TQ

Spring 2010 TQ Interns


I love how life works out sometimes. I don't know if I believe in fate, but I do believe that most things happen for a reason. This semester has been one of the most stressful, overwhelming that I can remember in a long while, but it's also been extremely insightful, life-changing (I feel like I'm always saying that, but I do often tend to experience and savor life-changing opportunities) and I feel SO LUCKY.

My internship has been a truly phenomenal experience. I never in a million years expected to be working with such an amazing group of individuals - employees and other interns as well. I never expected to be a part of an agency that truly provides outstanding support services to families and children... so much so that TQ is not considered an organization, but a "family". Once you are a part of the family, as an employee, intern, volunteer, client, etc. then you are in it for life! I've never seen such a community based non-profit organization that is so dedicated to helping families and children who are dealing with so many different challenges. It's refreshing to be a part of something that is not based around money, but something much more valuable.

I feel a strong sense of belonging there. And I've become very attached. And I don't want to leave!

The groups of children who I meet with who have incarcerated parents have stolen my heart. I go to four different groups (we go to many elementary schools in Guilford County), and there is one group that is just really special to me. I've really connected with those kids, they trust me, they listen to me. They look up to me. They want to give me cornrows and are always playing with my hair. They give me endless hugs that make me wonder how often they get hugs at home. This past week, one girl asked if I could come play with her at her house this weekend. I have absolutely loved being a part of their lives this semester, and they are so bright, smart, and I have so much hope for their futures... unlike some other people in their lives, I'm sure.

Aside from the fact that I have really meaningful and educational interactions with children every single day, I am incredibly lucky to be working with four other interns, all from my program at my university. We've all had classes with each other for the last few years, so it was easy for us to become close. We spend 20+ hours a week together, and never get tired of it! Sometimes we even leave TQ and all get together for a movie/dinner/going out. I'm really going to miss those girls when we graduate.

So, that's the update on my internship.

Next up, update on the rest of my life!

Quote

"You give little girls a good coach, decent facilities, a budget and theyll come running to play sports. Theyre the SAME as the BOYS. They have the SAME interests, and they have the SAME ABILITY. All they need is the OPPORTUNITY!" ~Dr. Christine Grant

Mommom

My grandmother passed away at the age of 83 on Friday, surrounded by our family. In her last minutes, I was hugging H in the airport terminal right before security. I didn't make it home in time.

Her viewing was on Sunday, funeral on Monday. I flew back to North Carolina on Wednesday night.

The first thing my grandfather said after it happened was, "Everyone in this room just lost their best friend."

I'm having the biggest mental block of my life right now, and have no idea what else to write. I guess I've only given facts so far and have avoided going into the feelings attached to them.

















I am sad.
I am angry.
I am relieved.
I am proud.
I am disappointed.
I am exhausted.
I am worried.


It's been a long week.

Luckily, Spring Break starts today. I babysit from 12-6, and then back here to finish laundry and pack. I'm going to Florida with H and some of her friends.

Oh take me back to the start...

My grandmother was born in St. Petersburg, FL. How appropriate that I am traveling to that area...

I'm just ready for a mental break.

And I Unfold.

I have truly put off thinking about what will happen after May 14, 2010. In 88 days I will be a college graduate, I'll be a real adult. How terrifying... up until now, my entire life has been one big plan. Daycare, elementary school, middle school, high school, college... I've been on this path that majority of other white middle class girls have been on their whole lives as well. And now what? I get this piece of paper that proves that I have an education, that I learned something specific.

It's so bizarre that it's finally (almost) over. The future is scary and exciting... but right now, it's more scary than exciting.

Weekend

I still am kind of in shock that I got to meet THE Olivia this past Friday night!!! She was visiting a friend at Duke, and since I've been spending a good amount of time at Duke recently, it worked out perfectly that I could meet up with her!

Side note: I haven't updated about this until now... but I feel the need to write about this so that my future entries make more sense. I'm dating an amazing girl, H, who plays rugby for Duke. We've known each other for awhile, from playing against each other and socialing together. She makes me very, very happy and I'm incredibly lucky to have her in my life. I'll update more on this later.

So, when I found out that Olivia was coming to Durham, I immediately made plans to get dinner with her! H suggested that we all go to a Kenyan restaurant near Duke, and I was totally pumped to try something new. I've never been to an African restaurant! It was awesome, the food was amazing, but getting to meet Olivia and her friend was even better!! We had some great conversations and I really hope that we get to do it again sometime soon. She is traveling to OH in June for a KCC fundraiser and I may just have to jump on the roadtrip and head out there!

The rest of my weekend was amazing and exhausting. We had two rugby games - we won one and lost one. Here are some photos of me from Saturday:













Passing out of a scrum.



















Waiting for the other scrummy's put in.


That's all for now... I hope you all have an amazing week!

Love,
K

Changes.

Well, I have a lot to update about. There's a lot of big changes happening in my life right now, but I'm only going to talk about one of them right now, because the others deserve my complete attention and happiness, and this one has been on my mind the most for the last few days.



















There's no other way to really get into this... One of my best friends is moving far away. Some unexpected circumstances arose in my good friend Suzi's life, and she's moving from NC to NY and then Boston. I found this out on Sunday, and she is moving this Friday.

At first, I was just completely shocked. It didn't really seem real - this girl who I met two weeks into my freshman year of college, who took me under her wing, who taught me everything I know about rugby, who left her position as scrumhalf of the team to me, who left me as captain, who taught me all of the best tricks I know on the field. The same girl who has carried me up the stairs when I got too drunk, went out with me for my 21st birthday, dressed me after I did my zulu, the girl who introduced me to banana fudge milkshakes from Cookout, got into ridiculous shenanigans with, got written up by the campus police with me, went on vacation with me to Baltimore and Chestertown and went crabbing with my family, the girl who asked me to be a bridesmaid in her wedding, who co-captained the Relay for Life with me, the first person I called when Liam died - who dropped everything and drove to campus to pack my bags with Kim so that I could fly home... the girl who I called during the funeral reception and sobbed to out behind my church. The same girl who I've had arguments with and made up and realized our friendship means more to us than disagreeing about something. The same girl who listened every single time I have ever needed to talk, who would drive to wherever I was if I was home alone and needed someone to be there with me, who I have laughed hysterically with a thousand times... the girl who washed out my hair in the bathroom sink at the bar when a teammate threw up on my head, the girl who gave me the confidence to extract myself from unhealthy situations, the girl who went on so many road trips with Kim and I ... cookie avalanches, OH SHIT STAIRS, Bloody Mary's and hottubs...the girl who sent my mom cruise catalogues when she was sick so that she'd have something to look at that was happy, this girl who was thrown into my life just becase my roommate freshman year saw a sign for women's rugby in the bathroom...

She's leaving.















I always thought I'd be the one leaving her behind, once I graduated. And I have been slowly preparing myself for that day to come. This has blown me away. It's starting to feel real.









































































Tonight Suzi dropped off her cap and gown from when she graduated in Spring '06. I remember the day she graduated so incredibly clearly, I remember taking that photo in the fountain (the same fountain that we both soaped and then got written up by the police my freshman year!) It seems truly fitting that I am going to wear the same cap and gown that she wore all those years ago. Sometimes life is so cyclic.

The past 5 years would not have been the same at all without her.

Finally!

LAS VEGAS TOMORROW!!

We leave Gboro at noon. Our flight leaves Raleigh at 3:40... We'll get into LV around 9:30.

I CAN'T WAIT!!

I'll post photos when we return :)

Everyone have a great week!!

Progress.

This morning I did something that was very hard for me. It's not something that I do often, and I avoid it because it makes me uncomfortable. But, I like to think that when we do things that are hard for us, we make the most progress with bettering ourselves and improving our relationships with those around us. I have goals for myself that I slowly work toward. Some may take years, and some are easily completed. But each time that I do something that I know will eventually put me closer to completing a goal, I feel so good about myself afterward, even if it's exhausting or upsetting or just plan difficult.

Things are great here. Rugby has been totally screwed up by the weather, so we have yet to play a game. This Wednesday we leave for Las Vegas (!!) and I am excited beyond belief! I can't wait to have a few days where I have nothing specific to do and to hang out with some of the greatest people in the world! We have a really great group of girls going.

I had a conversation this weekend about how cool it is that all of the women's rugby teams in NC all know each other pretty well and are actually friends. I have met some really great ruggers over the last 5 years, and my team has gone through cycles where we are really close with certain teams. I love that I could go pretty much anywhere in this state and not be far from someone I know through rugby. It makes playing games and going to socials that much more fun! On Saturday night there were four of us that went out - me from UNCG, one from Wake Forest, and two from Duke... all rugby players. Plus, while we were out, we saw another rugger who played for Guilford. How cool is that?

I'm off to my internship (which is still going great!) and then practice. I'll leave you guys with a quote that I've been thinking about today.

"We're never so vulnerable than when we trust someone - but paradoxically, if we cannot trust, neither can we find love or joy." - Walter Anderson

Things!

Life is exhilarating right now.

My internship is beyond amazing. I feel like I have such a purpose there, and I'm so happy that I chose this place to spend my semester. I don't observe- I do. I work with kids all day long, kids who need extra attention and extra instruction and extra love. Every second that I am there, I feel like I am doing something important and I truly feel like we are changing and improving these kids' lives. This is all I wanted. This is the "bigger picture" that I wrote about all those years ago...

Yesterday, I went into my internship for awhile even though I don't usually go in on Wednesdays. The snow has destroyed my schedule this week and babysitting got canceled for last night. We spent the afternoon making those fleece tie blankets. We make them so that policemen can keep a few in their trunks, so that if they respond to a domestic violence call or something else where they have to pick up an upset child, they have something to wrap around them and make them feel a little better. I love that we do that, just thinking about what those blankets will be used for made making them even more fun.

In 6 days (next Wednesday) the rugby team is traveling to Las Vegas for the International 7s tournament!! I'm so excited, I've never been to Vegas, except for a layover when we went to Idaho a few years ago. We're staying at Hooters (haha. It was the cheapest, closest to the strip, and had a special rate for rugby teams) and we'll be getting in around 9:30 Wednesday night. We don't leave until late Saturday night, we're catching a red-eye back and should land in Raleigh around 9am. There's 6 of us from my team going, and 3 from Duke. UNCG WRFC + Duke WRFC = very fun times. So basically, this is going to be one of the best trips ever.

I'm not even going to write about the "snow storm" we had last weekend. I'm tired of talking about the snow and it just annoyed me... I don't have classes, so the closing didn't affect me, I got really bored in my apartment, I already dealt with an ACTUAL blizzard this year (19 inches, imagine that, NC!) and the snow wrecked my plans for the weekend. I'm not bitter or anything ;-) But, I do have to say, I understand why NC doesn't invest much money into their winter weather equipment, since this only happens once or twice a year. However, they could save themselves a lot of grief if they learned to a.) salt the roads BEFORE the snow comes, b.) not wait until the snow stops to plow the roads, and c.) not use sand to melt the ice sheets on the sidewalks on campus. This is completely ineffective and doesn't melt anything- it just created a slushy sand mess that provides little traction and looks ugly.

*end rant.

I'm happy, I'm content, I'm busy, and my car has a few extra hundred miles on it from the last two weeks. :) I'll probably update again before Vegas... I have a ltlym that I've been working on for a few days....

Spread love,
K

We're a Family... and we're a tree!

LTLYM #28: Draw your family tree to the best of your ability.

A few things to note about my family tree:

First of all, I accidentally got my grandmother's maiden name wrong. I realized it as it was scanning - my grandmother's maiden name is Lar.rimore, not Plumber. That was her mother's maiden name.

Also, the "x"s represent someone who divorced one of my family members (hence the double slashes, those relationships ended in divorce). I put "x"s not because it's not that those family members didn't mean anything to me, but because for my own family tree, I felt kind of weird putting them on there.. however those "x"s are obviously still important people for their children (my cousins).

So, that's it :)