Talitha Koumi

Here's a Monday morning message for you – Talitha Koumi! ''Tali- what?' I hear you cry! The phrase Talitha Koumi is said by Jesus in Mark 5:42 when he heals a twelve year old girl and it translates 'Little girl, Arise!' If you are not a Christian then bear with me, there really is something in this for all womankind!

After my post on Friday I wasn't quite expecting that my journey into exploring what it means to be a woman today would start with such a bang and would start the very next day! I'd been planning to go to the Talitha Koumi Women's Leadership Conference at Tearfund for some time but being busy, and generally spending my time worrying about the prologue of John's gospel and what not, I didn't really have many expectations.

And didn't I get a great surprise! First of all it was extraordinary to be in a room full of Christian women all hugely gifted, colourful and splendid creatures and watching them one by one wipe the sleep from their eyes and do exactly what that phrase demands and arise. We heard about identity from Kate Coleman, whose amazing book I have blogged about before, and about all the things we can do as women to shoot ourselves in the foot as leaders. Desperate need to please, never saying no and allowing everyone else to dictate who you are, anyone? There were so many nodding heads in the room that it was like being in a room full of Churchill dogs (in the nicest possible way!)

There were some absolutely classic sound bites, a woman standing up and pondering why is was she could work in some of the most dangerous conflict zones in the world and lead multi-million pound teams and yet was only qualified to pour the tea in church and a lesson in tackling some of the inevitable flack as a female leader with a brilliant sense of humour from Elaine Storkey, President of Tearfund. There I was with a renowned Theologian and a former President of the Baptist Union in the UK and a hundred women all asking questions just like me and I wanted to stand up, clap my hands and yell 'Thank GOD!' (I seem to be drawn to this standing on chairs and yelling thing fairly often these days!)

For me it was a massively affirming time. I spent twenty minutes with a wonderful woman who was so genuinely excited about everything that I was doing and hoping for that I left with refreshed vision and motivation. And now here I am on Monday morning, with a mixed bag of feelings and all the usual challenges to take on again in my life but that phrase keeps ringing in my ears. Talitha Koumi, Talitha Koumi, Talitha Koumi. Little girl, get up, arise, stand up, be counted. As Kate very firmly said to us, 'Little girl, grow up.'

There are too many things to count that could overwhelm me on this journey, the arrows come from all angles and sometimes from the least expected places. But the way I see it we have two options. We can let the crap that comes our way overwhelm us, we can bow to it, stay quiet and stay in our places or we can get up, grow up and take responsibility for ourselves, our leadership and our lives. What do you want to do today? Who do you want to be? What do you need to say? I say to you: 'Talitha Koumi.' Little girl, arise.

International Women's Day - Women and the Church

Since starting training for ministry in the Church of England I think a lot about being a woman. Partly because our being there is still a fact that is remarkable to many people in the church even though we have been being ordained for twenty years now. The comments of others can certainly drive me crazy, the constant obsession with dress (For the record: I don't want to look like a man or like I just stepped out of the 1980s, I just want to look like me) and the constant application of 'lady' to any title (lady-vicar anyone?!) but quite often the many thoughts come from me.

From the incredible frustration of seeing a room full of entirely male Bishops and wanting to stand on my chair and scream 'What is going on here? It's 2013?!!' The incredible vacuum when it comes to female role models. I'm sick of being talked to about gender by men. 90% of every reading list I get given is by male writers. We are so used to it I don't even think we see it any more. I don't want to see women there for the sake of it. I just want there to be more excellent female scholars and leaders. I want to learn from and be inspired by some strong, confident and successful women but again and again these top jobs are occupied by men.

In some ways this all adds up to an enormous level of pressure. As a young women in a universally male dominated institution the fate of womankind can feel like it is weighing on your shoulders. The remarks about how women aren't getting the theological education needed to be senior leaders or building the confidence to apply for the top roles (if they could even apply for them at all, which as we know they currently can't) are common. The beedy eye of expectation is turning towards our generation and I can't help but wonder if we are up for the task.

Of course we want to take it on. Goodness me, we really do, for all the reasons I have given above. But before that I think we have some work to do. I think we need a positive discourse. I'm searching for it myself. Not just what women are not in comparison to what men are but what we are in our own right. What does it mean to be a woman in Britain in 2013? What does it mean to be a Christian women? This is my journey right now and I'm afraid I don't have any answers.

I know what I don't want. I don't want to spend my life thinking about my thighs and embarking on bizarre diets. I don't want to spend my life chasing a man (good job as I'm married!). I don't want to live in the shadow of my husband or for him to live in mine. I don't want to be someones assistant because I'm too afraid to be their boss. I don't want to miss chances because of lack of confidence and be another stat for why women aren't getting into the roles they should be. I don't want my gender identity to be dictated to me by advertising slogans or out of date theories, bad theology and dodgy preconceptions. I want to have a voice and I want you to have one too.

But as for that positive discourse, well Reader, I am still looking. And of course, you can be assured, I'll take you along with me on the way.

 

Linking up with Lulastic's International Women's Day Blog Link Up, stop by for many other fab bloggers celebrating everything female and probably ranting a lot less than me! ;)

 

Happy International Women's Day!

In which I know everything and nothing at all

Studying, what larks eh? Hours in the books, eons over essays and in our case a bewildering ninety minutes with our brilliant but brain fuddling tutor each week. You emerge, you hope slightly better informed, but more than anything completely, blatantly aware of you own huge inadequacies. Man, I love it! I can feel my wings spreading out with every passing moment, my mind stretching, my perceptions blowing wide open.

The whole process of coming into training has been a suspension of control. Rather than being able to plan out where my life is going and set neat little markers up so I can see where everything is and the way ahead now I just live day by day. Sure, I have hopes and dreams and a vague sense of where it is all going but the particulars and details are all in the imagination of God and I'm just doing what he has laid out on the table before me right now. Each day is completely spontaneous and entirely dictated by other people, it is terrifying and liberating. Every week I am asked to do something utterly bizarre that nine times out of ten I'm not totally convinced I can do. But then I do it and it's ok and my confidence grows.

What I'm learning is that if the future isn't meticulously planned out then there is nowhere else to live but the present moment. There is nothing but the opportunities that present themselves and then going for it with laughter and enthusiasm.

 

This week I spent an hour colouring talking about the merits of blue v.s purple hair with eight year olds, an evening dancing to the most insanely cheesy music man has every recorded to CD with a bunch of trainee vicars, mulled over the ins and outs of divine wisdom, plumbed the depths of my understanding of the mother heart of God and wore bright yellow shoes just for the fun of it. I find myself grabbing moments, grabbing life by the shirt collars, giving it a good shake and seeing what comes out.

As the end of term two beckons I'm so glad to be here. To be simultaneously discovering everything I want to be and landing firmly on my backside realizing everything that I'm not. Being a total idiot one moment and being more than I thought I could be the next. Knowing everything and knowing nothing at all.

Experiments in taking on the World

This week I've been having a little bit of an experiment with myself. Hold in there with me for this, it could all sounds a bit American (sorry American readership!) and cheesy but beneath all that I think there is some real truth to it. I've been reading a book called Weekend Life Coach by Lynda Field, an author whose book on self esteem is part of the NHS Books on Prescription Scheme (so she comes with some recommendation from the kind of people who know what they are talking about!).

This foray into the self help world of literature was partly prompted by a chance meeting I had with a patient while on Hospital Chaplaincy (yet another life-loving, courageous wonderful woman) and partly by coming across yet another depressing set of statistics about women in leadership. Did you know that the number one reason women don't go for senior roles is lack of confidence? Depressing isn't it?

I know full well that I suffer from 'Assistant Syndrome'. I always imagine myself as someone's assistant rather than the person in charge when I think about my future even though I know (from the many reports written about me over the last couple of years!) that this is not how others see me. On the spiritual side of things I worry that I will fail to use the gifts and opportunities that God has given me if I fail to really believe in myself, or that I will fail to enjoy all the wonderful things I've been given, to fully appreciate life, both of which just seem like a criminal waste and a slight to the wonderful God I believe gave them to me.

But Lynda argues that appreciation of life and confidence are attitudes that you cultivate. Her theory goes something like this: what you visualize in your head is what you get or put another way what you tell yourself will happen, you translate into action by the way you behave and bring into reality. So if you decide your day is going to be rubbish, it probably will be and vice versa. So this week I watched myself. Watched when I started thinking negatively and switched my thoughts to completely outlandishly positive ones.

In most of these incidences I was basically lying to myself. 'You really DO want to cycle up this hill Nicola and when you do you will feel a huge sense of satisfaction'. Yeah, right. I've cycled up the same hill about fifty times and never felt one ounce of satisfaction. But you know what? (and I still can't quite believe it). It really did work. I sat at the top of that hill, barely puffing and utterly shocked. Time and again over the week when I replaced the negative for the positive the experience or event or interaction went so much better. Better conversations, better work, better days.

Lynda asks you to visualize your future as wild as you can make it. What would you hope to be and do if the only limit was your imagination? I have to say even this outlandish thinking about my future seems to be paying off. For the first time when questioned about my future this week I smiled and nodded and said without hesitation 'Yes, I could see myself as Rector of a large church one day.' It was only after the words came out of my mouth that I realised I had said them. Where an earth did that come from?! Perhaps all this positivity stuff has something in it after all, what do you think? I think - watch out world!

The year that was - 2012

I don't know about you but this time of year always makes me a bit reflective. As the New Year approaches you look back over what has been since you last desperately tried to keep yourself awake till midnight (if you are old like me!) and wonder at all that has passed in the last year. This time last year I was where I am heading today, at my in-laws house. I was pretty grumpy as the clock turned twelve because life was so very uncertain.

2012 - the year of good beer and saying farewell to Summertown

I had no idea what 2012 held in store and at that moment I'd well and truly lost the excitement of that and rather felt frustrated. I'd been waiting one year and three months for my interview for ministry training and had another three months to go until it arrived. The biggest question though was what I would do if I didn't get in. Work was, as it had been for many years, uninspiring and with a constant nagging feeling of being utterly in the wrong place but unable to find the right one. And it was easy. I sometimes long for easy now but when I think back to I hadn't been challenged in a role in years. I hadn't cared about what I did every day for such a long time. 

And then 2012 came. With a bang. Five days in and our house was broken in to. All in all I'm pretty much over it but not enough to want to relive those weeks again. But here's how it was if you want to look back (aren't blogs handy?!)

In the midst of all of that the interview came around quite unexpectedly fast. Before I knew it was back home, waiting for that dreaded envelope with the answer I had been waiting so long for. Accompanied by a burst sewage pipe the news arrived, and as we know, it was a yes. Life had changed for ever and in five short months I was off, not before collecting and renovating enough second hand furniture to fill our new house (if not a small shop!) and with a month long sojourn to Zambia with a bunch of sixteen year olds.

 

Wandering the streets with some bookshelves. There was a lot of this going on!

 

Zambia was unexpectedly life changing. I barely had time to register that I was going before I found myself there. I learnt how much fun it is to care, to see other people develop and grow into themselves and I got back to the heart of what really matter just at the right time as when that plane touched down I had four weeks until we were packing up the boxes and moving to college.

Beautiful Zambia

And so what about this year, as the clock turns midnight and I let out an almighty yawn? What does 2013 have in store? Challenge, that's for sure. Change as I continue on this intense journey of training. Joy, as new Greek words become my words and new ancient worlds are opened up to me through study (I'm a geek and I love it!) Im pretty sure I'll be frustrated. I will probably moan on this blog a fair bit. It won't be easy. But I will care and looking back on 2012 I think that is the greatest gift of all. Days that mean something to me. Bring on 2013!

The view from my college study, where you'll find me in 2013.

Getting back to you

The space from college this holiday has given me that most brilliant of things – FREEDOM! (cue singing of George Michael, 'Freeeedom, I'll not let you down....', you with me? No? Ok then.). It has taken a few days but now, much like the girl in the Twinnings advert, I find myself 'getting back to me' as I float away on a sea of Vampire Diaries watching and cake eating induced bliss.

I find myself wanting to set a few things straight. To put some stakes in the ground to mark where I stand and what I stand for while I still have the objectivity that a bit of separation from everyday life brings. Something to look back on as I continue on this journey. Some signposts for the way. So here they are, some rough and early musings that have come up as I've 'gotten back to me'.

Right? Yeah right.

I've been known to get it 'wrong'. Say things in the the wrong order, say the wrong things altogether. Light the wrong candles, narrowly avoid setting fire to the giant flappy sleeved robe I'm asked to wear (I mean, what genius came up with that eh?). But stake one is this – there is no right way (except maybe the setting fire to yourself bit, I'm pretty sure that isn't right...). The right way is an action done with love, compassion, intelligence and integrity. Nothing else really matters.

The future is God-made not Church-made

Ordination is not a one way street to stress, a job you complain constantly about and never seeing your family again. That lifestyle is chosen, no matter what anyone tells me. I've never taken the conventional route. I've never been a slave to other people's expectations or what I 'ought to do'. I'm on an adventure with God, that is what the life of faith is to me. There are many roles and many ways of being in them and there is one for me, as me.

Brighter, bolder. More, more, more!

Quoting my old pal St Iranaeus: 'The glory of God is a human fully alive'. There is a feeling in what I've been taught in the last few weeks of diminishing yourself. There is a call to always blend in despite the major movements in the church being lead by those who did anything but. I was told this term that if I wanted to 'advance' in the church then I ought to wear black, to fit in with the 'boys' as it were.

But the thing is God made me colourful. And if I see ministry at its depth as a calling out to people to be fully alive, fully themselves in all their glorious technicolour, then how can I model that in black when I'd be wearing it to hide or advance? I must be colourful too. And luckily for me I'm not really bothered about advancing I'm bothered about being who God made me to be. Teen drama watching, Christmas obsessed, glittery nail varnish wearing me.

'It's not enough!'

There is a character in Gossip Girl called Cyrus Rose who when he hugs people holds on for the bit too long and when they try and pull away says 'Not enough!' My husband jokes that I am a spiritual Cyrus Rose. I have always had a deep hunger for the extraordinary. Having space from college has helped me to see what is extraordinary and what is just plain run of the mill. When I pray stuff happens. When I go to church I expect God to be there. When I say words I mean them. I've seen extraordinary stuff this term and that's what I want more of. Because anything else, well, it's 'not enough'!

So there we are. A few stakes in the ground. A wee manifesto for next term. And now I'm off to paint my nails and watch the Vampire Diaries. I am nothing if not consistent!!

…..And the mouse within

I didn't plan to write a part two to yesterdays post on this term but today has made me think otherwise. I've always tried to give a fair portrayal of how things really are on this blog. Ultimately this is because I believe whole heartedly in cutting the BS. I can't see any other way to really connect. Until we start to say with honesty where we are at, until we learn to live by the truth rather than the image we project, well, I'm not sure there's much hope for us. Much less in my line of work that has been know for centuries as a place of pomp, of hierarchy and of holier than thou. I don't know about you but I've seen enough of that. I'm looking for something more human.

Today we had a seminar on preaching. I'm excited about preaching probably because I love blog writing so much. That and because I genuinely love diving into the Bible which surprises me, shocks me, does my head in and encourages me in equal measure. But what I realised today in that seminar felt like the weight of fifteen bibles placed on my shoulders. Because, and here's the real secret, half the time I'm pretty convinced I can't do the things I'm being asked to do.

Now I know you're not supposed to say that. You are supposed to have the swagger of authority, to seem like you can hold the cares of the world in the palm of you hand and not even notice it. But I'm not like that. When I think about having something to say to people, something honest and relevant that stays true to the awesome and torturous history of this faith and the whole history of a nation, well, I feel very, very afraid. I feel like a gnat about to be splatted with the book I'm trying to preach from.

I've been known to call my being here a divine joke. Not that I don't think I should be here but that there is still an absurdity to it. I'm a square peg looking at a round hole and saying 'now how do you suppose this is going to happen?' It can be so easy to look around and think about everything I don't know. I can name about three hymns, all the ones people complain about because they are so old hat or sung too often. I have to rename the church silverware by names of Dr Who villains to make them stick in my mind and then very nearly end up calling a Ciborium a Cyborg out loud.

Ciborium or Cyborg?

Oh, I'm a trier, I really am, but sometimes I just want to sack the ritual and stand in the middle of a field to say my prayers that I make up right there on the spot. In the church God made rather than the one we create for him. Sometimes I need to sing Stevie Wonder to God and not something penned circa 1850. Sometimes I want to say I've had a bad day too, let you know that I'm a human being, that dog collars and robes don't mean a thing. We are all the same aren't we? We have the same beginning and the same end after all. The same hopes and fears at the bottom of it.

I don't say this to illicit cries of 'oh no you're more than capable'. Perhaps that is true, perhaps it isn't, perhaps it will become true with time. I say it to anyone sitting at their desk thinking 'I can't do this' or ducking out of what they feel they should be doing because of feeling too small for the task. I say it in the light of all the things I said yesterday. All the very real joys and triumphs of this journey. I'm saying it to be honest with you.

All I know I do have, and why the powers-that-be sent me here in the first place, is an irrepressible love for God. I don't really have any credit for that. It's like a power surge that I've found myself plugged into. One of my favourite poems is a very early, very simple Japanese verse. It goes 'Though one dams it and dams it my heart still breaks through like a swift river, saying how beautiful he is'. And that, my friends, is really all I have and I'm trusting it to carry me through.

I want that to be remembered as I tell my stories here and that's why I say it again now. Don't ever feel like you are too ordinary for the things you have in your heart to do. Perhaps it's the ordinary that will be the extraordinary thing. Who knows?

The term that was

I can't quite believe it but I am in the last week of my first term at vicar college. I was doing some reading today about education in Ancient Greece and the author described how the program for students involved working both body and mind intensively. With all the cycling up and down the world's largest hill (fact!) and the mind bending demands of the Oxford course I feel like this might have survived a couple of millennia and made its way into the ethos of theological college. Hmmm.......

And what else of these first few months? The study is as cool as I thought it would be, no scrap that, it's cooler. I'm reaching new levels of geeky with each passing week. The topics are fascinating. One minute we're in 13^th Century BC on the exodus out of Egypt with Israel (or not, depending on what you make of the research!) and the next we're in the courts of the temple with the Apostle Paul listening to classical rhetoric and the dawning of a new world faith.

College is maddening and brilliant. I'm pretty sure that once the dust settle on this term I'm going to start to realise what has already changed in me. Every week has something new and challenging, whether that is visiting at the hospital or leading a service, reading at church or figuring out the truly mystical inner workings of a church sacristy (the place where they set up all the holy stuff to you and me!).

I am still most definitely an alien on Planet Christian but now I'm in an even stranger place that is Planet Church of England, nay even weirder Planet Theological College! And what a crazy place that has been to be these past few weeks. I'm baffled by something at least once a day (women bishops anyone?!) but then I'm touched by something just as often. I'm learning the art of 'just turning up' when I really don't want to and knowing those moments when like a wink to God, the author of the sense of humour, I can bend the rules a little.

I probably know less now about where I think I'm going than when I started here. I've definitely been drawn to things, sometimes quite brilliantly unexpected things. I've had little hints of where this might all go, what kind of church or community might be the right place for me. What I might be good at and what it might be as well to avoid. But mostly I've learned not to look too far ahead. There really is too much going on today for that and that is pretty darn cool.

Hospital Visiting

Every week this year I'm spending an afternoon with the chaplaincy team in one of the hospitals in Oxford. I've wanted to work alongside a chaplain since I worked as a nursing assistant up in Aberdeen. The chaplains there were amazing. After the Piper Alpha Disaster in the North Sea the chaplains provided a safe space in the chapel where relatives could wait for news and then have someone to fall back on whatever the outcome. I found it fascinating, to see people go to the depths of human devastation time and again and still be happy, smiling people, usually with a fantastic sense of fun. It just seemed so illogical, surely being surrounded by all that suffering would harden you? That you'd lose your sense of joy in it all? But I never saw that.

I've often wondered if there is something in that. If travelling through 'The Valley of Sorrows' with people, as one of my favourite psalms puts it, really does bring a sense of peace that goes beyond all explanations. It's something I feel drawn to wherever I see it. So when the opportunity arose to do a placement in hospital I knew it was one to go for. I'm afraid of it, that's for sure, but I seem to have an irrepressible urge to go into those fearful places. As I spoke to one of the chaplains today she smiled when I said that and responded 'that's what chaplains do'. That combined with my love of being out in the world, on the cutting edge, left us mulling over if there might be some chaplaincy work in my future. Watch this space!

Today I visited the Childrens' Hospital. It's purpose built with play rooms in every ward, chill out rooms on the teenagers floor and bright colours everywhere. Of all the time I've spent in hospital this was the most upbeat and uplifting environment I've been in. Thank goodness for that for the sake of those children that call this place home whether for a few weeks of cancer treatment of an unexpected trip to surgery after a nasty fall. The bravery was palpable in the air. Heroic kids, Mums and Dads worthy of awards for just being there and keeping a smile on their face.

The chaplain was inspiring, wearing a dress covered in daisies and popping her head round the curtains to say hello, hear stories and to let people know there is someone about should they need them. We talked about her day to day, the literally life saving work of helping someone back from the emotional brink at the loss of a child. I've never seen a minister involved so much, so often, in the darkness of human experience and I couldn't help but think that if Jesus was about today that is where you'd find him. What a relief from all the infuriating technicalities and politics of church. This stuff really matters.

If you're the praying sort then do remember these kids and parents in hospital tonight, I know I will.

Keeping it Simple

The seasons are changing and with it our habits. Where we wanted to be outside with a chilled glass of wine, the bottles of red are being dusted off and the sofa is the location of choice. Box sets are our friends, cups of tea our staple. It won't be long before the mulled wine is brewing again. This week was ripe with challenges and by Friday I'd lost all energy for them, just wanting to curl up as the season demands and let the world pass me by for a minute. But luckily this weekend has been everything that this week hasn't been, an antidote to all the confusing, complicated strangeness where I've desperately longed for simplicity.

Last night I cooked a huge lasagne, is there anything more rejuvinatingly simple than that? Two of our best friends sat around our dining table and we laughed and chatted. We all have responsibilities now, shoes to fill and worries that our feet are not big enough to fill them. Like toddlers walking in our parents shoes. For a while it was good to realise that life can be as simple as the popping of a cork and leaning back in your chair and laughing.

This morning I went for the first time to my placement church where I will be each Sunday for the next year. After all the theorizing, the debates on how church should work (and frankly all the sheer complicated nonsense that surrounds that!), I could finally breathe again. It's an almost comical irony that training for church ministry takes you so far our of the world you are training to be in. Vicar School is so earnest, so slick. Does that sound ungrateful? Perhaps it is. But I've been missing the roughness, the patched togetherness of ordinary church services, of life in the community.

That is the Kingdom of God to me and where I know I belong. I'm a thoroughly ordinary person, constantly saying the wrong thing and laughing far to loudly. These are my people! At church today the children took to the front and sang a song with beaming smiles on their faces, gifted little things full of happiness and possibility. We celebrated someone's 100^th birthday with a posy of flowers. We talked about chicken recipes over coffee. Glorious simplicity.

I realised this week how much I need those moments. Like a shaft of sunlight cutting through the clouds on a grey day. It's a well needed reminder of what it is all for. As the lady who lead the prayers at church today said 'There are so many divisions in church, remind us that what you ask of us is so simple. To love you, to love our neighbour, to include and put up no barriers that stop people from knowing you.' I'm holding on to that this week. To going for it with the abandon of children, to caring less when I get it wrong, to looking for the heart of the matter. To a bit more simplicity.

Tired and Inspired

I've been itching to write a blog post since I started college on Monday. But as it is this week has been planned down to the last minute, nay second, with meetings, tours, warnings, encouragements all neatly packaged into twelve hour days. Tired doesn't cut it!

The church in Cuddesdon - the site of much damp, chilly prayer this week! (from www.oxfordcitybranch.org.uk)

 

Tired, yes but also inspired. Every corner of college is a piece of history. Samuel Wilberforce, founder of the college and son of the great emancipator William Wilberforce, looks down on us as we eat our meals. The wings of the building are named after past principals, vice principals and benefactors each with their own fascinating story. All of them innovators, lots of them the thorn in the side of their contemporaries because of it. Each of them standing up for something different, for higher ideals that they refused to compromise.

Samuel Wilberforce, what a legend.

The history is as winding as the staircases. I'm captured by it, a bit entranced. Ready to be a tiny little bit of the history of this place and very thankful for it. The library is a slice of heaven, volumes and volumes lined up around perfect reading nooks all looking out onto the rolling hills of the Oxfordshire countryside. Study has begun in earnest, my first essay is due next week, but I'm smiling to myself as I leaf through the reading list. I'm finally here at last!

Today we visited some churches, barely a few days in I can't help but wonder about the end when I'll be back in the community, ordained with a ministry of my own. We visited a couple of churches near Oxford ending up at Dorchester Abbey. Every ordained role is so different, every community so unique and for the first time I feel inspired by the people I meet. I want their jobs. I've never felt this way. I've always been the one in the training rolling my eyes and thinking 'man, I DO NOT want your job!' and despairing that I feel that way. Wondering if I will ever find my 'thing'.

But oh am I tired! My legs feel like planks of wood from cycling up and down the hill. I have a cold coming and I know it's only getting tougher, busier, more challenging from here. But I AM HERE! For the first time I have a bubbling excitement at my work, a rising hope in me for the future. I've got a secret smile and that wonderfully happy-making feeling sneaking up on me in quiet moments that this is exactly where I am meant to be.