operations training. The worst part was that I had to get UP at 3:45 am in order to be there by 5. (it only takes about 20 min. to drive there, but they have us park a ways off then just shuttle us in, so you have to leave time for taking the shuttle) I learned how to open and close the doors, what to say, how to make sure the shuttle is ready for takeoff, how to group the guests for entry(called grouping, go figure) how to work the turnstile, how to greet people when they come in the front door, and how to work in the tower(mostly just watching the monitors to make sure all the guests are ok, this also includes knowing which ride stop to use should I need to stop the ride) all this took about 8 hours. I then came home and crashed. The rest of my day has been homework, not too exciting, but a nice break from the hectickness(is that even a word?) of this morning. :)