Sleep Cycles

So, I don't know when it happened but at some point this year I took a detour from the camp schedule and started staying up until ridiculous hours.  The thing is, getting back on camp schedule is going to be difficult.  It's also important to note that my new sleep schedule has not been to stay up to ridiculous hours and then sleep late.  I'm talking about staying up until sometime between 2 and 4 a.m. and then waking up the next morning between 6 and 8 a.m.  What the heck is wrong here?  I mean, surely I will be doing this for study purposes next year but there is really no point in doing it now.  I used to do it in undergrad because I liked to hang out with people as long as they were awake and then do my alone studying after everyone was asleep.  Now though, I'm doing nothing productive.  I have been on facebook, talked on AIM (which I had completely forgotten existed until recently), read a couple of blogs that interest me, read the New York Times online, watched YouTube videos.  Seriously, I'm not sure that this is something I should be staying awake for.  And yet times when I've tried to adapt back to a normal schedule I've been unsuccessful.  I tried to do so last night.  I put in a movie and laid in bed.  At 10:00 I turned the movie off and snuggled into bed.  I laid there, and laid there, and laid there.  Nothing.  No sleep.  Then, having set my alarm for 11:00 a.m., I was awake at 7:00 a.m.  I've got to start doing some sleep inducing drugs or something (um, actually, ignore that- bad idea).   Anyway,  I've now reached a sleeping hour window and I think that I will try to grasp it.

My name is Samantha Lewis and I am going to sleep...

...maybe

Happy Days

To be quite honest I do not have time to blog right now, but, I'm going to anyway. Things have been pretty busy lately. I pretty much got back from Montgomery Tuesday night of April 14 and haven't really taken a breath since. I substituted and then we had the golf tournament that Friday. Regarding the golf tournament- it was great. I had a great time. PLUS, I won a t-shirt for being on the team with the highest score (for those of you who didn't get that just now, it means I got a prize for being on the worst team there).

Anyway, since then I have subbed a lot, including my birthday when I was supposed to sub for gym and showed up fully equipped with a lawn chair, a frisbee and a whiffle ball bat. I did that for 3 periods and then the journalism teacher had to leave so I went to her class the rest of the day. I was fine with that because being in there made my think of Mr. Forbus (old journalism professor) which meant I spent most of the day trying to get people to use words that actually describe what they mean. The rest of that day was pretty eventful. Got called back to camp to make a bed- a little bit infuriating but fine. Ran out of gas- I'm an idiot. Made it to The Pig- hooray. Then I went to Wilco, which was awesome. I do feel like I would be over glorifying the experience if I didn't try to convey how absolutely AWFUL the opening band was. A Hawk and a Hack Saw- look them up, they're terrible. And, in all honesty, I briefly fell asleep during Wilco (combination of exhaustion and other things). BUT, Wilco was pretty amazing.

Last weekend was Double Decker weekend in Oxford, which was pretty awesome. They close of the square and people set up tents and sell things and there are bands and it was great. The most important thing to note is that there was one of the best petting zoos of all time. I got to feed the llama.

Today is filled with getting camp ready for a group that will be coming in tomorrow. Plus church. Tomorrow, I think I may be off to the ATL (happy days).

My name is Samantha Lewis and I've been busy.

I'm going to school here... are you kidding me?

There are many reasons that I am excited about the fall. These pictures represent one of those reasons:

Amazing.

Good Mornting

So, I woke up at about 5:00 (eastern time) and tried to fight it for about 45 minutes but sadly lost the battle. I know that later today I am most certainly going to regret this. My greatest moment of regret will likely come during my drive from Atlanta ("Mom, don't you know I'm in the A-T-L?!) to Montgomery (FunGomery, if you will). I'm not sure if it's the excitement of school next year or if it's the excitement of looking at a house this morning, but something has me awake right now. And I'm not just talking about that morning awake where there is some groggyness involved; I'm talking eyes wide open, alert and awake. I think it's probably a combination of the two excitement factors that's doing me in. In any event, here I am.

It seems important to note that NO ONE is on facebook chat at 6:00 eastern time. I thought that maybe one of my friends who does honest work for a living... NOPE. Seriously, out of 976 people, not ONE is on right now. That's CRAZY. I suppose we should keep in mind that one of those friends is Hank The Hawk, whose facebook I still monitor. So, ok, 975 people. What the heck?

So this is an opportunity to get started on some of the work I need to get done. Unfortunately that will probably not happen. No, I'll facebookstalk some people, read the New York Times online, play a little websudoku.com and utterly waste away the next 2.5 hours. Hooray.

My name is Samantha Lewis and I am awake.

CloverJam Time

This is a post from yesterday that wouldn't go up until now:
Huntingdon, in all of it's success and failure, at least recognizes that there were traditions here at one point in time. The theme for this year's reunion "Different, but Still the Same: 100 Great Years of May Day,Homecoming, Reunion, and CloverJam in Montgomery." Homecoming used to be in the spring and it was lovely. Girls dressed up on the stage on the green, a celebration of coming home, glorious. 3 or 4 years ago Huntingdon decided that since we now had a football team we needed to do homecoming in the fall. They now do the whole prance out on the football field in heels thing. It's fine, whatever. To subdue those who were angered about this (like me) Huntingdon decided to have a reunion weekend during the spring. It occurred to the powers that be that in order to get people to come there would have to be a significant event. Thus CloverJam was created. An opportunity for students, alumni, and the cloverdale community to crowd the streets of Fairview Avenue and participate in fellowship at its best.

All of that brings us to this year when it was decided that the event needed to be moved on campus to avoid debauchery and so that it would just be the Huntingdon community. Also, they decided to get a big band. What became of this? CloverJamXL. Yeah. They were like "throw an 'XL' on the end of there, nobody will know the difference." Haha... oh Huntingdon. My dear sweet Huntingdon. The big band- Sister Hazel. I will quote my friend JD here "Sam, who is Sister Hazel?" Student tickets-free, alumni tickets-$10, community tickets-$20. Keep in mind that part of the reason we moved the event was so that it would only be the Huntingdon Community and then we proceeded to sell tickets to the public... my dear, sweet Huntingdon. All proceeds go to benefit the MDA, which I'm ALL FOR. HOWEVER, I question the amount of proceeds we're going to bring in. But I hope for the best. ALSO, for an alumni event, shouldn't we charge the students before we charge the alumni? Just a thought. AND to add insult to serious injury, they've banned dogs from the event. Mr. Joe is crushed! He loves CloverJam.

My response to everything has been rather rational, something I'm not accustomed to. I organized a group of people to write letters to the college expressing out concern. I'm not sure if anyone else sent a letter, but I did. I got a response that was basically "thanks for your concern, we're doing this anyway." It was, however, kind of them to send a response. Then, I gave up. There was no fighting this one. I have purchased my ticket and will be attending the student acts from 6:00-8:00. These happen to include the Jennifer Moody Band which I'm STOKED about. I am not going to Sister Hazel. Not that I'm completely opposed to their music, more that I'm completely indifferent to it.

Some things I'm excited about this weekend:
-Seeing many good friends
-AOII gathering this afternoon
-Softball Game
-Return to Old Cloverdale, the real O.C. if you will
-Chris' Hot Dogs tonight

My name is Samantha Lewis and it's CloverJam weekend

Best day of my life

So I'm ready to get back to having the best day of my life every day. I did this for about two years and then it kind of slipped away. Well, I'm trying to give "best day of my life" a come back tour. Mostly because, well, it's the right state of mind. I think my parents called this the Pollyanna point of view. She played "the glad game". But I always thought that was kind of lame. Mostly I thought it was lame because it was infuriating to be angry and then have your mother say "you should play the glad game." I didn't want to be glad, I wanted to be pissed. Well, the basis of "best day of my life" is pretty similar except that it's not from Pollyanna and it does not imply that I'm always happy. Instead, "best day of my life" simply is my personal reminder that I was not guaranteed another day. Life is uncertain, each day is my gift from God. I think it's about time I start treating it like that again.

My name is Samantha Lewis and I'm having the best day of my life.

Meditate on these things

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.
Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy—meditate on these things. The things which you learned and received and heard and saw in me, these do, and the God of peace will be with you.

I lose sight of these words so often. How does that happen? They're so important. I mean, there are so many passages in Phillipians that I have to read 17 times and then I'm still not sure if I understand, but this- this I get. So if i get it, I should go ahead and GET it, which may or may not make sense. It's not important. What's important is that I'm going to try to meditate on whatever is true, noble, just, pure, lovely, of good report- Happy Thursday

My name is Samantha Lewis and I'm going to have a Phillipians 4:6-9 day.