Hump Day

So as "hump day" comes and goes, I finally get a decent break from work and life and get to sit around and think about everything that has been going on in my life. Of course camp is the main event, as always. Today we went to The Miracle League Baseball Field in Cranberry. It is such an amazing place. It is a place for these kids to feel like they can do normal things and live a normal life. The Pirate Parrot showed up too. It was such a great day except for the blazing sun that gave me some nice farmers tan lines. Yet life seems to be going on. I am so amazed at how some of the other people act around here. We work at a camp for children with disabilities. Of course schedules will change and you may have to go a few extra hours unshowered then you planned. But once again, life goes on. I know that sometimes I may not be the best counselor, and that I may be too lenient and other times to strict. But I respect the campers and the other counselors. Today was the first time since this camp started that I have an a long enough break where I can actually relax and not just shower or change my clothing. I know its not ideal, but its something that I love to do! I love making an impact on these kids lives and I love helping them out in ways that no one else seems to be able to relate to them. Not to mention I am still 19 years old, a college student, my friends are all over the country growing up and taking classes, and the love of my life is over 600 miles away at any given moment. So for now, yes, during the summertime I am very content just being at camp and being overwhelmed with everything going on here at camp. Everyday is a new challenge and to me, nothing is better then a great challenge! I love trying to calm down a crazy kid with downs syndrome who will not listen to any one else, because when I do finally find a cure to what is going on. I know next time it will never be the exact same thing. Although we are being challenge with the difficulties of some of the campers, they are faced with so much more. Adversity, Physical Barriers, and everyday little things that we take for granted. They live such a harder life then we ever could imagine. This week I have a boys unit. They are so adorable, with disabilities ranging from Spina Bifida to Cerebral Palsy to Downs Syndrome. I am so blessed to have met every single one of them. They have had an amazing impact on my life and I know other around them.


Until I have another free minute,

Love Cee

The best things in life.

As I lay here at work, which is also where I live most of the summer. (BTW, work is called The Woodland's Foundation - it is a place for children and adults of all ages with chronic illnesses and disabilities to come to camp. I am a Unit Coordinator, or in other words, a counselor.) I began to stumble, because no one is really around and since I do not get the internet from my room I had to come over to the lounge. So I stumble. I come across a photo of "The best things in life." As I read over it again and again, I notice that all of these wonderful things on this list really are the best things in life. Like this morning, I stayed at a friend's house down in the city and I had to be at my other job at 9, which is early for a Saturday, especially when you have worked all week. I woke up at 5:45 and felt refreshed, then noticed I had a good 2 hours of a good solid sleep left. I took full advantage of it of course! Last night I made some new friends and got to spend time with older ones. It turned out to be a great night. I sing every time I get in the shower, even if it is in my head. The sunset. I love watching the sunset over the city and yesterday as I drove into the burgh', I got to see the wonderful sunset over the city. Bryan called me today on my way to dinner with my parents, "Hey you, I really miss you," he said "I think I will come home this weekend!" I got a small tear in my eye just because of the fact that this is the first summer Bryan isn't in MOS or DEPLOYED and of course I work if not everyday, everyday. So today really was one of those really, really good days. Oh yeah, I was early to work this morning and I stopped and got an Iced Light Mocha at Starbucks. Such an amazing way to start the morning! Especially when it had been a long week and it was going to be an even longer day.

Can I just say how much I love people and how much working a shift @ Dick's Sporting Goods turns me off to them. People are so unappreciative of so much. They should be lucky they have such loving family members and friends. Then I think about all the kids who come to The Woodlands, and just how happy that they are alive everyday. It is such a change of pace and seeing it from both sides really allows me to see just how selfish some people are. It is sickening. People should feel blessed with the challenges and blessings that they receive.

So as I continue to ramble on about thoughts that have been playing in my mind all weekend, I would just like to say how excited I am that I get to spend a weekend at home with the love of my life. I am so blessed to have such an amazing person in my life. I am so excited about what our future has to bring and the more and more I think about it the bigger my goosebumps grow.

Until I have another free minute,

Love Cee

MY LIFE. I keep everything inside. I tell no one my deepest darkest secrets. I get knocked down and feel like I'm back at square one. I don't get most things. I honestly really really try to, but still I do not. I struggle with things when I put on a face as if everything is just fine. There are times I feel like a really bad person. I usually make decisions I know are not right and regret them later. I have issues letting go of the past and accepting change. I don't cherish things like I should at times. I have so many flaws. I don't know how to deal with it, so I hide it or I do things to distract myself. I hate and rarely cry in front of others. I hate complaining, although I love hearing others complain because I know that there are other out there just like me in so many different ways, and yet I still put on a face as if I am fine. I feel like I have a good head on my shoulders Usually, things don't go my way. I just wish I had a way to be freed of the weight on my chest. Let go. I'm so uptight. I always have so many thoughts in my head. It feels like my brain is going to pop. I have such great friends and that if I actually talked about myself to them nothing would be different. I just have always been one to keep things to myself. I have always told Bryan everything and ever since he joined the Marines it has been so hard to keep in touch about everything in our lives. He wants to know so much about me and I want to know so much about him and with so few visits each year. UHHH, just sitting here thinking about it makes me ill. Our relationship has been so crazy and yet I would not want it any other way. We just get to tell each other the bare minimum. We know so much about each other and the lives we live and yet the months were he is in the field or deployed we seem to know little about each others lives and when we do have time to catch up on it, we just want to spend it in the present. The life of a marine girlfriend or spouse is such a ridiculous, yet rewarding lifestyle.

Today when I was at a family friend's graduation party I was talking to a few people and as they would ask how school was going, the more and more I realized how I just want to be graduated and living life. I want to be working and out in the real world. I am not meant to be in school. As much as I continually love educating myself, I feel I am just meant to be out there and doing something with my life. I want to be rewarded everyday at work with the gifts I feel I have been given. I want to come home and not have to worry about studying for a test the next day. I could just ramble on and on about this stuff and just empty out what is going on and constantly moving around in my brain. Again, this is how I am all the time, I usually have the worst time sleeping unless Bryan is laying next to me. My brain never sleeps. I am always thinking about what my future has to hold and where I will end up. I am in no rush to grow up, yet I just want to know what God has planned for me.

"Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men." Col. 3:23

On the bright side of everything, Haiti is in about two months! I am so excited. I could not have been blessed with a greater opportunity to help others and fulfill amazing joys. Plus I really wanna take home a little baby Haitian, not that I would actually do that, but to just see the smiles on their faces when we give them all the awesome stuff that we got donated. I have so much fun things for them to play with and to help themselves out. All I want to do is help others, like at the Woodlands. I am so happy that summer is starting because I get to spend everyday helping the kids and adults with disabilities. It is so easy to put a smile on my face everyday when I get to do this kind of stuff everyday. Everyone should get a chance to experience it. And on the 4th, Bryan gets to come home and he said he will come up to visit and hopefully volunteer. It makes me so happy that he wants to be apart of my life in this way because it is one thing he has never really been apart of. He is so great with kids and although its always nerve wrecking to be around a child or adult with a disability, he would be such a great role model for them. I really can not wait! Adult camp starts tomorrow and although not all of the counselors are going to be working, I am still excited to meet the campers since most of them are going to be new.

"You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You are able to say to yourself, 'I have lived through this horror. I can take the next thing that comes along.' You must do the thing you think you cannot do."
-Eleanor Roosevelt

Goodnight all (:

Got Big News...

Of course today was the day I got the text of when Bryan will get deployed. He was telling me for a few weeks that it would be in December. Even though I was pretty bummed that when he got home he would still have 6 months left, I was so excited because for once he would be able to come home for my birthday, to top it off my 21st birthday. I found out that he is getting deployed next May. I got so excited that he would be home for my birthday and now he won't. In 3 years he won't have been with me on my birthday and then adding a 4th year next year on such a huge birthday. It really sucks, but once again I have no control over the lifestyle we live. On the bright side, as soon as he gets home from deployment, he will have only about a week until he gets out of the Marines for good. Which if I can add is the most exciting news I have ever actually heard. We only have 17 months left to go and I will have fulfilled my dreams by surviving through this whole time. It is so much harder to be in a distant relationship when you love someone as much as I do. If you really do want a relationship to work out and you love someone so deeply, you will be able to survive and live a happy life knowing that you struggled through some rough times and it has made you the strong, successful person that you are.

Moving In...

For the first time, I feel as if I am on my own. Yes I have lived an hour away from home from the time I graduated high school two years ago, but I am finally moved into my own house that I share with three other fabulous girls! I can finally add another key to my car keys and make it actually feel like home, where I actually have more then just a bed and dresser and own more then just my closet full of clothes.

Bryan left again. I love the time we get to spend together, but then when the day comes where he has to drive a lonely 600 miles south it breaks my heart that I am not with him. It breaks my heart that we are not moving into a house together somewhere, cleaning and remodeling our house. Give me a few years though, its so exciting to think about!

Bry taught me how to shoot a gun finally the other day. It was so wonderful to feel and be apart of his life in the way no one else is. I loved the rush and the kick of the gun and the smell of the dust. Such a great feeling, so I highly recommend to anyone who has not shot a gun, please do, but only in a responsible way of course.

The Woodlands begins again tomorrow! My summer will basically end and the smiles of happy children and adults with disabilities who are more then blessed to be there. It is such an amazing feeling, to know that you are doing something right and that you are putting a smile on a little kids face (: