I am really going to do this...

Thursdays are rough for me.  I spend most of my day in the office which if you know me I don't like being stuck at my desk.  I get bored.  I need lots of human interaction.  Also tonight is the first of Munchies with Melissa so at 9pm I was having one of my floors over for some community building.  I needed a nap.  Desperately.  So I laid down and fell asleep for about 20 minutes and then woke up completely anxious.  I wasn't late so I didn't know what was going on.  I decided to get up, check some email and run some errands.  When I opened my email I saw one from WR.  I wasn't expecting to hear from them for another week.  And yet, here it was.  I was accepted.

I realized a small part of me was hoping I wouldn't get accepted so it would be them making the final decision for me.  I immediately burst into tears.  This is it.  This is real.  Now or never.  Am I doing this?  And in my heart I knew, I am really going to do this.  I am going to completely and utterly walk away from my life for 11 months.  I'm going to spread the love of Christ across the world, raise an obscene amount of money to do said sharing, spend some nights sleeping in a tent and (most troubling of all), probably have to dig a hole to poop at times.  I am not this girl.  Am I?

As I've been telling friends I'm going to do this, the thing that amazes me again and again  is how not surprised they are.  I thought people would think I'm crazy, I mean I mention the money and pooping in a hole and yet they still think it's perfectly natural for me to do this.  Two quotes from friends, "I think sometimes people forget how awesome they are.  I think Melissa's forgotten." and "I'm sure your mom has been preparing for this for the past 9 years.  When you came back from the Balkans it was your whole life, the greatest thing you've ever done.  She knew you were going to have to travel again, she's just glad it took you 9 years to leave again."  And I started to remember the year I came back from Youth in Mission.  It was all I thought about all the time.  Going back, being a missionary, living a simpler, more Christ centered life.  And then I graduated and Sallie Mae started knocking on my door.  I got a job, an apartment and a normal average life.  And I forgot myself.  I won't go so far as to say I am/was awesome but I was set on changing the world and telling everyone about Christ.  And I've forgotten that.  I don't recognize that girl, but that's about to change.

My last "test" was telling my mom.  If she said I was crazy and wouldn't support me then I would seriously consider not going but nope, she's fine with it.  I really feel like mom secretly knew and did all this research.  She was calm, cool, collected and totally supportive.  Not what I was expecting.  So now I make plans.  Now I practice hiking, researching the best way to dig a hole in the ground to poop in, buy a tent and a sleeping bag and try to spiritually, mentally, physically and emotional prepare for something I'm pretty sure is impossible to be prepared for.  Prayers are always appreciated....