Pet Therapy

When I was younger, I used to think wishing for things when you saw a shooting star or threw a penny in the fountain was for real.  Like it was gonna actually come true, one day.  One night, when I was maybe 10 (?), my dad woke me up at 3am and we got in his pick-up tuck and drove out to Colden, NY, where there are no city lights to take away from the beautiful starry sky above.  We laid in the back in the bed on blankets and watched an absolutely marvelous meteor shower.  About 20 minutes in, I saw this HUGE flash of light out of the corner of my eye; it must've been one heck of a shooting star.  Excitedly, I squealed, "Dad, did you see that?!"  I was disappointed when he looked at me, confused, and asked, "What?"  I was so bummed he didn't see the miraculous thing I had just witnessed.  So I looked back up to the sky and shut my eyes tight.  I wished for a pet.  I wished really really hard.  A pet that wasn't a fish or a hermit crab.  I had had plenty of those.  I knew it could never happen, since my mom and sister are so allergic to any kind of animal with fur.  But I wished anyway.

One random day about 4 years later, in January 2006, my godfather called me.  He told me there was a stray kitten that had wandered into his work building in the city of Buffalo.  They had tried getting rid of it, but it kept finding it's way back into the building.  "Do you think you guys could take it in?" he asked.  "We want a good home for it."  Immediately I was angered.  Why would he be calling us? I wondered.  He KNOWS we can't have an animal.  Regardless of my hot head, I told him I would talk to mom about it.  We hung up, and I became excited.  What if we actually could take this kitten in?  I told mom about it; she ended up calling my godfather for more information...I still have no idea why she bothered.  That Friday, January 13, I came home to a meowing little gray kitten at the door.  Instant tears.  I couldn't believe my wish upon a star had come true.

Now, I should probably mention my dad was out of town that weekend.  Before mom brought the cat home, she had actually called him for the go-ahead to adopt it.  Well, he must have just been having too great of a time with his buddies, because he never said anything about hating cats, hating their fur, hating their faces, all of which he brought up with his arms folded the second she greeted him at the door when he came home.  He was not happy.  "I don't like cats," he said, very matter-of-fact.  Me, mom, and my sister Alicia all looked at each other and gulped.  We figured it would just take some time for him to get used to the idea.  But he didn't just get used to the idea.  He fell head over heals for that stinkin' cat.

We named her Weezie.  We had two different stories ready for why we named her that, depending on the demographic asking about it.  If we were telling a pretty good friend, co-worker or teacher, the conversation would look something like this: "Her name is Weezie."  "Oh!  Why'd you name her that?"  "Because usually cats make mom and Alicia wheezy!"  This usually followed with some light chuckling.  However, if we were telling a really close friend, relative, or someone who simply just shares the same kind of sick humor as my family, the conversation would look something more like: "Her name is Weezie."  "Oh!  Why'd you name her that?"  "Because Weezie Jefferson in the TV show The Jefferson's moved on up from the east side!"  This usually followed with hearty laughter, maybe some snorting, and milk coming out of the nose.  You get my point.

Having a cat was a novelty for all of us.  A novelty that simply just did not wear off.  It didn't take dad long at all to warm up to her.  Pretty soon she was his "baby girl" or "Weezer."  I think all families probably have pet names for their pet.  We always wanted to hold her, play with her, and yes, even scoop her poop up after her.  When she was a kitten she had this fetish of freaking us all out when we were trying to sleep by jumping up onto the beds and pouncing on our feet.  She was so playful.

We bought her a bed that she was way too small for; we thought she'd never grow into it.  She did, eventually.  Not to mention mom bought her two Longaberger baskets to sleep in; one for the family room and one for her bedroom.  Every trip to the Dollar Store would lead to buying her another toy mouse, mouse on a string, mouse in a ball, etc.  She got Christmas gifts.  She was one spoiled little kitty.

We had our fair share of freak outs with her;  we would let her outside occasionally, and one day she slipped outside the fence when none of us were watching and didn't come back until the next morning.  One time she brought a chipmunk into the house and didn't set it down until she had shown mommy what she had caught - in her walk in closet.  Alicia and mom had a fun morning trying to catch the friggin thing.

She was so smart.  Once she sat adamantly in front of the fire place, meowing.  It only took us two days to figure out she was trying to tell us there was a squirrel who got stuck in there.  If she was hungry or wanted to go outside, she'd tell you.  She learned words like "treat," "chicki chicki" (chicken), and even her own name.  But she was still always stupider than your average dog.

Except for the occasional times where she'd hop up onto a kitchen chair or try to claw her way outside, Weezie was never really scolded.  She was always the most well behaved out of Alicia and me.  She loved everyone.  Well everyone except Grandma, Aunt Simone, Aunt Linda, Mike...I should probably just delete my previous statement.  Weezie brought a kind of love into the house that none of us had ever experienced before.  If mom or dad or any of us had a bad day at school or work, we'd feel better the second we walked into the house because of the gray little furball sitting there to greet us.  She calmed us down and let us hold her when we needed a good cry.  We could talk to her without worrying she'd tattle tale.  She was the perfect little friend.

About a year ago, Weezie was diagnosed with feline asthma.  Yes, there's such a thing!  The past year has been full of vet visits, different medications and diagnoses, but she continued to get worse.  When we could see that her breathing was labored and she was having 2 or 3 coughing spells a day, we knew it was time for kitty heaven.  Dad went and put her down today.  He told me it was the hardest thing he's ever had to do.  I believe him.  It's hard not to get attached to the animal that's been cozying up your house for the past 6 years.  Weezie will always be the best thing that's ever happened to our family as a whole.  She had a special little connection with each of us.  She loved mom the most.  Probably because she was the one who rescued her.  She is already so missed.  RIP little Weezer Bee!  We miss you!

Espanglish

My name is Angela, but my mom calls me Ángela (there's an accent over that big A, making  this name sound like ' ON-hey-la ').  Seriously.  My mom calls me by my Spanish name.  That’s the kind of impact the Spanish language has had on me over the last 7 years.  I have cousins who teach it, teachers who help me to experience it, and a family who never gets tired of hearing it.  After I started learning Spanish in the 7^th grade, I was excited to expand my vocabulary to one day be able to have a legitimate conversation with someone in Spanish.  I studied my little middle school butt off, and it paid off.  I held a 100% all throughout middle school.  I don’t say this to brag, I say this to prove how dedicated I was – and still am – to this subject.

           
Once I hit high school, I began to practice having small, personal conversations with one of my bilingual cousins.  My mom thought this meant I could easily understand the entire Spanish language, as she would frequently ask me to translate conversations, say, that two Spanish speaking women were having in front of us in the line at the supermarket.  “Mom!” would usually be my response, as I looked at her with disbelief that she had made such a request.  However, I can’t deny that I would try to eavesdrop a little bit, just to see if I could make anything out.

           
While Spanish was a big part of my high school life, so was Video Production, which ended up becoming my major.  Up until very recently, I was prepared to make video my whole life, with room for little else.  Over winter break, my mom (surprise!) sat me down with a very serious look on her face.  She brought up the words “grad school” which I immediately shut down, since video majors don’t really need to look into graduate school in order to obtain a good profession down the road.  But video work was not what she was talking about.  Her idea was for me to graduate with what I have in place as of now, which are a Video Production major and Spanish Language minor.  She then suggested I take a couple years at grad school to obtain a teaching degree, and, you guessed it; go teach kids how to speak Spanish.  I’ll admit, when the words flew out of her mouth, I didn’t love them.  However, after I spent a good 3 or 4 minutes thinking about it, I fell in love with the idea.  Don’t get me wrong; filmmaking has always been another big passion of mine that I still plan to pursue.  I’m not looking to go to Los Angeles (too commercialized) or New York City (too…hectic!), but want to keep looking into editing as a side job, perhaps.  But teaching kids the language that’s become such a passionate part of my life?  That’s a no brainer.  Thanks, mom.

           

I just finished applying to the study abroad program in Toledo, Spain for 5 weeks this upcoming summer.  The above paragraphs may have been included in my essay.  If given the opportunity, I especially look forward to interacting and speaking with my host family and learning about their culture.  Culture!  An aspect of the Spanish world I never truly appreciated until recently, while learning about it in the 200 level series this year.  It’s so incredibly great to not be ignorant about how people in Spain and other Spanish speaking countries live their lives.  I can only assume that studying in Spain will not only prepare me better for the rest of my college career, but will also fuel my passion to teach children/teenagers the magic of knowing another language.  Mmm magical. 

For now I'm just crossing my fingers and waiting on those reference letters...yikes. 

Also, it would be greatly appreciated if none of my media professors knew about this, thanks.

Constant Change

Change is constant.  Even when life is throwing you the same routine everyday, change is happening behind your back anyway.

I went home to Buffalo for Thanksgiving and just got back to school yesterday.  Those six weeks threw me more than I expected, but so far, I'm handling it.  Break was actually great.  I got to work, which means I made enough money to get on an airplane for a YoungLife Christmas Party in Columbus and actually do some decent Christmas shopping.  And buy Mighty Taco.  That's tied with being the best reason for making money.  That and being able to afford out-of-state tuition.

I got to hang out with my family and see my boyfriend for more than an hour over my computer screen.  Spending quality time with the people I love definitely gets better as I get older.  I caught up with a few old friends, which is a rare occurrence since my school break is majorly shifted compared to everyone else's. 

My old YoungLife leader, Mary Beth, got married a few days ago, to a man she met while teaching and fulfilling her God call in Honduras.  I had the privilege of watching her niece and his spanish speaking toddler nephew and infant niece one night while the family was out doing wedding things.  It was a challenge, especially with the 3-year-old who was getting out of his baby talk stage.  It's a challenge to understand English speaking 3-year-olds, let alone another language.  It was a fun night though.  I learned a lot, too.  Pajamas is pronounced "Pay-YA-maz" in spanish, NOT "Pa-HA-mas."  I felt like a dog chasing my tail as I tried to get him to locate his pj's, or as I started referring to them, "the clothes that you sleep in!"

I'm pretty sure my mom and God sit down and have coffee every morning to discuss my future, because she makes comments and puts ideas into my head that make me completely rethink my whole life plan.  I'm going to school to graduate as a video major, but suddenly am now seriously contemplating teaching a foreign language.  You can't make this stuff up.

In other news, my boyfriend's parents sold their house in Buffalo and are moving to Virginia Beach.  Not that I blame them.  But it does sorta put a kink in plans down the road, depending on where Mike now chooses to live.  I'm not freaking out.  God's got this. 

My cousin's in California are struggling.  My cousin Camille, who's had cancer for a while, is nearing the end of her battle.  She was told on Saturday that she's got about a month or two left in this life. She'll leave behind a faithful husband and three beautiful little boys.  Again, God's got this.  Although I admit I'm freaking out.

Home was too comfortable to leave this time around.  I didn't want to leave my bed, my shower where I don't have to wear flip flops, my Tim Hortons, Mighty Taco, Red Robin, and Target.  My grandparents.  My sister.  My mommy and daddy.  The call of Athens was not nearly as loud as it was last year.  Not that I can complain, because my parents often remind me of a little place called the University of Buffalo right down the road.  But deep down, I'm happy with the college choice I've made. 

Classes started today and it's "back to the grind" as mom always says.  I'm still getting into the swing of being back.  I'll have dinner with everyone tonight and be fine, most likely.  And gear up for a new quarter! 

Change is constant.  Luckily, God is too.  Funny how that kinda stuff works out.

The Project That Almost Killed Me

Music video.  Check.

WHAT. A. PROCESS.  Lemme back up for a sec.  This fall quarter I entered my first real Video Production class.  All pre-reqs are finally done and out of the way.  Now I can start the good stuff.  MDIA 240 - Intro to Video Production.  This is by no means an easy basic class.  The projects in class take work; the projects out of class take work.  Our first project was a 1-3 minute short narrative, complete with character conflict and resolution.  We thought it was pretty good, but sadly, our professor and some peers did not.  You can watch it here.  Our second project - a music video.  Getting the rights to the song we used was not required, but highly recommended.  Again, it had to have a story/conflict, and had to be between 2-4 minutes.  The rest was all up to us.  And I must say, that certainly sparked some creativity.

We met as a group 2 days after getting the assignment to figure out logistics and come up with a story.  We didn't have much time to execute (it was due in 12 days) so we needed some good ideas and fast.  I was running a little late to this first meeting...when I finally arrived, I was hit with one big idea....and about 30 million components.  They were certainly being ambitious when I was MIA.  The few things that I kept hearing were "lots of locations," "lots of people," and "all in reverse."  Can I be honest with you?  I really wish I could've been on time to this group meeting to STOP all these ideas when they were still forming.  Because all those phrases were really coming into my mind as "lots of location releases," "lots of image releases," and "editing's a bitch."  I hated it.  All of it.  I decided to keep my mouth shut though, and see where it went.

Kelly, our producer, and I sat and thought about which bands we could email a request to use their songs.  We're both huge fans of Passion Pit, so we shot out an email asking specifically to use one of our three favorite songs..."it won't be used for profit, we'd really appreciate it, blah blah blah."  4 hours later, Passion Pit's GM had approved us and "Little Secrets" was in our hands.

We sent out emails upon emails, to dining halls, club sports, sports centers, equestrian ranches, and PEOPLE.  Lots and lots of people.  We told people we'd be shooting that following Sunday.  And so the setbacks begun.

Setback #1 - No people.
Yeah.  2:30pm, Sunday, October 9th.  Then 3. Then 3:30.  Thank you to the 9 (?) or so people who showed up that day.  You guys rock.  We actually shot for about 4 hours that day, went home to eat, then shot for another 2, thanks to Andrew, our sound guy, and his Athens Middle School WyldLife kids and their parents.  And more image release forms.

Setback #2 - Lost footage.

After about 3 straight days of shooting, I came into my scriptwriting class Wednesday morning, only to have bad news broken right over my head.  Yeah all that footage?  "It's gone," said Alex, our DP/camera guy.  "My card reader really sucks."  I wanted to scream.  My professor, who overheard what was going on, actually encouraged me to.  AAALLLLLL that shooting.  Gone in a split second.  Needless to say I was a little bitter that day.  Prayed a lot.  I guess it worked, because at about 8pm that night, Kelly texted me saying Alex had somehow gotten it all back.  Thanks, Father in Heaven.  Much appreciated.

Setback #3 - Where did all our group members go?
A little later in the week, we were really having a hard time getting us all together in one place.  When 3 could meet, one was in class, one was sleeping, you get what I'm saying.  One guy who was always around whenever we needed him (for the most part) was Sam, our lead actor.  He was boss.  We need to buy him a steak.  Moving on.

Setback #4 - Why the eff do we need to have a story for a music video?
We would've dismissed this aspect of the project if it wasn't worth 35 points on our rubric.  We NEEDED to come up with a story within the video.  The best thing we came up with didn't match our 4 minute song.  We scrapped the song and inserted in it's place "Sleepyhead."  Same band, and we still had the rights.  And so we began to shoot revolving around this song.

Setback #5 - (A personal one).
Long story short, I was supposed to be editing this, with Alex as my first assistant.  It was a busy weekend with OU homecoming and whatnot, so trying to get the footage from him was next to impossible.  Saturday night (the 15th) at around 1am, I received an email from him telling me "my backpack was stolen with my phone inside it, and sorry, and blah blah blah, and you can edit it now if you wanna."  Well, truth be told, I had already dismissed editing at this point, knowing Alex just wanted to do it...and he can pull all-nighters; I can't.  I trusted him.  I've seen his work.  It was all good.  I could finally relax for a second after 12 days of shooting.  I saw a rough cut of it the following day and really liked it.  This idea I thought was so stupid was actually looking pretty good on the screen.

I will quickly add that on the day our video was due, we were still shooting to fill up some empty time Alex still had in the song.  Video due at 5:10, and we wrapped at 4:00.  Are we crazy or what.  Alex made some quick cuts and exported it.....

Setback #6 - IN THE WRONG DIMENSIONS.
It's now 4:50.  Thankfully, Kelly's sister offered to drive us all to class.  We squeezed in the backseat with Alex's laptop open and re-exporting into the right dimensions.  We arrived to class on time, the project still exporting.  Class started and students began to present their projects.  We all kept looking at the little blue bar on Alex's computer.  After the video finished for the second time, Alex opened it up only to realize he had exported in Standard Definition, not HD.  File > Export.  Again.  This time he got it right.

Our turn.  We all got up, named ourselves and our positions, and showcased our video to the class and our professor.  She's the one we were really worried about.  My heart was actually pounding.  Hard.  It finished, we returned to our seats, and about 5 hands shot up in the air.  I braced myself.  Students began to talk....wait, I think that was a compliment?  They liked it?  Yes to the art design?  To the editing?  The direction?  All good things.  Our eyes moved to our professor.  "Two things," she said.  "And they're really minor."  She gave her tiny critiques (really tiny), and finished with, "I loved it.  Great job."

PHEW.  Suddenly, all the stress of the work, the hours of shooting, the image release forms, the tension in the group, melted away.  It was all worth it.  Am I really saying this right now?  Yes.  All. Worth it.  Because we created something we are pretty freaking proud of.  You can check out our masterpiece here, and feel free to let us know what you think.  Passion Pit did!  Which leads me to

Setback #7 - Passion Pit's response....

"Good video.  Great job."

You can't have everything.

YoungLife Leaders are Heroes

I've been inspired to blog again, thanks to all my awesome friends who keep blogs about their lives.  I never really realized what interesting friends I have.  I am genuinely intrigued by what they have to say.  Go figure.

This past week at school has been nuts.  I picked up 20 credit hours, expecting to drop one within the first week, but you know what, I think I'm gonna stick with all of them.  I'm only working a few hours at the dining hall so that I stay sane in the midst of homework, fellowship, and leading.

Leading!  I'll be honest, I was nervous to get back into the swing of things at Nelsonville High School.  And honestly, there's only been really one actual "swing," with that being All Area Club this past Monday night (which was AWESOME).  I'm still waiting to get hit in the face when the swing becomes continuous.  Anyway, I was nervous because I felt I had suddenly lost my passion over the summer.  Which seemed un-freaking-real because I LOVE YoungLife and I LOVE high schoolers and I LOVE my team so it didn't really make all that much sense to be feeling the way that I was.  I was worried about my attitude because the thoughts going on inside my head were, I'm gonna have to go to the school, instead of, I freaking WANT to go to the school.  See the obnoxiously important difference in those two thoughts?  I had.  And freaked.  I was fearful that leading was not where God wanted me and I had made a mistake getting placed and signing a contract and AH.  Deep breathe.  

I came to college, saw my team, and BOOM.  I was instantly back in love with Athens, my co leaders, 11 Stew, the whole shabang.  I've seen my high school girls (and guys), I've been to the school, I've hung out with my team, etc.  The passion came back, like I knew it would, deep down in my heart.  This is what I was built to do.  Love kids.  Lead them to the Lord.  Why?  Because that's what my YoungLife leaders did for me.  They invested their time and love and energy in me.  They prayed for me.  They weren't getting paid.  Sometimes they weren't even getting loved back.  And, despite my perceptions, they were actually human too.  They got tired.  They got frustrated.  They got weak.  Did we, the highschoolers, ever see that?  Nope.  They slapped on their smiles and amped up their energy for us, so that we might see the light of Christ shining out through them, even when they felt their darkest.  They walked the hallways of our high school and took us out to eat.  They came to our sports games and musicals and talent shows and graduation parties.  They sought us out and just listened to us talk about our problems that sometimes weren't even all that big, but they comforted us as if they were.  They held bible studies and cabin times so that we would not fall away.  They kept persevering even when they were shut down time and time and time again.  They planned their lives around us.  All because they knew about this incredible love that God has for His people, and just wanted to share it with us.  Just wanted us to know about it.  Because they care.  Because they love me.  And because they want to see me in Heaven.  Did I mention they're not getting paid?

I understand all this now because, well, I'm going through it.  Although I led WyldLife (YoungLife for middle school kids) in high school, I'll be honest, it was never this intense. Never in a million years would I have guessed the amount of time and energy spent on planning club, praying for kids, fundraising for camp, holding each other accountable, etc.  It's exhausting.  But I get why we do it.  I get it because I had it done for me.  And so of course I'm gonna want to keep passing the love.  These are kids lives we're talking about.  Don't you think it's slightly important?  I certainly do. 

I feel like this is such a jumbled mess of words but I had to just get it all out in the open onto a page around the world whatever.  My YoungLife leaders were my heroes in high school.  They're actually still my heroes.  I definitely would not be who I am now if they hadn't stepped into my world.  I would not be doing the things I'm doing if they hadn't showered me with their love and the love of God.  Whoo.  I just hope that one day, some kid would be thinking the same thing about me.  Calling me their hero.  Because I believe that's what YoungLife leaders are.  Just trying to make sure they're gonna see everyone in Heaven.

The original 7 leaders who brought me to Christ and changed my life.

Collapsus [Blog 9B]

I Wish I Would Have.... [Blog 9A]

Well, I was excited to present our game design project.  For the first time all quarter, I got to work with some GIRLS for a change, who wanted a good grade as much as I did.  We met in the library one evening and discussed our game concepts; what we wanted it to look like, the music behind it, the characters, etc.  Leaving the library (after someone else had offered to do the powerpoint so I wouldn't have to for a 5th time, another plus!), I was feeling good.  It was Monday and this project was already done.  What a great end to the quarter this was turning out to be!

We presented in class on Friday, along with everybody else, but as I watched other groups present, I noticed some things in their powerpoints that we didn't have.  Pictures, music, sound effects.  None of these were required, but nonetheless, it made their presentation, you know, prettier.  We did the best presentation we could; I was feeling good and confident.  After all, I've maintained about a 100 all quarter in this class (my TA is pretty frickin' awesome with grading).  Well, grades on Blackboard had a different story.  My first B+.  Ouch, even though I shouldn't really be saying ouch.  An 88 is not bad!  But you know, compared to the rest of the quarter...let's just say I was kind of wishing I had done the powerpoint myself like every other week.

Thankfully, I can make up for it in this blog by reflecting on a couple of my mistakes with the presentation.  Nothing I like doing more than blatantly pointing out my own flaws as a creative person.  Just kidding, I'm over it.

The first thing we could've done was add some pictures to spice up the visual attraction of our presentation.  We left our audience kind of in the dark when explaining what our game would look like.  We wanted it to be a side scrolling game and very colorful and cartoony, kind of like this picture:

Side-scrolling view, colorful, cute

We also wanted to convey to the audience of how our character was going to look (you could pick boy or girl, kind of like Wii style) and how he would advance to the next level: by collecting balloons!  Sorry he looks like Harry Potter, but there's nothing really wrong with that, right?

We could've also added in some music as an example of what we wanted to be coming out of the speakers when our little kid demographic would play this game.  The second part of my soundscape I did early in the quarter would have definitely sufficed for this.  It was upbeat and jazzy and even had kids laughing in the background.

In my elementary years, I was actually required to create a board game for an accelerated program I was in (yea, I was one of those kids).  I came up with a great idea, but when it came time to formulate and explain the rules to other people, I got stuck.  I think the same kind of thing might have happened here.  Although we explained the rules and delimiters pretty well to our audience, I definitely feel like it was the most difficult concept to present; we had an excellent idea of how the rules would work in the game because, well, we created it and spent an hour sorting it out.  If you explain a game to someone, usually it takes a little application on their part to fully grasp it, right?  You wouldn't just try to explain to someone how to play Euchre.  You first explain it, then play two or three open hands, then re-explain what trump means before actually diving into a game.  Same thing goes for this I think.  We knew that rules are things that the player has to do in order to advance, so we tried to tell our audience about the criteria needed to be met during a level for the player to advance (i.e. they have to give an answer).  We tried to make it clear through our delimiters what things would be holding a player back (i.e. the answer the player gives needs to be correct; the player cannot advance until the required amount of balloons collected per level matches the quota set by the game).

Overall, game design is pretty fun.  You're the boss: you make the rules; you make the delimiters; you add in your own sound effects.  It's neat, just not something I see myself spending my life on.  Editing still sits in #1.