Just another day in paradise

Well, it's been a couple weeks since I went home, and while I was there I seemed to have taken some Wisconsin weather with me, and upon my return, I seem to have brought a little bit of Portland weather here. In the last week, there's been a small heat wave, getting up into the 30s, and if I remember correctly, I think we even had some rain instead of snow. Also, the snow around campus has been melting. It might not sound like much, but for someone who's not used to having feet of snow on the ground for 5 months out of the year, it's nice to see the grass again. Unfortunately it's supposed to get cold again this week, so we'll see how that goes.

The weekend I went home, I spent a good amount of time in the airports and on planes, giving me ample time to contemplate life, before jumping back into school. When I was home, there was so much talk about Grandpa, and just his way of life. I really am so grateful for him, and for my whole family. It's funny how much grandparents shape you without you even realizing it. When Aunt Teri gave his Eulogy she told so many stories I didn't know about him, but that are very telling of where my Dad came from, and that have been passed down to me. One of his big philosophies was, "If something is worth doing, it's worth doing right." I never knew that came from Grandpa, but I have heard those words come out of Dad's mouth so many times. Grandpa was also a big believer in finding the positives in life, and finding a funny side to all situations. I'd like to think I'm pretty good at that too, but maybe not quite as good as Grandpa. One of the stories Aunt Teri told was about his later years of golf. Grandpa had macular degeneration, so his eyesight had gotten pretty bad, which in golf, is a bit of an issue. When it got to a point where he couldn't see where the ball had gone, he just shrugged it off, saying, "I've always wanted to be able to hit the ball out of sight. Now I can!" Grandpa was the ever-optimist. I'm so glad that I had that type of influence in my life growing up. As Aunt Teri told story after story about Grandpa, it all started to sound very familiar, like my own Dad. Grandpa's dad died when Grandpa was very young, so he never really had anyone to show him how to be a good dad, but he really figured it out. However, I know I got lucky because my dad had a wonderful example and teacher, which Dad became himself. Aunt Teri talked about how Grandpa would always be teaching them things, and going out to play catch after going to work all day. When she talked about all these things, my childhood flooded my memory. I remembered Dad playing basketball with John and me, in the dark in the driveway, having me dribble around a pop can obstacle course, while he set up trash cans to act as defenders for John. Dad also coached every single one of us in basketball for at least a couple years, not to mention he was at pretty much everything we participated in. I especially have to give him props for coming to all of my music concerts and recitals because those were incredibly boring, and he hates sitting still for long periods of time. (Mom also deserves the same props for going to all of our games, because she was not a huge sports fan, but was there every season.) Finally, in hearing everything about Grandpa, and knowing how my dad is, I finally figured out where my wanderlust came from. Grandpa seemed to always be open to new places, hitchhiking here from Minnesota, moving to the coast for a few years, and moving around in Portland a bit. Also, I spent a good amount of time with his sister, Betty, while I was home, and she told me all about her world travels. It's in my blood. So I guess that's what brought me 2000 miles from home, to the arctic tundra we call Wisconsin. An itch to go somewhere new, with new possibilities.

In other news, there's not a whole lot of excitement for me at the moment. School is going well, definitely better than last semester, but still very busy and hectic. I had a physics test last Friday, which I think went alright, but I'll be finding out about that tomorrow. Next week I'll have four exams and a quiz, plus my senior seminar project due, so that will be craziness, but hopefully I'll have some time this week to start preparing. Work is about the same too. I'm interning in the admissions office still, which is wonderful. I work with absolutely the best people, and have a great support system there. Coaching is also going pretty well. We had a tournament this weekend and got 2nd place, and the girls are really improving significantly. Finally, the countdown to Spring Break has officially begun. 20 days of class left. Then after break, there's 3 weeks until Easter break, then 3 more weeks of class. Then finals. And graduation. That's coming up quick. I did apply for graduation last week, which is weird to think about. I could potentially be done with school forever in about 12 weeks. So scary and exciting! Anyway, I'll post a few pictures from the past couple weeks to add some visuals to this post, which got much longer than I anticipated.

Here are a couple taken from the plane as we were landing in Milwaukee. The first one is Lake Michigan, and it is partially frozen, and the second one is the shoreline of Milwaukee with Lake Michigan.

These two are of my room upon arrival back at school from being home. Our office likes to pull pranks on each other and originally I helped blow up all these balloons to fill one of the counselor's offices while he was out, but then they turned the prank around on me while I was gone, and moved all the balloons to my dorm room. There were 513 balloons.

And this is just a picture from this weekend (I apologize for the blurriness) with two of my best friends, so you can put a face to a name. Rachel is the one in the middle, we coach basketball together, and Kassie is on the right, she's my roommate. If I find a job in this area, I'll be living with these two next year.

I love and miss you all!