So here it goes. Today I give you freshman year.
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| The Chicago River |
So I was off to Chicago. After a summer of good-byes and
high expectations of the windy city I was finally there. In my little dorm room
with a student athlete, there I was. My parents took me to Target to get some
little things before they left and I broke down. I didn’t realize the
loneliness I was going to feel the moment they left. They had literally been
there for everything in my life. I thought I was ready to live hours away from
home, on my own. After the initial shock of being on my own I eventually made
some friends, my roommate was great, our suitemates were great. School was much
more difficult than I imagined, but I survived. I came home for fall break and
this is when I decided I couldn’t make Chicago my home, simply because it
wasn’t my home. During this semester away, my suitemate and I would go to a
great church in a great neighborhood in Chicago. We tried to get involved in
student ministries, I just never felt like I met a group of people who I could
connect with. I often regret that I didn’t stay longer, but then I look at the
Wells Fargo student loan statement that they send me every year and decide it
was probably a good idea to not go to a private school all four years of
college. After this semester I realize God totally sent me to Chicago for his purpose.
The amount I learned from him in these 14 weeks was incredible. He taught me
what full trusting in him looked like. One day, being so broke and feeling like
I couldn’t ask mom and dad for any more money, I happened to win a contest that
I didn’t know I entered and won 100 dollars. This was just enough to get me
through the rest of the semester, buying Christmas presents for my family
too. Even though I was making
friends, I was so depressed at Loyola. I remember crying through my biology
class one day, because I just wanted to be home. At this point in my walk I wasn’t journaling, so I really
can’t remember what I was saying to God, but I imagine it was like “Lord,
PLEASE help me get through these next weeks without dying.” I was a dramatic
little freshman. I managed to make it and return home for my next semester.
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| Some Friends |
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| Sweet Puppy Violet |
Returning home was so hard. I didn’t think it would be, but
my close friends were gone. I was living with my parents, so it made it
difficult to make friends. I almost regretted coming home and going to KSU. I
thought KSU, being a state school, was going to be easy. No, it was actually
much more difficult than I imagined. In February of my freshman year I learned
some shocking news about my family and again I spent most of this semester
crying out to God. I asked for healing, restoration, strengthening and all of
that He gave and He gave fully. My faith shook due to a certain biology class
that I was taking. My professor made fun of Christians daily. All of this
craziness and difficulty had taken a toll and I had no idea what to do with
myself. So I secluded myself, drowning myself in TV shows. Eventually one
night, one of my friends invited me to a campus ministry that I had never heard
of. There I saw another friend who invited me to a Freshman lifegroup. I was
TERRIFIED to go. I was so shy and all these kids from Johnson County were
freaking me out. But I went and I made myself keep going. It was here that I
met Ms. Mary Beth Gromer, who would later be my roommate. This was also the time
that we got Violet. Our sweet little Mini Schnauzer who loves to be loved. It’s
crazy how full my heart feels when she cuddles with me. I’m a nut-case.
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| Acadia National Park |
So in the middle of the spring semester
I found an opportunity on Facebook to go to Maine for the summer through Campus
Crusade. I said to myself, “Anyway to get away from this madhouse and take a
walk in one of the most beautiful places in America? I’m there.” So after
talking to my parents and fundraising, I got on a plane to Bangor, Maine. It
was gorgeous. The people that I met there, the vulnerability that we shared,
the thoughts that I refused to encounter at home, made this experience
incredibly unique. God taught me true forgiveness, which is something that I
had never learned. God taught me that I am my own person and that sometimes it
is okay to say No. God also taught me that I need to listen, that my
relationship with him was quite one-sided at the time and that HE was also
apart of the relationship too. These valuable lessons I took home with me, and
my walk and relationship with the Lord was dramatically changed. I found a
journal from that trip. I didn’t write much, I was still figuring that one out…
I’m still figuring that one out. After reading through it I’m amazed at how
I’ve grown, how my bouts of disbelief are no longer what they used to be. “It’s
very humbling to stand in God’s creation… so then why is it so hard to listen
and feel guided?” My simple thoughts have now become more complex than that. I
see my trust in him as grown tremendously since then. My heart for him has
grown tremendously since then. Just now I am seeing fruit.
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| My job wasn't too busy, so played silly computer games mostly. |
As the summer rolled on I knew that I could no longer be
living on my parent’s money, I mean I was already living in their home. So I
searched for a job. ALL summer long I searched for a job. At the beginning of
August I was called in for an interview at Pawnee Mental Health Services. Starting this job was difficult for me.
It called me to be loving to those who were so different than me. Not only did
the job call me to do that, but God called me to do that. Oh, what I learned
from this job. I’ll try to share. I learned how to not be afraid of speaking to
people on the phone. I learned that love has no bounds. I learned of the demons
that people face and live with daily. I learned that sometimes all we need to
do is look a person in the eye. It also taught me to be tough and have a little
backbone, how easy it is to get manipulated. I could name so many more. This
job touched me beyond what I ever thought it could. It was difficult to have
people spill their hearts out to me over the phone because they felt no one
else would listen. It was difficult for me to see the HELP line go off and
realize that someone is legitimately thinking of ending their life in that
moment. It was difficult for me to see the violence that people suffered and
were willing to dispense if threatened. I worked here for two and a half years
and my heart softened and hardened at an incredible rate. This job had a
flexible work schedule, but it meant that I had to work Monday through Thursday
evenings. This means that I almost always missed Ichthus and was unable to join
many student activities.
There will be more I promise. I know... I left you all with a huge cliff hanger! haha.
