snowboarding saved my life

Amazing grace
How sweet the snowboard
that saved a wretch like me.

chairlifts have a way of bringing out the contemplative side of me; swinging high above pines, peaks, snow, valleys; the sun on my face, joy in my heart, a board on my feet.

i hadn't been out in awhile, and i couldn't believe how much i missed it.

i LOVE snowboarding.

i LOVE that God gave us mountains, snow, and the technology to get up and down them several times in one day.

snowboarding did indeed save my life.

i spent my teenage years in the trenches of anorexia. obsessed with starving myself. thinking and dreaming about how not to eat, how to exercise until i blacked out, how to slowly kill myself via starvation.

through serendipitous events, i received some salvation in the form of a big piece of wood delivered in the mail one day. 163 cm of salvation, painted black with splashes of fluorescent pink. sims swithblade. my new obsession that helped deliver my from my own personal hades.

snowboarding consumed my thoughts, i turned away from my homework every 20 minutes to look at the sims. started reading transworld snowboarding, snowboarding magazine, memorized the 6 brands of snowboards, pored over the new burton catalogue, idolized victoria jealouse, and the other few female riders on the scene in the early 90's. the more i thought about snowboarding, the less i thought about starving myself.

and then started my recovery and acknowledgement that i was suffering.

i am recovered, and i still love snowboarding.

Thank you God, for snowboarding.

three stooges

I spent 4 days with my niece and nephew in victoria recently - i hadn't seen them in over a year, and it may be another 3 years before i see them again... jacob was only a crawling, beer guzzling babe of one and katie had just passed out of her toddler years when i saw them last.

jacob, still with a zest for beer, runs at full speed, throws himself off high objects risking life and limb at every opportunity. katie has developed into a fully fledged princess with a wardrobe to match it. what have i missed?? it is alarming!!

jacob knows how to charm...

katie has a daily after-school routine of becoming a princess

three stooges

A part of me wishes I could live around the corner and pick them up for icecream on a whim, or play "choo choo" trains on the living room table more often. Another part of me wants them to be proud of their nutcase aunt who jumbles around in a 4x4 in the bush of africa. i love them dearly, i hope my physical absence in their daily routine doesn't make me less significant in their lives...

I also went to visit my Oma for an afternoon, one of my last chances to sample her outstanding coffee and watch her throw her cane across the room. She is still spry for 93 1/2, takes only a multi-vitamin, and the way she whips around her apartment, you wouldn't know she is missing half a femur! When I told her I was moving to Africa, she smirked and said "i'm not surprised!" For all I know, she will still be making coffee and doing needle work at 97 when I return from Kenya. She is an exemplary model of good honest hard work and a fiercely independent woman! (i ask her about boyfriends in the building, and she turns up her nose, saying "what do i need one of those for?")

a new washing machine

I recently procured a state of the art washing machine! As you can see from the photo it is extremely low maintenance, has no moving parts, and requires no gas or electricity to run! Talk about environmently friendly!

This machine will be going with me to Kenya where I will spend 2 1/2 years with CRWRC (Christian Reformed World Relief Committee). I have been accepted as an intern and will be working and learning about Community development with a health care focus. All I know thus far is that there are community based health promotion activities, and a program for orphans and vulnerable children. The grandiose plans I have in my head involve starting quilting bees, and starting a water filter program (have a head start on this as a college friend who is a water engineer already lives there and is interested in promoting this in the area).

I still don't know when I am leaving - more than 6 months though- as the visa process has not started, or exactly what I will be doing. I need to step out in faith and follow the call for my life!