nostalgia

do you ever hear a song that immediately takes you back to a specific time and place and memory? so vivid that you can almost see the people you were with down to the way the light hit their face or the way the air smelled or the way the pavement sounded under the tires of the car you were riding in? Sometimes the first few chords hit you hard in the stomach with that leaves you gasping for air. Sometimes the the first few words leave a smile lingering on your face as you pause to relive the moment that comes so fast you literally don't think twice.

I am nostalgic tonight.

Whenever I start to clean my room, I always end up sitting on the floor with my back against my bed, thumbing through my blue binder, full of letters and photos from my best friend and reliving our adventures and story. That leads me to my iTunes playlist with over 50 songs that he made for me almost a year ago titled "this is love" and i finish cleaning my room listening to it and sometimes singing along. It's a really good playlist.

But there are a few songs that when they start playing, I am physically frozen in the middle of whatever I'm organizing because I am reliving a moment or a memory. And I realize that I am so grateful for memories and for the opportunity I have to escape to them every once in a while. I've learned that there is a fine line between living in the past and visiting the past. One has the tendency to destroy a person, the other has the ability to strengthen a person. The past can't be changed and that's a hard thing to come to terms with at times. But, I've realized that the past builds our futures. We are literally built out of experiences; things we've done or seen or been through. What's the point of doing something if you can't remember it or visit that memory? How are you to remember the things you have learned or the people who changed you or inspired you? Living in a memory isn't wise, but living with memories makes all the difference.

I embrace my memories-the good, the bad and the beautiful. Especially the beautiful. Without taking the time to remember my life, I forget the things I learned, and I have done an awful lot of learning over the last five years.

So tonight, I'm going to fall asleep while wandering in memories of late night drives and icy air, the wave of headlights running across the back wall of a guest room, blue bows and bare feet, the feeling of a bald head under my hand and the beep of an IV pole and the sound of a clear river running over boulders. Because my memories make me who I am.

why i'm an english major

"for some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. what a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. they show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die. they are full of all the things that you don't get in real life--wonderful, lyrical language, for instance, right off the bat. and quality of attention: we may notice amazing details during the course of a day but we rarely let ourselves stop and really pay attention. an author makes you notice, makes you pay attention, and this is a great gift. my gratitude for good writing is unbounded; i am grateful for it the way i'm grateful for the ocean."

anne lamontt

i believe in miracles

Today, my family and I walked around the Lost River Flume Gorge and Caves. 

It was over a mile of endless stairs and crawling through and around rocks in the heart of the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

And not only did I make it through the whole hike without tripping or falling,

I made it through pain free.

Being "crippled" for the last five years was something I learned to adjust to. It was pointless to get upset about the adventures I was missing out on because I was alive and that was all that mattered at the end of the day. Yeah, I had my days when I through myself pity parties because I was left out or because I was physical unable to do things-I can't even express how frustrated I was at times at being so limited and at the loss of my left leg's usage.

But today...

Today, I hiked through a Gorge and went up and down over two hundred steps. Today, I was not limited or scared of pushing my boundaries. Today, I was pain free. Today was the first time in five years I pushed myself to my limits without feeling the hurt.

Today, I remembered what it was like to have two legs-and I appreciated it more then I ever have in my life.

Today, I was reminded why I chose to put myself through those months of pain and why I continue to work through the tough days of rehab. Today, I was reminded of how real miracles are, because I'm only four months out from a total knee replacement on an alleograph and I wasn't even supposed to be off crutches yet.

Miracles are everywhere.

Just Believe!

Snapshots on Wednesday

Normally, I would save these photos for my weekend snapshot post, but I was so excited about these photos that I wanted to share them now.

Today, my Dad, Mom, my little sister, Katie, and I went up north to Cornish, NH and toured the St. Guadens National Historic Site. St. Guadenes is a very famous scultptor during the civil war and made his home in the beautiful state of NH. The grounds are absolutely breath taking and I took some of my best photos to date while exploring the expansive woods, gardens and buildings. 

Dad has the week off, so tomorrow we're going up North to see the White Mountains!

New England sets my soul on fire. 

glasses and hair cuts

I'm trying desperately to grow out my hair ever since it started growing back five years ago. 

it is a losing battle on a general basis.

I finally got it past the awkward hair length stage a year ago and was doing really well until December when I decided I needed a trim. 

Apparently "trim" means two-three inches off.

so I haven't cut it since that fateful December, until last week when I realized that my ends were so fried, that I needed to do something about it.

But once again, a trim apparently means "two-three inches off."

and also, "reshape my side bangs" means this concoction: 

I have learned that when you go for a hair cut, you need to be VERY specific with your hair dresser about what you want. So, I came up with a list of things to keep in mind when going to get your hair cut.

1. Specify how much hair you want off. Don't say things like "trim" or "take off the dead stuff" because that is basically saying: "cut whatever you the heck you want, I don't care." Specifically state "only a half inch off" in order to preserve length.

2. Bring in pictures. Having something specific to show your hair dresser will always help them see what you can't put into words. As an English major, I'm often describing concepts instead of physical attributes. "I want edgier ends instead of whimsical." Yeah, that doesn't get you ANYWHERE, let me tell you.

3. Never say words like "heavy" when referring to your bangs. Ever.

4. When getting your bangs recut or shaped, ALWAYS pick a spot on your face that is lower then where you want your shortest piece to be. For instance, I should have said "below my eye" instead of "below my eyebrow" in order to have the length of bangs that I wanted.

5. Remember that hair grows back. 

IN OTHER NEWS! My grandparents took me to see Captain America today. I'm still completely unsure about what I think of it, but I was excited that I got the 3D glasses and remembered to keep them. I always thought that the "nerd glasses" fad that is going on right now was a bit ridiculous, but when I popped these babies on my face, I was hooked. I wore them to dinner and all evening. And, my sister now owes me five bucks because I bet her that the first thing Mom would say to me when I came home was how ridiculous I looked. Her words exactly were: "What are you doing with those silly things on your face, you goober!"

Five bucks richer!

VEDA

The other day, in the middle of my blog re-vamping process, I was trying to figure out how to be a better blogger and become more involved in the blogging community. And lo and behold, my friend showed me this site called We Blog, We Vlog, a place full of bloggers and vloggers who VLOG every day for the month of August. It looks like a lot of fun and quite a challenge and is exactly the kind of project I was wishing for in order to become more involved in the blogging community. I'm stoked.

Evolution

I have had this blog since the end of 2008. Can you believe that? That is three, going on four years of blogging at There and Back Again. 

But, as you can see, I have gone under a major redesign and renaming of this little refuge of mine.

Welcome to Into the Wild.

(be sure to grab a blog button from the right!)

There are a bunch of reasons I decided to rename my blog. 

There and Back Again represented my journey of discovering myself in the face of many trials and people.

I decided it was time to embrace this new chapter of my life that includes my new knee, working at Zion's Camp, the upcoming adventures in China, finishing up my degree and maybe, one day, welcoming home the Love of my Life; as well as representing the passion I have for my life and the beautiful world I live in.

Anyway, I came across a bunch of saved headers that I used over the last three years. 

It's cool to see how I evolved, through my blogging, editing, photography and emotions.

(Alexandra did this one for me)

heat adviosry

we're in the middle of a super sonic heat wave of epic proportions. Temps are in the 100's and the humidity index is well in the 90 %. So, I am hunkering down in my grandparents house for the weekend, were they have central air and on demand. Keep cool, kids!

Links and Logs

it is hot hot hot today and the weather channel says it's supposed to stay that way for the rest of the week. I love summer here, but I could do with a little less humidity, please and thank you. I keep on thinking about the missionaries in the New England area when the weather is like this, and I hope that mine is staying hydrated while doing the work in Massachusetts.

I worked out today for the first time since my knee replacement and boy oh boy, was it a reality check on how out of shape I've become and how much effort I need to keep putting into recovery. I'm not going to lie, it was a little frustrating and discouraging to get on the eliptical and only be able to handle seven minutes of it before my knee started to get tremors (nasty muscle convulsions). But, my iPod knew exactly what song to play as I started to let those emotions get the best of me. Thirty Seconds to Mars reminded me to keep fighting this fight, because my recovery is an ongoing battle. Okay knee replacement. This Is War.

Super empowering.

In other news, I had the super awesome opportunity to guest blog for Paige about New England, so you should go check it out. Paige was one of my guest bloggers last month during the opening weeks of Zion's Camp and she wrote an awesome letter to her 16-year-old self, so if you missed out on that, go read it here.

also, in the coming days, I will be doing a major blog redesign, so hold tight while I get my head on straight and figure out what I want to do with my life/blog.

and finally, my contact for my housing is in and the deposit has been made. I'm living in the newest apartments in Rexburg this semester (though it was not by choice) but I'm excited, none the less. I can't wait to have my own washer and dryer, because I had to roll all my quarters to pay for my cell phone bill this month. As much as I love having a summer to just focus on recovering, it is a pain to not be making money!

the truth is

even if i could break through the velvet layers
and reach through the summer haze,
the heat saturating the world with color so vivid
even my perfect sight cannot
focus on a single entity
and it all twists into one perfect blur of deep brown,
truth is, i wouldn't stop it.

truth is, i used to wish that i could reach up into the sky and
past all of the clouds and stars and planets
and find the sooty corners of a seemingly endless space
where treasures were waiting just
for me, but now
as i squint through the muggy vapor and watch as colors
forget their names in a dance of uniform harmony,
i wish to collapse into the earth
and crawl into the empty spaces left by shadows and profiles,
listening to the whisper of silence
and find myself drifting away in a granite lullaby.

and the truth is,
even those who leave their lives engraved in stone become sand,
and no one cares that they are washed away
and smoothed down into miniscule grains that no longer make a difference in the world
but long to be remembered as the boulder originally hewn from, and no longer
exists.
so i let the heat haze vaporize the colors and
turn everything into a chestnut
haven and i sink knee deep into the ground
and i listen to the silent voices of stone
because their grains of sand still have stories to tell.

truth is, i am a grain of sand
hewn by God from a granite boulder,
part of the earth,
reduced to a shadow of a memory.