On Monday morning my side of the cabin woke up at 6 AM. We were supposed to be completely ready to meet our carpenters (our experienced leaders for the week) by 7. I was disappointed in my fellow females when I saw how many of them brought unnecessary amounts of makeup and hair products and appliances. Seriously? We were going to be doing construction. Not trying to win a beauty pageant. Nobody really cares much at all about how you look. I think it's an addiction.
We split ourselves into two groups: landscaping and roofing. Landscaping sounded more interesting, but very few people were gladly volunteering for roofing so I joined the roofing team. Our carpenters didn't arrive until 7:30. We had been warned that people in Appalachia don't operate on strict schedules. The truth of that statement quickly became apparent. It was nice to work around such laid-back people. Our carpenters were named Boone, Ivan, and Bill. Boone was the head guy, and he loved to play tricks on us. I think Ivan may have had a slight mental disability, but he was very sweet. Bill (who we later nick-named Bad-Ass Bill) was only eighteen, but he was described by the owner of our host organization as a "carpentry genius" and he deserved that title. The first thing we noticed about our job site was that there were chickens everywhere, and that they liked to call all day long. I didn't mind, thanks to my extended exposure to non-stop rooster crowing in Colombia, but some of my classmates quickly became irritated by the birds.
Our first task was to get the 60 lb. packages of shingles from the front of the house to the top of the roof via a ladder behind the house. The girls carried the shingles to the ladder - or rather Charity and I carried them to the ladder (and managed to cut ourselves on them) with occasional help from the other girls who couldn't carry the packages alone. Once we got the shingles to the ladder, the guys got them on top of the roof. A few of them took turns hoisting the shingles over their shoulders and carrying them up the ladder. At the top, another guy would drag the bag off of their shoulders (the ladder guys had scarlet, shingle-burned necks by the end) and carry it to the peak.
At one point, Boone decided it would be fun to put a rubber snake under the shingles to see if any of us girls would squeal in terror. At the time, only Charity and I were carrying shingles, and it didn't bother either of us at all. Finally some of the other girls decided to help. Sure enough, when the shingles were lifted, squeals erupted. It took one girl several seconds to realize that it wasn't real, even after it was clear that it wasn't moving anywhere. With permission from Boone, I stowed the snake in my pocket for later pranks.
When Charity cut her knee open on some shingles, we discovered that one of the vans didn't have a first aid kit and that the other did... but Mrs. Rivet had locked the keys inside. I don't know how we finally got them out, but eventually we did, and Charity got her band-aid. It was a shallow cut, but it just wouldn't stop bleeding for a while.
By this point, the prep work was over and we were ready to get up on the roof and get to work. First we had to nail 2x6 boards under the angled edges of the roof. This involved reaching over the side of the roof to hold the 2x6 perpendicular to the roof and flush with the edge. While reaching over, we had to be sure to keep our weight about 1.5 feet away from the edge because there was nothing supporting the roof until that point (if that didn't make sense, I can draw a diagram sometime). That part made even me nervous, and I have an unnatural lack of fear of heights and falling.
Next we nailed in drip guards along the edges. I got to do quite a bit of that because it didn't make me at all nervous. After that, we were ready to begin the actual shingling. Unfortunately I didn't wear gloves. The resulting blisters have been seen on Facebook. Fortunately I did remember sunscreen. I managed to avoid sunburn altogether.
Once lunch time rolled around, we realized that all our sandwiches were with the group at the other work site. I went with one of the teachers and a few others to go rescue our sandwiches and bid good-day to all my friends at the other site. I only talked to one or two people at my site, so it was nice to see the others.
After lunch we went right back to work. By the end of the afternoon, I was one of the best novice roofers. Upon our return from the sandwich site, Mrs. Rivet had given her keys to one of the girls so she wouldn't lose them. Well... the girl lost them instead. We spent several minutes looking for the keys before discovering that Boone had found them on the ground and picked them up partially as a prank and partially to make sure that they weren't truly lost.
We made our way back to the cabins. Much to our delight, we discovered that the running water had been restored! Showers for all!
Shortly after returning, I set out for the rock formation with some of the guys. I didn't know they were going. I found them there when I arrived. My hopes of peace and solitude were ruined, but at least the guys weren't at all obnoxious. I still got my peace to a certain degree. Atop the rock were all sorts of lovely lichens and mosses as well as some stubborn beech saplings growing out from between layers of the rock. The view was nice, too. When I first climbed up, I used the same method the guys had used. It didn't work to well with my über short legs. Once on top of the rock, however I found a crevice I could fit into that led to another small opening in the underside of the rock. Once I dropped through that hole, I easily walked out from beneath the rock without even having to stoop. It wasn't too hard to climb back up either. It was perfect.
That afternoon I decided to be a good student and work on some calculus. That was pretty much the only homework I did for the entire week. I probably should've done more, but it was nice to have a break from school for a few days.
We had a nice, simple spaghetti dinner outside in the cool spring evening. Following dinner, Courtney and Anna decided that yoga would be a fun idea. I reluctantly joined them. We went behind the girls' cabin to avoid awkward looks from out classmates. Unbeknownst to us, someone was washing dishes right in front of the window on the back side of the cabin. Mr. Muchmore was amused by the contrast between Courtney's yoga and the pitiful attempts of Anna and me.
We lit a campfire as the sun began to set and roasted marshmallows. Campfire + marshmallows = a delightful combination. As the fire began to die down, we headed inside for the night.
Thursday, April 9, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Appalachia Part I: Sunday
If I post then entire account of my Appalachia trip at once, I won't get around to finishing it until at least a few weeks from now. Instead, I'll post it in chunks - one for each day of the trip.
On Sunday Courtney picked me up from church early. When we arrived at school, I helped Leah's dad pack the vans. We make an efficient packing team. Unfortunately, the people were packed awfully close, too. My van had nine people and eight seat belts. I got to sit in the middle of the back row. Aside from a few panicky moments early on, I was surprised to find that I didn't have a serious problem with the crowdedness.
We arrived at our cabin at around 6:00 or 7:00, thanks to the unnecessarily extended stops and the late start. The girls' "cabin" was very nice (depending on your definition). It was hardly a cabin, really. It was all clean and new and polished will real mattresses and Perggo floors... but temporarily with no running water. The view out the door was absolutely gorgeous. I'll have a picture of it up on Facebook eventually. The girl's cabin was partway up a mountainside and hemmed in by ridges on three sides. On one of these ridges was an interesting rock formation that begged to be climbed. Maddy went along with me all the way to the top through thorns and brush. Thanks to my short legs, I couldn't find a way up the rock at the time, but Maddy did.
Before leaving for dinner and grocery shopping, us girls went down to the valley below our cabin to see where the guy were staying. I preferred their cabin. They stayed in a historic cabin with low ceilings, unfinished walls, and furniture from the 70s. It was rather dim and somewhat grungy, but it had a nice, homey feel full of character and warmth that the pristine girls' cabin lacked.
After we had all loaded back into the vans, we headed out to Pizza Hut for dinner. From Pizza Hut, we went to Food City to do our grocery shopping for the week. Emily and I were sent to the produce department, but we were distracted for several minutes my some delightfully scented candles. There were so many different smells to test! Later on, some of my friends and I met up in a freezer aisle and decided we were tired of shopping for the time being, so we sat down and played charades instead. It was much more fun.
When we were done at Food City, we finally returned back to the cabins at roughly 9:00 or 10:00. I could see the stars clearly. I only know two constellations, but I found them effortlessly. Ursa Major and Orion's Belt seemed huge up there! I hadn't seen them clearly since October, so I'm not sure if the perceived size discrepancy was due to season or elevation. I did not admire the stars for long because I did not want to feel obligated to pretend to associate with my more boisterous classmates who were outside at the time.
On Sunday Courtney picked me up from church early. When we arrived at school, I helped Leah's dad pack the vans. We make an efficient packing team. Unfortunately, the people were packed awfully close, too. My van had nine people and eight seat belts. I got to sit in the middle of the back row. Aside from a few panicky moments early on, I was surprised to find that I didn't have a serious problem with the crowdedness.
We arrived at our cabin at around 6:00 or 7:00, thanks to the unnecessarily extended stops and the late start. The girls' "cabin" was very nice (depending on your definition). It was hardly a cabin, really. It was all clean and new and polished will real mattresses and Perggo floors... but temporarily with no running water. The view out the door was absolutely gorgeous. I'll have a picture of it up on Facebook eventually. The girl's cabin was partway up a mountainside and hemmed in by ridges on three sides. On one of these ridges was an interesting rock formation that begged to be climbed. Maddy went along with me all the way to the top through thorns and brush. Thanks to my short legs, I couldn't find a way up the rock at the time, but Maddy did.
Before leaving for dinner and grocery shopping, us girls went down to the valley below our cabin to see where the guy were staying. I preferred their cabin. They stayed in a historic cabin with low ceilings, unfinished walls, and furniture from the 70s. It was rather dim and somewhat grungy, but it had a nice, homey feel full of character and warmth that the pristine girls' cabin lacked.
After we had all loaded back into the vans, we headed out to Pizza Hut for dinner. From Pizza Hut, we went to Food City to do our grocery shopping for the week. Emily and I were sent to the produce department, but we were distracted for several minutes my some delightfully scented candles. There were so many different smells to test! Later on, some of my friends and I met up in a freezer aisle and decided we were tired of shopping for the time being, so we sat down and played charades instead. It was much more fun.
When we were done at Food City, we finally returned back to the cabins at roughly 9:00 or 10:00. I could see the stars clearly. I only know two constellations, but I found them effortlessly. Ursa Major and Orion's Belt seemed huge up there! I hadn't seen them clearly since October, so I'm not sure if the perceived size discrepancy was due to season or elevation. I did not admire the stars for long because I did not want to feel obligated to pretend to associate with my more boisterous classmates who were outside at the time.
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Nihilism in the Choir*
As my readers know, the Finneytown Chorale received a 1 in class AA at contest last weekend. This means that we qualified to move on to state contest. After a vote, we decided that we'd try it. Unfortunately, today we learned that scheduling conflicts would make it nearly impossible to go on any of the four possible contest days (well we could still actually fit in two places, but our teacher doesn't seem to be trying very hard). Because of this, anarchy and nihilism will reign in the choir.
Anarchy was already a problem. My teacher has never demanded much respect from the students, so he hasn't gotten nearly as much as he would like. Surprise, surprise. But I won't rail against Mr. McKee's classroom "control" at this time. I won't spend much time describing anarchy since I've given some description in person to my readers in the past. I'm just sick and tired of non-stop chatter and nonsense. People talk while other people talk about why we shouldn't be talking all the time. It's immensely aggravating. It's not like we're the concert choir, full of people who just needed another credit. We're all talented musicians, and an extremely high percentage of us are honors kids and "good students."
Now that we're not going to contest, we have nothing to work towards (as some people see it). This is where the nihilism comes in. With no purpose/goal to work towards, there's no reason for the hooligans not to cause mayhem. Some of my classmates and I would consider it a good enough goal to simply create beautiful music and to share this music with our family and friends. However, about half of the problematic people are seniors with severe cases of senioritis. They really don't care about anything school-related at this point, even if that means being inconsiderate towards others. My teacher might have us do this awesome but incredibly complicated Eric Whitaker piece, and maybe that will inspire some to actually work. I have my doubts.
A few of my friends and I are actually considering how nice it might be to have a study hall fourth bell with AP exams approaching. I probably won't switch classes, though. I've stuck with it this far, so I might as well finish strong.
*My original title for this post was "Nihilism and Anarchy in the Choir" but "Nihilism in the Choir" sounds like an awesome band name, so I had to leave it that way.
Anarchy was already a problem. My teacher has never demanded much respect from the students, so he hasn't gotten nearly as much as he would like. Surprise, surprise. But I won't rail against Mr. McKee's classroom "control" at this time. I won't spend much time describing anarchy since I've given some description in person to my readers in the past. I'm just sick and tired of non-stop chatter and nonsense. People talk while other people talk about why we shouldn't be talking all the time. It's immensely aggravating. It's not like we're the concert choir, full of people who just needed another credit. We're all talented musicians, and an extremely high percentage of us are honors kids and "good students."
Now that we're not going to contest, we have nothing to work towards (as some people see it). This is where the nihilism comes in. With no purpose/goal to work towards, there's no reason for the hooligans not to cause mayhem. Some of my classmates and I would consider it a good enough goal to simply create beautiful music and to share this music with our family and friends. However, about half of the problematic people are seniors with severe cases of senioritis. They really don't care about anything school-related at this point, even if that means being inconsiderate towards others. My teacher might have us do this awesome but incredibly complicated Eric Whitaker piece, and maybe that will inspire some to actually work. I have my doubts.
A few of my friends and I are actually considering how nice it might be to have a study hall fourth bell with AP exams approaching. I probably won't switch classes, though. I've stuck with it this far, so I might as well finish strong.
*My original title for this post was "Nihilism and Anarchy in the Choir" but "Nihilism in the Choir" sounds like an awesome band name, so I had to leave it that way.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Renaming the Blog
While reading my psychology textbook, I discovered that the term "antisocial" technically refers to something far different from what I had intended to communicate in my blog's title. According to my textbook, "antisocial personality disorder [is] a personality disorder in which the person exhibits a lack of conscience for wrongdoing, even toward friends and family members. May be aggressive and ruthless or a clever con artist." I don't think I want to associate myself with such a disorder. Even though the general public's definition of antisocial goes along with my former notion of the word (which was that antisocial people are uncomfortable around people or more comfortable alone), I'd rather change my blog's name now that I know the technical meaning for the term. I don't like my new title as much as I did the old one. I'll probably change it again when I find a word or phrase with a similar meaning that I like the sound of.
Sunday, February 15, 2009
Tale as Old as Time
So this might sound a little sappy or whatever, but oh well. Maybe it's not as sappy as I'm thinking, since I generally put an unnecessary amount of effort into avoiding being sappy. I suppose a bit of over-sentimentality (or "spoony-ness" to use Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day from yesterday) isn't so bad every once in a while, if that's what this is. Ordinary sentimentality definitely isn't a bad thing in moderation. Now I'll stop rambling and get to the point so I can get back to work on less enjoyable things.
As my readers know, Ben's sermon this week was about God's omnitemporality. This morning during the sermon, the song "Tale as Old as Time" from Beauty and the Beast popped into my head. I thought about the song for a second and scoffed at the idea that the story of Beauty and the Beast was a "tale as old as time." But upon further reflection, I realized that the general idea of the story was in fact older than time. It was outside of time, even. God has chosen to love something decidedly unlovely: humanity (as we read in Romans 5:8). When I continued to think, I made yet another connection (well, actually I remembered a passage from Orthodoxy): not only has God chosen to love an unlovely thing, but because he loves it he's decided to make it into something lovely (as we read in Philippians 1:6). I can't help but thank God for all this. I've made my actual point in a few sentences, and yet these few facts are mind-boggling. I could (and should) spend quite a bit of time, or more appropriately all of my time, with these amazing, comforting truths in mind.
As my readers know, Ben's sermon this week was about God's omnitemporality. This morning during the sermon, the song "Tale as Old as Time" from Beauty and the Beast popped into my head. I thought about the song for a second and scoffed at the idea that the story of Beauty and the Beast was a "tale as old as time." But upon further reflection, I realized that the general idea of the story was in fact older than time. It was outside of time, even. God has chosen to love something decidedly unlovely: humanity (as we read in Romans 5:8). When I continued to think, I made yet another connection (well, actually I remembered a passage from Orthodoxy): not only has God chosen to love an unlovely thing, but because he loves it he's decided to make it into something lovely (as we read in Philippians 1:6). I can't help but thank God for all this. I've made my actual point in a few sentences, and yet these few facts are mind-boggling. I could (and should) spend quite a bit of time, or more appropriately all of my time, with these amazing, comforting truths in mind.
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