1. Music!
When I was in middle school, I wanted to be a professional french horn player. When I was in high school, I wanted to be a music teacher. When I went to college... my french horn was given back to the high school (which I had forgotten that it belonged to); my guitar was at school with me, but hardly ever used because of the combination of running and being a student that takes forever to get her hw done; and my trumpet was shoved under my bed because I was too scared to take it over to Cox to play it. The keyboard had to stay home, unfortunately. Whenever I came home for Christmas break, I'd play in the annual "Coffee House" with my middle school band director/HS Jazz Band director/Trumpet teacher, but that was the only time I ever seriously practiced my trumpet throughout the past few years. Now that I'm home, I have plenty of time to play my trumpet, and I'm even playing in the Alumni Jazz Band in the Jazz Night thingy at my HS a week from Saturday. I was supposed to play last year, but... I had a track meet. Of course. Having a fever makes it hard to motivate myself to play a lot of the times, but I still really enjoy it. I also asked for a self-teaching piano book for Christmas, because even though I could play... I never actually learned to play, so I didn't know anything about finger positions or chords... I just... played. Kind of. I've been determined to plow through that book since Christmas so that I can get the next book in the series. Sometimes I feel way too sick and tired to play, but I can usually conjure up enough energy to get through a few more pages in my piano book and play some Jazz on my trumpet each day. Music therapy is sweet.
2. Swimming!
In case you haven't witnessed me trying to swim before, I've always been a terrible swimmer. I could doggy paddle and splash around... but that's about it. One day, I randomly decided to sign up for swimming lessons at the Y. I was TERRIFIED the first day, but I ended up loving it. Yesterday was my third lesson, and now I can do the front crawl for three lengths of the pool! I'm thinking about going for 4 tomorrow... we'll see. We even got to use flippers yesterday (which make you go really fast if you use them the right way!)! Swimming does make me tired, but I'm tired no matter what anyways, and we really don't think it's going to make anything worse.
3. Nala!
Nala is a rabbit that Aunt Jen and Uncle Andy (and Aunt Jen's mom) gave me. We've had
her for just over a week now, and we love her. We don't have any other pets right now, so she gets all the attention. We let her out every night so that she can run around and play, and it's really amusing. She's gotten comfortable enough to lay down and let us pet her, which is a big deal for Nala. She's currently sleeping in her litter box, which
is apparently her favorite place to hang out.
4. Learning!
Having a fever for 99 days makes it VERY difficult to focus on anything, but, I do really like to learn, and not being at school gives me a chance to learn things that I want to learn, when I want to learn them. I'm tutoring a friend in Chemistry, which I thought was extremely boring in high school, and now I love it. I've had to re-teach myself a lot of the stuff, but I'm really enjoying it. My dad also gave me a book called "Mind Hacks" for Christmas, and it's about a lot of crazy things that the brain does and it's really cool so far. I haven't gotten very far in it though, because I've been reading "The Pilgrim's Progress," which is taking me FOREVER because my brain feels like it's melting. I also have a whole collection of C.S. Lewis books waiting to be read... ohhh boy. Most importantly, I've been able to learn a lot about myself... but I'll get into that in another post.
5. Relationships.
I left the most important one for last, so hopefully you made it all the way down here. When I first came home for medical leave, I was terrified that I was going to lose all of my friends. To me; leaving Roberts meant leaving them. I mean, technically I did leave them, but I didn't lose them. Well, not all of them at least. Yes, there are a ton of people that I haven't heard from sense I've left, but there are a few that have been staying in touch with me a lot, which means a TON to me. Then, there are my coaches, who I guess aren't technically my coaches right now. I thought I was going to lose them too. That was a silly thought. Instead, I've gotten to know Uncle Andy's family, Aunt Jen's mom gave me the rabbit that she was completely attached to, and I even made a surprise visit to Coach Kurtz' a while ago to give Tickle Me Elmo back. Those are three very cool people, and they've helped me through a ton of stuff. It's very cool to not be coached by them (and not even know the future of my running career) and still know that they care about me.
Being home has also made me focus on some relationships here that are hard to focus on when I'm at school. I lived at school for the summer, so I really didn't see any of my extended family for a very long time. Now, I get to see my Grandma more often (I went out to lunch with her and my aunt the other day!), and my Aunt and I even went to Yoga class together at the Y a couple of days ago. One of my best friends also happened to be home last semester, so we've been able to hang out a ton (and vent, a lot.), and I've been able to see a lot of old friends from high school too.
I think the relationship that has been changed the most is with my parents. Being sick is hard, but I'm pretty sure that having a very sick daughter isn't any easier. They've been awesome, and being home gives me a lot of time to talk to them. This might sound pathetic, but my favorite time of day is when my dad gets home from work. That's when we get to eat dinner together, talk about life, watch Psych and play with Nala. We've also become pretty close to some of my high school teachers and coaches, so it's nice to be around them again. I'm really not a fan of the fact that I'm still sick... but I do like what's happening in the most important relationships in my life, especially with God. I've never been so desperate for Him before, and even though I don't understand why He hasn't answered my ridiculous amount of prayers to be healthy yet, He's doing something, and this has given me PLENTY of opportunities to learn what it really means to trust Him and depend on Him.
I keep a journal, and lately when something really good happens (usually having to do with relationships), I'll add "that's more important than running a 16:50 5k." When I was a freshman, Uncle Andy told me I had the potential to be running that by the time I was a junior or senior. It was my goal. Of course, I still think it'd be very cool to be able to do that (and I'm also a big fan of the preparation it would take. I'm weird like that.)... but, I'm also very open to the fact that God might have a different plan for me. Or, maybe I just need to learn some lessons before I do anything like that. We'll see.
P.S. This just took me 2 hours to write... just to give you an idea of what it's like to try and write something that's legible when you've had a fever for 99 days. I have to admit, I'm going to be a little mad if I end up not having a fever tomorrow after all of this. 100 sounds much more epic, and what's another day after 99 of them?
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