New Beginnings

i am going to try and do more online journals, here is my first attempt. i hope you can find a path amidst my wandering thoughts...

These past few months and years have been a time of new beginnings for me. I have moved from the OHIO North Carolina, to Sunny California, finally came out of the closet, did 2 years of voluntary service, started my masters in Marriage and Family Therapy, lived in 3 different houses, started a job at starbucks and finally feel I have found the right place to be right now. I have found myself to be a much more balanced person the past 2 years. Using music to push me and pull in the reigns when need be. Leaving my family back in Ohio and Indiana has been the hardest thing i have ever done. I haven't seen them in nearly a year and it kills me daily, but i have found a family here in Fresno who I love like we are blood. I am learning to let life come as it does and not expect things to be a certain way. I have also found a new spiritual awakening these past few years. My body and soul seem to finally be aligning and that is a very special and powerful feeling. I thank my family, friends, teachers, numerous authors and the musical artists I listen to daily for this awakening.

There are days when I feel helpless and hopeless, and there are days when I could not be happier to be where I am...no matter my feelings, each day i am thankful to be alive and to be in this world. there is so much to live for and i thank the great Spirit for the opportunity to relish in the wonders of this world, in relationships with those i love and those i continually struggle to love and forgive. I am playing music again. Got my guitar out yesterday for the first time in a long while. Denise and i had some folks that are patrons at her work place over last night for dinner and wine. They asked if i would play for them...reluctantly i obliged. thank god i did. i had no idea how much i needed to play. i don't know if i have ever felt so in tune with the music i play as i did last night. i was one with the songs and one with my voice. i felt strong, vulnerable and very alive. it felt right. life feels right.

now i find i've changed my mind.
this is my religion. (Drowned World/Subsitute for Love)



Music relevant:
Carousel, Vanessa Carlton
Drowned World/Subsitute for Love, Madonna
New Beginning, Tracy Chapman
Circle Game, Joni Mitchell
Gold Dust, Tori Amos

Present/Future...

Hello everyone. Time for another blog that is way past due. It has been almost a YEAR since I have written one of these. So much has happened since. It was quite funny to see pictures from my last post of our time on the coast in Cayucos as we just got done with that trip with my second VS group. Here's a couple of pictures from our time there this year. :)
These were mostly taken at Morro Rock in Morro Bay, but some we also went to Pismo Beach and a little north of Cayucus to see some Elephant Seals. :) It was such a fun time to relax and get away from the central valley. We were not able to get out to the beach all weekend though because of the tsunami that had just Hawaii. The tide was always too far in. No one was allowed on the pier either as the waves were crashing through it! I had some great seafood that weekend! Fish and Chips and clam chowder (not as good as the chowder on Martha's Vineyard though!!). The view of the coastal range as we drove between Cayucos and Pismo Beach (45 miles apart) was just gorgeous. Vegetation was so green with eucalyptus trees on the winding roads, spanish moss trees, haunting on the trail of the elfin forest we walked through and wild poppies on the side of the highway. The sight of the otters in the ocean floating on their backs and the elephant seals barking and meowing like both cats and dogs was quite entertaining. It still amazes me how close I live to so many places of natural beauty (within 3 hours of most places) but rarely get to go see them. Work keeps me VERY busy and when I am not working, I enjoy relaxing with friends at the Revue (cafe'/coffeehouse). Well...onto some bigger news about my future. Throughout the past 20 months working with COSA, I have finally found what I believe to be a career path. I never thought the moment would come when I would actually find something I wanted to do with my life as a career that I would enjoy! It had always been music. There will always be a part of me that will wonder if I could have made a career in the music business, but regret is not the right adjective. I am very excited about this new path I am hoping to take. I have started (and almost finished) the application process to the MFT (Marriage Family Therapy) Masters program at California State University-Fresno (Fresno State). I am hoping to eventually become a therapist and find a job working with individual and group therapy. I think I want to work with clients in the LGBTQ community and possibly victims of sexual abuse. Working with sex offenders for 2 years has awakened an energy in me to now work with victims of sexual abuse and peoples dealing with issues of sexuality. I believe my empathetic personality, need for working with the marginalized and the longing for harmony in life (relationships with others, the community, environment and oneself) will make me a good therapist. I almost feel like events in my life and all of the different relationships i have had with different friends and communities has led me to this point of decision. It is a very exciting time for me as well as a very scary time with many "unknowns."
So right now, I am just in the phase of waiting to see if I get into the program. I am feeling a bit confident as one of my letters of reference is coming from a renowned professor of Criminology at CSU-Fresno (Fresno State), Dr. Arthur Wint. I have been lucky enough to work with him as he is on the COSA board and has been a keynote speaker in some of our training sessions. Also, Clare Ann is another person of reference for me (my boss at COSA) and the fact that I have been doing "therapy-esque" work already for almost two years with a very difficult demographic will bode well for me. Please keep me in your thoughts and prayers as this next chapter of my life begins to unravel.
Anyway, I am getting SUPER EXCITED about our vacation in July! It sounded like everyone had a good time at Ri's birthday party yesterday at Grandma's. I wish I could have been there. That is one thing that will be difficult to adjust to if I do get into the program and stay out here in California...being so far away from you all again. I do feel this is a great step forward for me though, and even though the distance will be quite difficult, I cannot let that hinder my growth and journey through adulthood. If I could, I would move you all out here with me and we could all live within 5 blocks of each other and still have our jobs and activities. OK, i am getting sappy and emotional now. Anyway, I know i say this all the time, but I shall truly try to write a blog more regularly. Would love to hear from everyone by email or by phone soon! I was going through some photos when I transferred them from my phone to my computer and came across these that took last year and thought I would add them at the end of this blog in memory of Grandpa Lynn. I'm sure we are all thinking of him and Grandma constantly. He is missed greatly every day.

I love and miss you all dearly!

Jor

PS: Something I told most of you, last fall I was able to see my favorite singer/songwriter/musician Tori Amos in concert and was able to meet her personally before the show! Here is a pic! You can clearly see how ecstatic i was!
Here are some pics from Christmas at Liechty's and Zickafoose's :) and a pic of some of friends from the coffee shop at Karaoke one night this winter and another night bowling!



The Elephant Seals in Cayucos and Rainbow after a day of rain at the Revue. Thank goodness for winter/spring here in Fresno where we get SOME rain!















OH! and I thought you all would get a kick out of this! I have been going to our church's Monday night quilting group at our next door neighbor Sylvia's house for about a month now! :) We have about 11 quilts and comforters that will be auctioned at the MCC Relief sale in April. This is a picture of the big quilt I helped on and a picture of some of the stitching i did on it close up.

Summer is here...

Again, it has been so long since i last blogged. my apologies. in my defense life has been extremely busy lately. my stress level has been up there especially in the last month. as some of you know, i am now splitting my time between two positions here in Fresno. i am working 3 days a week only with COSA and on the other 2 days I am the director of the CARE program at Mennonite Community Church where I attend services each Sunday. The bulk of my time with CARE is running the food pantry 3 Wednesdays each month. This includes picking the food up from Community Food Bank, organizing it in our pantry, giving the food out and working with the volunteers on the pantry days. other tasks include putting together a block party for the community in August and discerning whether or not to give out money to those who come to the church with financial problems. we are able to give out $50 to people who need it for bills (utilities/rent/transportation...) and other things. It has been difficult lately to balance these two positions as they cross frequently. there are days i am at the church, but have COSA circles to go to...most of them meet at the church in my office anyway, so at least i don't have to take time to travel. COSA is going well, we now have 12 circles going and i am part of 8 of them officially. i will not go into detail about each circle...but some are going well, others are struggling as many of the core members are out of jobs due to the economic crisis. we just started a new circle that is very challenging for me as the core member is in denial and will not take responsibility for his offenses. i refuse to work with people who are not in COSA for the right reasons...those who just want support and the "goodies" COSA has. it will be interesting to see how this circle unfolds.

on the home front end, we have been VERY busy as a house, taking frequent weekend trips. Kelsey is leaving mid-July, Jon in August and we are realizing how fast this time will go. it seems the roommates realize we haven't done much as a house and haven't seen much of California. SO...we have gone to the coast a couple times which has been great! (Cayucus, Moro Bay, San Francisco). I will put pics up too. we went to the Sequoia National Forest yesterday for a day trip. a couple weeks ago we were at the Rocky Mountain Mennonite Camp in Colorado for the annual MVS retreat. it was phenomenal. the only bad thing was being stuck in an airport/airplane for 30 hours straight!! it was awful...i will put up a picture of us and the Seattle unit sitting outside of the airport for 7 hours. i also attended the Meet in the Middle for Equality rally in Fresno. it was a rally to repeal Proposition 8 which took away the civil right of the LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer) community to marry here in California. there were thousands of people from all over California and other states with speakers (some celebrities and some who have been fighting for gay rights all their lives as well as children from church congregations speaking against proposition 8 as it breaks families apart.) i could not believe how moving it was, just the fact that conservative Fresno was hosting this event. getting back to the house, we are each house sitting in the next 2 months for several families in our church congregation. i will be sitting for 3 weeks in a row for 2 families! but both of them have inground pools! so i will NOT be complaining! hehe. i will be laying out every weekend and each day when i get off work. i have a feeling the weather is going to get HOT soon. we have had very mild weather here in Fresno as of late. people keep telling me how lucky i am that the weather has been so beautiful. some say this is the first time they can remember it being this cool in mid June in 15 years!!










i will be leaving for Columbus, OH in a few weeks to attend the Mennonite USA biannual convention as a youth group chaperone. it will fun and i will hopefully be able to see some of you! i will not be able to leave Columbus but i think some are coming up to CBus to visit me. Mom and Grace are hoping to fly to Fresno in August too i think! i am SO excited for that!!!! well, i must tell you i miss you all so dearly. i had a little emotional breakdown last week after talking to the family while at my food pantry job. i miss home, i miss my family. i was feeling quite sick with a headache and being just plain tired last night and went to bed early after renting a movie and watching it by myself. Kelsey and Jon were out at an arena football game and Daniella is house sitting. I was glad to have a nite to myself, but found myself really wishing i was at home on the couch with the family keeping me company. that is hard, not feeling well, being in an emotional "funk" and not being able to be with my family.

well, here are some pictures i have taken on our trips. i will try and put all of them on snapfish soon...i LOVE and MISS YOU ALL! i think of you every day. (get better grandpa! i am praying for your healing to come swiftly.)

This is me at work saying hi to you all with a smile before i give some sad news...

well i have bad news. this sunday after church i was making brunch with daniella, making scrambled eggs when i got a call from my boss clare ann...she told me mike, one of our core members died on saturday night in a car accident. she didn;t know too many details except for he was driving home from his mothers house and was afraid he was going to be late. (he has a curfew set by parole and if he is late, they may send him back to prison on a violation of parole) he was going too fast and had a fatal car accident where they believe he was ejected from the car as he wasn't wearing his seatbelt. the article in the newspaper said he hit a tree, but a few of the volunteers and clare ann went to visit his mother and checked out the crash site and could not find any sign of damage to a tree or really any other sign of a crash except for a few old flares. i did not know what to say. it was a complete shock. he had just bought a dodge neon 2 weeks ago and was doing very well, had a positive outlook on life although he had just been laid off from his trucking job (as the company lost their contract with Sunkist...7 out of the 10 employees were let go).
we met as a circle this afternoon to process everything which it seems none of us had really been able to do without the other circle members. mike's mother is completely devastated and doesn't really have the resources to know what to do in this situation. She does not have money for a funeral and we are working with her to help with logistical things. we are going to put together a memorial service for mike in the next week or 2. it has been quite an emotional month and a half for me, all with work being very busy, missing home, missing friends, not being able to see grandpa, and just sort of being in a rut for a lack of further explanation. i seem to be a bit emotionally worn out and this event sent me over the edge if you will. it is hard to be so far away from all those i love in these times. i have had many days after work going to the coffee shop and writing in my journal, reflecting on my feelings. needless to say i am much appreciative for all the little cards you all send with a bit of cash so i can keep up my coffee habit. :)
on a happier note, the church congregation had a grocery shower for us and donated about 10 sacks full of groceries, odds and ends that we will now not have to use our grocery budget for. it was overwhelming at all the things they gave us. and last night i made grandma dori's chicken and rice casserole that is a favorite by everyone at the house. i use the biggest 18 inch pyrex we have and barely have enough left-overs to take lunch for myself the next day! also, it has been absolutely gorgeous this past weekend! and the past two days have been so sunny, but cold and surprisingly windy...
well, i was writing this at the coffee shop (The Revue), but had to go home for dinner. Kelsey made lasagna (YUMMY!) and i helped her make bruschetta as a side. We have been eating as a house at the dinner table instead of eating in front of the tv lately which is so much nicer! we used to only do that once a week, but have started to eat almost monday-thursday at the table together. we light candles and i put on some nice relaxing music on my ipod for us. it is still a quite difficult getting all of them to open up about their day, so i end up talking a lot about what is going on in my life...of course i am the emotional dramatic one here! haha. i told them today that mike's circle met today to process and i also told them how emotional i have been lately, i even confessed the past few days on the bus ride to and from work i find myself tearing up and crying a bit...it just seems those 45 minute bus rides where i am just waking up, or exhausted from a day at work, listening to my moody music find myself welling up with all the emotions i must surpress each day when i am around people. i don't have anyone here who i can confide in like i did in north carolina with my best friends...i am yearning for them. Mallory will be in LA this weekend, but i have a youth fundraiser for Menno Conference Saturday night and cannot make a trip to SoCal. It makes me sad we will only be hours away and can't see each other.
A couple songs that have really been helping me lately are by the Wailin' Jenny's; a canadian folk trio with phenomenal harmonies and poignant, life lessons lyrics which hit home. "One Voice," "Avila," and "Apocalypse Lullaby." I will end with the lyrics to the songs...wish i could get them up on this blog, but can't find them on the site i get music from. Also, when talking to mike's circle today, a quote from my favourite movie, "The Hours" came upon me. I watched this film 3 times last week. (part of the emotional outpour...) Nicole Kidman plays the character of writer Virginia Woolf and is speaking to her husband about the novel she is writing, "Mrs. Dalloway" and he asks her why one her characters must die. She replies, "Someone has to die in order that the rest of us should value life more. It's contrast." I never truly understood that quote until today. The circle was discussing how much of a success story mike's was. everyone we spoke to or gave a presentation to heard us tell the story of mike...and we as a circle were so impressed by the total change in his attitude and way of living. clare ann made a comment that his death has made her think about how precious and short life is and how quickly, in a nano second, life can end for anyone. we become comfortable and complacent with our routines every day and can easily forget how blessed we are to wake up each day, be with, think of and talk to those we love the most. death does make us value life on earth more, though sad it is to lose loved ones. i also think being away from those you love (like me in california) also makes one value life and relationships more. i have never felt such a closeness and need for you all in my life. i think of you all EVERY day and i thank God you have been put in my life, whether as a friend, mom, dad, sister, aunt, uncle, cousin, neighbor, or whatever. i guess that may be it for this entry. i feel that i have just finished a depressing journal entry and for that i apologize if i made anyone sad. hopefully the next one will be filled with just joy! not sadness and joy. i love you all deeply. please don't ever forget that.

love,
jor

Apocalypse Lullaby: the wailin' jenny's

Hurricanes will come
Earthquakes break the walls
Oceans rise
Empires fall

Enter world, light unshown
Follow heart, follow home
Here we are, light unshown
One round heart, one round home

Spin the speed of light
Tetrahedron blue
One last paradise
You can make for you

Enter world, light unshown
Follow heart, follow home
Here we are, light unshown
One round heart, one round home

Faster than a ship
Further than bomb
See the glowing grid
Send love throughout the throng

Enter world, light unshown
Follow heart, follow home
Here we are, light unshone
One round heart, one round home

One Voice: the wailin jenny's

This is the sound of one voice
One spirit, one voice
The sound of one who makes a choice
This is the sound of one voice

This is the sound of voices two
The sound of me singing with you
Helping each other to make it through
This is the sound of voices two

This is the sound of voices three
Singing together in harmony
Surrendering to the mystery
This is the sound of voices three

This is the sound of all of us
Singing with love and the will to trust
Leave the rest behind it will turn to dust
This is the sound of all of us

This is the sound of one voice
One people, one voice
A song for every one of us
This is the sound of one voice
This is the sound of one voice

Remember this Jenna, Layne, and Anna!? (Dresden and Paris!)

Even Here We Are

Hey all!

So i know i just posted a blog, but I wrote it a few weeks ago, but the internet was screwed up so I am just posting it now. I am currently sitting in my favorite coffee shop listening to my favorite music. I posted a new playlist with new songs on it so you all can enjoy what I am listening to when you read this blog. :) Well, the Jewel concert was phenomenal. Of course. Things have been pretty fun out here. I have been keeping myself busy. I have seen 3 movies in the past month and a half! I told you (or you will read in my next older blog) that I used a ticket Mom gave me at Christmas to see "Revolutionary Road" and then the next week I went to see "The Reader." Both films starring Kate Winslet, my favorite actress. She won an oscar for her role as a former SS (Nazi) guard who goes on trial...it is a fantastic film with amazing acting...both movies quite depressing though. I tend to enjoy the dark, depressing, emotional films over others. Then last night, I went on a date with myself to see "Milk," the story of Harvey Milk and his assassination in 1978 starring Sean Penn (who also won an Oscar for the role). If you get a chance to see it, go!


Well, another way I have been keeping busy besides COSA, is I have been cleaning the house a lot and re-decorating. I cleaned out the laundry room behind the washer/dryer and swept and mopped it. No laundry room has ever been cleaner! hehe. Then i mopped the kitchen and started re-decorating the bathroom. I will put up before and after photos once i take some on my phone...first off, the color is a hideous, pinkish/beige color. and then, past VSers insted of putting nice pictures up, decided to scotch tape and duct tape old pictures from calendars all over the walls. They were scattered everywhere on the walls, collecting dust and crinkling up with age. So i took them all down, washed the walls, and put some beautiful pictures up! One that was hiding in our back computer room by local artist, a large framed photo of Yosemite and a poster of one of my favorite singer/songwriters. I have talked to the other housemates and we are going to paint it sometime soon. I can't wait! Then we will re-paint the living room. Boy does this house need it!! Everything is broken, old, or just plain ugly. HAHA! I decided it is time for a change! It is actually quite nice to clean and decorate. It gives the house a fresh feel and I get to relieve some stress and just listen to my iPod while doing something productive besides sit and watch TV.

I appreciate SO MUCH everyone in the family keeping me updated on Grandpa's recovery process! I am SO happy that things are going well Grandpa! We were worried for a minute! I cannot believe you walked 1/2 a mile yesterday! It was very nice to talk to you last week and I will try and call soon. Keep your head up and a positive attitude! We love you and I cannot wait to see you in April. Yay Jenna and Pete! I am so excited for the wedding!!!! I can;t believe it is in less than 2 months. I truly have never been so excited to come home! Even more so than before Christmas! Probably because now that I have a taste of what it feels like to come home and leave, each trip home will get better and better. :) I miss you all so dearly, it has been very hard this past month to be away from you.

It was a BEAUTIFUL day today in Fresno. A bit cloudy (now really cloudy) but it was in the 70's! I walked here to the coffee shop in a tshirt and jeans. I did a reader's theatre for the scripture this morning and sang in a quartet (#29 in Sing the Journey). It was communion Sunday and the 1st of lent. We have a beautiful banner up front and they will add a new one each week. Kelsey and Jon went to the mountains this weekend to go cross country skiing with a few church people. I decided i wanted a weekend to relax and have to myself. It was well worth it. I even cleaned a couple windows inside and out after church! Mom, you would be so proud! But if i didn't do it, no one would and it would keep collecting dust.

I think that can be it for now. If you all would like me to write about anything in particular or have questions just comment on my blog and i'll answer in the next blog. I love getting comments from you! Ok, i miss you, i love you...think of you every day. i leave you with some lyrics from a song that just played.

Even Here We Are: (Paul Westerberg) on Shawn Colvin's latest album, These Four Walls

It's a beautiful flower in your garden
But the most beautiful by far
Is the one growing wild in the garbage dump
Even here, even here we are

It's the song of the bird way up in the sky
But the most beautiful by far
Is the scream of the man who never learned to fly
Even here, even here we are
Even here, even here we are

When the sun shines bright, it's a beautiful sight
But the most beautiful by far
Is the blind girl alone, the angel of the night
Even here, even here we are

It's a beautiful flower in your garden
But the most beautiful by far
Is the one growing wild in the garbage dump
Even here, even here we are
Even here, even here we are


Amen.

jor

ps: here's a fun photo from Gulf Shores!

My goodness it has been so long since i wrote a blog! I just got done talking to Grandpa on the phone. I wanted to catch him before he went into surgery tomorrow morning. I only wish I could have bee there to actually see him! I will definitely be thinking and praying for him a lot tonight and tomorrow morning. I must say I will most likely be asleep during the surgery as it will be around 2:30am here in Fresno.
Well, I just got back from the mountains at around 2pm this afternoon. I went up with my roomates to a cabin (Casa Pacifica, owned by Fresno Pacific University) with our churches youth group and another youth group from College Community MB Church (which I did a COSA presentation at last Sunday). It was a blast. I finally got to see and play in some snow! My roomates left last night after being there during the day. They don't do well with games and new groups i guess. But as most of you all know I LOVE GAMES and being in big loud crowds. hehe:) So stayed the night and helped clean up this morning. I finally learned how to play the game "Settlers" which many of the church youth have been telling me i HAVE to learn because they are obsessed with it and if I am going to convention in Columbus with them in July i better know how to play. It actually is a very fun and competitive game, so i ended up loving it!
COSA is very very busy right now and a bit stressful at times. But i am still very much enjoying my work. I have decided to stay on for one more year after this. My supervisor has been planning on this for some time i think so it is nice to actually say yes. Daniella is also staying which is not the best thing ever...but I will have to deal with it. It is just hard because she has told me she doesn't like Fresno and would get out if she could, but she doesn't feel like moving again. I encouraged her to try and move to another unit where she would be more happy like Seattle since she talks about moving back there someday and how much she loves it, and it sounded like she was going to go that route but decided she wants to sit still and not have to move. It will be another interesting group dynamic when the new VSers move in and see how they take to her.
I am taking tomorrow off work because I worked a 13 hour Friday and a 8 day Saturday a few weeks ago for COSA training. It will be a very nice day to sleep in and lounge around. We have started 2 new circles since Christmas break and our working on starting 3 more new ones. We are low on volunteers but working on it. I am now currently in 8 circles (one of our core members was violated on Dec. 31 or violating a condition of his parole...NOT reoffending, but will be out in 8 months), and will be in all the new ones also to start with. The circles has been very emotionally draining lately, several conflicts in some of them, but I know they will all get back to normal soon.
On a happy note, Tuesday night, I will be heading to Table Mountain Casino in Fresno with 2 of my friends from Fresno to see Jewel live in concert. This will be my 4th time seeing her and I cannot wait. Tickets were only $30 so I didn;t even have to use my whole stipend on them! (Actually Mom and grandma Sue/grandpa Ed helped me out with this! Thank you!!) Also, I got to go see "Revolutionary Road" in the theater with some friends also with a free ticket pass Mom got me for Christmas. It was a brilliant, beautiful, heartbreaking film sometimes hard to watch. It is about a married couple in the 50's who are going through a crisis of self-identification, depression, dreams that are shattered, loneliness, etc. If you have the chance to see it, DO!!!! Especially for you married folks. It will put things into perspective i think. I was a bit depressed the next couple of days. But it was well worth it! I also went with the same people to see "Titanic" the musical put on by a local highschool...my friend Michelle worked the sound board. For a highschool, i was completely impressed! It was very well done and they actually had a mechanical part of a ship onstage that tilted and people slid down it just like they were falling off the boat! I couldn;t believe it was a high school production. (this was a very rich school so they can afford to build amazing sets.!)
Well, i think that may be enough for now...i will try and not wait so long until the next blog. Miss and love you all dearly.

peace. love.
jor

oh, here's a couple photos that make me happy and remind me of FUN TIMES in ALABAMA!!

Almost Home...

Well, as I write this (i know it's been quite some time...sorry!) i have just finished cooking my THIRD Old Fashion Cream Pie since being here in Fresno. HAHA! COSA is having a "Thanksmas" (get it? b/w Thanksgiving and Christmas?:) party tonight and I had to make a pie and a hash brown potato casserole. Also, I only have 5 more days until I come home! I have never been so excited to come back to Lima! I am so looking forward to spending time with everyone! The Christmas season has not been the same here in California...partly because of the lack of snow...but I have been faithfully listening to holiday music since the 1st of November! :)
Life has been VERY busy this month with COSA, church and just other MVS stuff. At COSA, we are getting 3 new circles together which is very exciting but very stressful at the same time. Since we work with volunteers only, it is very difficult to find 4-5 people that can meet at the same time every week for an hour and a half. It is also hard to find volunteers in general. 3 new circles means 12-15 new volunteers which is quite a lot! That is something Clare Ann and I are working on...volunteer recruitment. This week, I have been using Clare Ann's car to take one of our core members to work in Kingsburg (25 minutes away from Fresno) every morning before I go into the office or to circles. It has been such an amazing transformation in his circle as he has been looking for a job for about 5 months with no luck! Our circle has been working very hard to work on that and with the right connections and knowing that the core members has had past truck driving experience we were able to make trucking school happen for him AND get a job aligned with a friend of Clare Ann's who has a heart for parolees...especially se offenders. We were able to raise $1000 from the local Menno and MB churches and pay his trucking school in full which puts in a very good name for COSA, that we are reliable. Maybe we will be able to call on that school for other core members in the future?
Also at work, we celebrated 2 core members one year COSA anniversaries and 1 core members 1 year anniversary of being out of prison. He has been in prison since he graduated from high school and this is so great to celebrate! So COSA has been very fulfilling this season. I am ready for a break though! Going to Vegas for Thanksgiving was wonderful, but jam packed with things to do so I am ready to sit on the couch for a couple days! hehe. It was such great fun to visit not only Danielle and Mark, but have our friend Ashley there from Virginia! It was such a special Thanksgiving...I will never forget it. I will post some pictures up here from Thanksgiving in Vegas and from our MVS unit after we decorated it. Daniella would not let me get a real tree because she says that is so wrong and she would be very upset with me if i got a real tree. I tried to explain to her that have Christmas tree farms specifically to cut down the tree and then they plant a new one. It's not like they are cutting down part of the rainforest! But we found a fake 4 foot tall tree in the closet so I put that up. It was so much fun to put up and decorate Danielle and Mark's tree in Vegas too!
Well, I know I will have so many stories to tell when I come home so be ready! :) I miss you all so much and have been counting the days down for quite some time with the fam in Lima. I have also been missing my North Carolina family a lot this season as I spent it with many of them on Martha's Vineyard last year. I was able to connect with two of the staff members from Martha's Vineyard who had the little girl Olivia and just had another baby! Brett and Liz are their names and Brett just got a job as an english prof at Mt. Vernon Nazarene University in Ohio. It was great to talk to them! I have been listening to a lot of new music and have ound so many new artists that I am enjoying for the first time! It's so refreshing.
Speaking of music, I have been playing my violin the past couple Sundays at church and I am singing special music on Sunday with a men's group which is fun. I have been going to Mennonite Community (our church here in Frenso) after work sometimes to just play the piano to relax and that has been a comfort to me lately. (I have a key to church because many of our circles meet there.) I just started writing another song and that has been quite therapeutic also. Anyways, I think that is all I have for now. See you all sooN!



Peace and Love!
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