Work sucks, I know...

So, I had a summer job...

I worked at a local catering company that did food service for a large corporation in the Charleston area. Basically my job was to serve food, help customers, talk to them, run the cash register, restock the food and beverages, was dishes, cut fruit, and basically whatever else was needed.

For the most part, I liked my job. I worked with some pretty fun people (but some not-so-fun people), had a pretty large group of regulars that were fun and great people, and I was kept entertained for most of my stint as a food service worker.

I learned a lot in my 3 months with this company. I learned a lot about food service and why I do not want to ever make this business my career. I had planned on doing a rant about how to be a good customer (since there are a lot of notes/blogs/etc about how to make a sandwich, how to wait a table, how to work at Burger King, and that kind of thing) to show that yes, we are there to serve you, but you don't have to be a snob about it.

However, instead of the rant, I'm going to post what one of my coworkers, Christy, and I made up one extremely boring Sunday at work, alternating writing down the ways you know that work sucks.

You Know Work Sucks When:

• The most exciting part of the day is when you get a text from your mom.
• You make up games like "Fruit Skips", "How High Can You Reach?", and "Soy Sauce Launch"
  
• You're so bored that you clean walls to entertain yourself
• Getting to sit on the "perch" is a reward for standing for a few minutes
• The grits are congealed and they don't pass the plop test.
• You're excited to do dishes so you can stop staring at an empty dining room.
• You organize your boss' desk when he doesn't ask you to (and when it's not really messy to begin with)
• You organize, and then reorganize the stockroom to see how many boxes you can get rid of
• You text the words to the song stuck in your head to your boyfriend (work sucks, I know. She left me roses by the stairs. Surprises let me know she cares. Say it ain't so, I will not go. Turn the lights off. Carry me home. Nananananananananana nananananananananana. Or something like that)
• Hunting flies with a rag is a sport
• Excitement is seeing someone coming in to bring different food (lunch rather than breakfast) to you from the other part of the company. '
• You're OCD about the way the jelly sits in the tub...and the butter...and the sugar packets....
• And, finally: You know work sucks when you do a dance around the kitchen area when it's 1:59 so that when you get back to clock out it's exactly 2:00.

As always,

Lex

A Turn About the Marsh

So, I know I've been slack about posting on here. I said I'd do a Salkehatchie entry post-trip, but I'm still trying to get a picture slideshow together so I can put that on here instead of just trying to describe everything I did. Pictures say a lot more about the experience and work done than me just saying "we put on a roof and painted an old house". Yes, I could tell you the story behind the family we worked for etc, etc, but still. Pictures are needed. Anyway, that is neither here nor there.

After my hellacious 3 days at work this past weekend (22 hours of work in a 30 hour time period, followed by another 8 hour shift on Sunday), I thought that would be what I would write about.

But it's not. Last night, I had something happen that was amazing, beautiful, and rather philosophical.

As a lot of you know, I love to kayak. Ocean, river, whitewater, marsh, you name it, I've done it. Whitewater is probably my favorite, but marsh kayaking is a close second. The two are completely different, but that's part of the reason I love them so much.

Whitewater kayaking is all about the rush, not knowing what the rapid is going to be like or how fast you'll take that turn, or any other number of unpredictable things. One of my favorite memories of my old youth group at Bethany was when Matt was our youth minister and took a group of us up to Columbia to go whitewater rafting and kayaking on the Saluda River. It had rained a lot the week before, so the river was much faster and higher than usual. It was the second time our group had been up to the river, and I had fallen in love with whitewater kayaking because of that first trip. Since the river was a lot more dangerous this time, however (the rapids were about a class above what they usually were), the river guide was going to have all of us just be in the raft. Now, don't get me wrong, whitewater rafting is fun. The first time I went I was about 11 and I was in Costa Rica with my grandparents, and we went whitewater rafting on the Sarapiqui River. It was amazing. But since my first trip to the Saluda, I had really wanted to do more whitewater kayaking. Just as we were all about to get in the raft, Matt shows up dragging two kayaks and two paddles, throws me one of the paddles and tells me to pick my boat. I was ecstatic. Matt taught me a lot about whitewater kayaking and spent a lot of time teaching me some essentials, and some cool tricks as well. The experience was amazing to say the least.

So, you have the rush and amazing feeling of whitewater kayaking, but then there's another place in my heart for marsh kayaking. It's a completely different experience. It's quiet, peaceful, and just seems fitting for some reason. I love seeing all the wildlife that is hidden in the marshes. Birds, fish, gators (yes I've seen them out there before), and sometimes deer if you're lucky. My dad and I started to go marsh kayaking when I was a lot younger. He just all the sudden wanted a kayak and to explore all of the marsh waterways of SC, which there are a lot of. He would take me with him in our 2-person orange sit-on-top and we'd try out a different boat landing almost every weekend. Now that I'm older, I like to go out on the water by myself a lot of the time. My grandparents from New Jersey have a house in the Charleston area that backs up to a large creek. They have kayaks, and I've sort of claimed "Big Red" as my own. It's nothing special, just a red sit-on-top, but I love the way the boat feels in the water and how quickly it turns. It's an indescribable feeling.

Anyway, the point of all this was something that happened last night. I went out for a quick turn around the marsh, just needing a short trip to clear my head. The last few weeks have been rough. Heck, the last few months have been rough. Things haven't been great for me, for my family, for my friends, for a lot of people close to me this summer. Relationships, family problems, health problems, friend problems, and those are just naming a few. I just feel like everything's been crashing around me for a while. And I don't know how to stop it, or how to make it better. I had a mini breakdown last week, which led me to being on the beach in the middle of the night. I was out with friends and had another piece of bad news come in and just needed out. So I just started driving. I ended up at my favorite beach, out by the lighthouse, my sanctuary. And I just sat there for a few hours. Crying. Being pissed off. Staring at the moon. Wishing things were different. Thankfully one of my best friends called me that night and helped me keep my sanity. I'm so grateful for friends like that. The ones that stand by me no matter what. But that's a different rant for a different post.

When I was out on the water last night, it was absolutely beautiful. The sun was just starting to set behind the clouds, the water was showing off a perfect reflection of what was left of the blue sky and puffy white clouds. Dragonflies danced around my boat. Fish were jumping. It was just so perfect. It looked like it should be something on the cover of a brochure for South Carolina. Anyway, I got to the end of the first leg of the creek that is separated from the rest of the creek by a land bridge and just sat. I let my boat drift and just sit there, being still and not moving. I watched as the ripples around the boat changed to almost nonexistent. It made me think of something that someone told me once. He had been sitting in a pool, trying to get it to be completely still, and realized that even if you're not moving, you still affect the things around you. You can never be invisible, and you will always affect the things around you even if you're not taking action. Just your presence changes things. I thought, and still think, it was a very deep way to think about it. It's one of the reasons I admire this person, his ability to look beyond the face value of things. It's one of the reasons I miss being around him.

But life makes things complicated. The things we decide to do, or even the inaction we take, causes things to happen. Just like ripples on the water, we affect the people around us, for better or for worse. You can't run away from your problems as much as you try to. You eventually have to come to terms with things, whether it's a botched relationship or friendship, whether you feel it should have turned out the way it did or not, you have to accept things for how they are now. Wishing for a second chance will only turn out disappointment, and refusing to accept change will only leave you bitter. It's fine to remember the way things used to be, as long as they don't interfere with your current life. These are just a few of things I've realized this past summer. You have to let go, you have to move on, and you have to live life to its fullest. And I'm working on that.

When I got back from kayaking, I felt better. I felt refreshed. I felt new again. And I feel like I can handle this now. Everything that has happened this summer, for good or for bad, is helping to change me into a better person, the person I need to be.

As always,

Lex

Salkehatchie

So, this will be my last post for about a week.

Why, you may ask?

Well, I will be unable to access a computer, or the Internet, and will have very limited phone access.

No, I am not going on a top secret spy mission, or to the moon, or anything like that.

I'm going to Santee, South Carolina. For those of you from SC, you know Santee is off of I-95 about 90 or so miles outside of Charleston. For those of you not familiar, Santee is in the middle of NOWHERE. Corn. More corn. Power plant. a few trees. Some open fields. etc.

So why am I going there, of all places?

Well, every summer I go to Santee to work on houses. I work with a program called Salkehatchie Summer Service (insert page here: http://www.salkehatchie.org/). Salkehatchie is a program where teens, young adults, and adults of varying construction experience get together throughout SC to repair homes of the less fortunate. These are home of people who may be facing financial, health, or other issues and do not have the means to make vital changes to their home. This can include anything from roofing to flooring to fixing foundations to repairing or building porches to plumbing to electrical work. We've seen it all. Houses burned from electrical fires. Homes destroyed by storms. Homes that do not have electricity, running water, or even a bathroom.

I started working with Salkehatchie the summer before my freshman year of high school when I was 14. I learned about it through my church (Salkehatchie is a Methodist service project, but is open to anyone of any denomination or walk of faith but is deeply rooted in the Christian faith) and went with a bunch of friends in my youth group. We went to Piedmont (another part of SC) that year and had a good time, but the following year I couldn't go to the same camp. I asked one of my former youth ministers with whom I was still very close what he recommended that I do. He told me to go to Santee and meet Joe and Kathy Jo and Tommy (the camp directors). He also told that was where he felt the most at home. So that summer, I went by myself to Santee. I didn't know a soul. I was 15 and felt very out of place without my friends. But Matt (my former youth minister) was right. I felt at home at Santee. I felt like I was supposed to be there. And I've made lifelong friends since starting at Santee. Now, going on my 6th year at Salkehatchie and my 5th year at Santee, I'm an assistant site leader. I keep in touch with a good number of the campers and site leaders throughout the year. And I'm ready for another amazing week. Each summer that I go to Salk, I seem to learn a new set of skills. My first year, I knew how to hold a hammer and that was about it. Now, I know how to do a whole lot of construction thanks to my years at Salk and with Habitat for Humanity. I've done roofing, siding, painting, porch building, plumbing, electrical work, built and outhouse, fixed foundations, put in multiple sets of windows and doors, and a whole other list of things that I can't even remember. I run a saw better than most of the guys (not to brag, but I'm serious) and do as much damage to a nail with my little 12 ounce wooden hammer than the big macho guys with their fiberglass killers.

But aside from all that, Salkehatchie is a really great project, and I'm glad to continue to be a part of it.

If anyone has questions for me about the program or you want to get involved, feel free to ask me!

When I get back, I will be posting about my week and some of the things that went on, along with some pictures...possibly. :)

Have a great week everyone!! Catch ya on the flip side :)