Melilyn.com

My friend James and his dad are hosting a tour to Israel in Spring 2009, and they invited me. My first reaction was “Oh, yay! I’ve always wanted to go to Israel, ever since I was old enough to realize it was a real place!”

And honestly, for just over a week in Israel, the price isn’t all that bad either. If I save a certain amount each week between now and then, it won’t be too overwhelming. Just get that registration in pretty quick and you won’t have to pay quite as much.

Honestly, though, the more I think about it, the scarier it gets. Not the actual going part, but the “committing to paying this huge amount” part. I’m afraid of committing and then having to pull out at the last moment. It’s happened to me before. The first time I tried to enroll in college, I went ahead and signed up for housing, because at that time, I was going to have my trust fund money by the time school started. Well, things with my grandfather fell through and I had to pull out… but because I had signed up for housing, I ended up owing the university no small bit of money.

Which they still hound me about.

I’m just afraid of that happening again… committing to this Israel thing and then having to pull out at the last moment because of things completely out of my power. I can’t afford to lose anything like that.

I don’t know. I guess I’ll have to think about it some more.

I am back… I just didn’t have the “oomph” to say anything the last couple of days. My family just got back, too, so the energy in the house is up. I know I gripe a lot about my family sometimes, but seriously, this house seems so empty without them. It was great not having to do anything, but at the same time, there was nothing to do!

Sukkot was nice, very laid back. Camping in real tents (we finally sold the trailer that we really didn’t like anyway), cooking over the fire (well, sometimes), eating s’mores, sitting in the lake all day (because it was too hot to do anything else), and playing backgammon to odd hours of the morning. Dad took my camera, and if he got any good pictures, I’ll post them up. It was nice. Lonely at times, but nice.

My couple of days at home alone were cool too. With all of the people in my family, there’s always someone around, so it was weird. Plus they took all of the food with them! And if they left something for me, they took the stuff I needed to actually cook it!

All of that with some drama at work (attempted poisoning, or something, plus that drunk guy today?) and some sorta-drama with a personal situation, it’s been an interesting week.

Tomorrow I’m going to run and get a capo so I can play things in the right key… and then make another attempt at cleaning my room. Lazy week is over! Now get to work!

Thanks to all of you who left me questions, and phooey on those of you who didn’t. Anyhow… here they are. Also, if you still want to leave me questions on the original post, I’ll be glad to answer them for you here.

Bobbi-Lee asked: What do you plan to be/do when you “grow up” (leave school etc) and why?

In a perfect world, I would love to travel, anywhere, just to learn the language and soak up the culture of each country. Maybe I’d be working on a novel, or maybe I’d be freelancing (web design, of course), or who knows? I’d love to go to Israel. Or Italy. Or Scotland. Or Germany…

In a realistic (yuck) world, I see myself in a little house with a big yard for my cat collection… working on that novel or freelancing or teaching or whatever the Lord would have me do.

And in the near-ish future… I’d just like to get into college and be able to stay there without completely going broke.

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