Climbing the Summit

For the past two weeks, I've been at a marvelous summer camp called "The Summit." It's for all those nerdy, intelligent people out there who actually like to think (and care about thinking). It's a worldview camp where you sit through 7 hours of lectures per day (and no, it's actually not all that bad, as you'll be able to decipher from the pictures). You have plenty of free time as well. Oh, and guess what - there aren't any nerdy looking people there! Amazing, right?
In any case, instead of going through a boring narrative of what I did the past two weeks, I thought I would prefer to give you a list, and to show you. So here are the amazing things that I did in the past two weeks:

-Was surprised by my roommate from camp from last year, Megan, who decided to show up at Summit without even telling me, and then attacking me as I attempted to drag my luggage up to our room.
-Met a guy at camp who I met on the computer and I've been a good friend with for about three years, Jordan, and guess what! He wasn't a psycho! (okay, maybe a little.... more like a cynic, but whatever)
-Was told by a random guy while I was playing the piano down in the basement that I was the best sounding pianist out of the four or five that were playing around the basement, when I was actually just picking out a cover for "How He Loves."
-Had frizzy hair for three days straight
-Had the best small group ever
-Ate M&Ms, Cheez-Its, and Fudge Rounds with Megan past midnight
-Learned how to draw something besides a stick man and stars
-Had the most lame food fight ever. As in, throwing a potato covered in tomato sauce at Jordan. And just for the record, it was an awesome shot.
-Drank caffeine to stay awake for the first time in my life
-Saw both pain and joy at its core
-While riding in a bus, almost got killed by a 18 wheeler that had lost control of it's brakes, coming down a mountain. Thankfully, it passed our four school buses. Unfortunately, he went off of a drop off, and had a terrible wreck. But, again, thank God, he is alive.
-Ran in the rain
-Sung "Our Song" with a group of people in a bus
-Died laughing, cried, screamed, hurt, danced
-Had several difficult conversations
-Dreamed
-Failed at meeting my hero (Josh Bales - coolest indie singer eevverr), as he came up to me and asked me where the silverware was in the cafeteria, and I stared blankly, said I didn't know, and stood there silently until he walked away, and then hated myself because of it.
-Discussed James and the Giant Peach and Alice in Wonderland
-Wore a hoodie in the middle of summer
-Kissed a lion

-Prayed
-Sang my guts out to David Crowder

-Missed my bestest friend a heck of a lot

{and if you can't tell from this picture that she tagged me in on FB, she missed me too}

-Met someone who had the same dreams, talents, sense of humor, type of family, and mindset as I do
-Learned how to put my hair up in a bun
-Got approximately six hours of sleep a night
-Cried my guts out for an hour and a half over losing Winston
-Ate meat that was questionably either horse meat, dog meat, or spam painted with nail polish made to look like meat.
-Learned about abortion, cosmic humanism, homosexuality, Islam, how to ask questions, evil, how to read the Bible, law and government, economics, entertainment, postmodernism, feminism, marriage and family, evolution, how to be a leader, Marxism, and secular humanism, to name a few things, in two weeks.
-Screamed when a cicada was dropped on my leg
-Got to listen to Josh Bales lead worship every night for two weeks
-Watched a girl play an impressive piece on the piano in the talent show..... playing with her back on the piano bench, so she couldn't see the keys.

-Had the best small group leader ever

{i freakin love her}

-Bought eight books, two Josh Bales CDs, and a Summit T-shirt (and was given a Josh Bales T-shirt and Josh Bales CD from Megan for my birthday. best. birthday. present. ever.)
-Was deprived of nail polish for two weeks (I almost died)
-Was deprived of coffee for two weeks (They took me to the ER I was so bad off.....)
-Made my own Summit T-shirt for people to sign
-Didn't have an iPod for two weeks
-Sang "Hey Soul Sister" for a week with Megan
-Went to a local coffee shop and got a Snickers frapp
-Read Cat in the Hat at said local coffee shop
-Got dressed up....
-Only to proceed to do an "interpretive dance" to "Life is a Highway" and....
-Run through a huge field.
-Caught a cold
-Olive Oyl. Don't ask.

-Got chased around with the nastiest worm on the face of this green earth


-Got poked in the stomach more times than I can ever even begin to count
-Had my shoe stolen, and had to walk around a building in front of a ton of people with just one of my Converse.


-Looked pretty hot with Megan
-Spilled water down my shirt twice in one day
-Screamed, talked, and sang so much that I lost my voice
-Got lots of mail. Including a 9 page letter from my biffle. Which made me laugh incessantly.
-Got lots of awesome hugs
-Doodled on one page with three people
-Ate Lucky Charms for breakfast almost every day
-Got to talk to some of the wisest people I've ever met in my life
-Used eyeshadow just because I felt like it. Hah.
-Embraced my artsy side a lil
-Skipped wearing my retainers.... *sshhh*

-Got told I have an awesome boyfriend. Yeah. I knew that already.

{my new favorite picture of us. ever}

-Got a piggy back ride
-Listened to Weird Al. Party in the CIA and The Saga Begins. yesh.
-Finally got to meet my hero, Josh Bales, even after the embarrassing incident. He was awesome. And I wanted to scream and dance and run around. But I figured that would be kind of. Well. Yeah. That. Anyways, I was kinda super excited. I'm that cheesy fan who has all of his CDs and a T-shirt. Unfortunately not a gray T-shirt. Sorry. You don't get that because you aren't exposed to his awesome music.

-Made friends. Made stronger friendships I already had.

{my buddies from camp: Jordan, me, Daniel, Megan, and Spencer}

-And followed that super cliched, cheesy statement that you can find on pretty much any cross stitched pillow or picture frame.... I "lived, laughed, loved."

Hope you vaguely begin to grasp how incredible the past two weeks have been for me, and maybe even comprehend a tad why I'm so sad I had to leave.
And to show you even more, I'll be doing a YouTube video about it as soon as I get my voice back and no longer sound like Miley Cyrus.

And so goodbye Summit... I miss you. I miss the people I met there. I miss the millions of Winston Churchill and C.S. Lewis quotes I wrote down every day. I miss the deep thoughts. I miss the stupid jokes every morning. I miss the Smeagol/Gollum impressions. I miss screaming and singing with Megan. I miss it all. I wish you hadn't gone, but I'll always treasure these memories.

I'll always remember you from my favorite quotes from the speakers and the wise people who even they look up to....

"If a word is not worth fighting for, what on earth is?"
-G.K. Chesterton

"The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it and ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is."
-Winston Churchill

The comparison of these two quotes:
"My friends, we live in the greatest nation in the world. I hope you will join with me as we try to change it."
-Barack Obama
"Life is tough. It's tougher if you're stupid."
-John Wayne
(thanks for the infinite wisdom, John Wayne)

"Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but every virtue at the testing point."
-C.S. Lewis

"Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love of goodness or joy worth having."
-C.S. Lewis

"It does not matter what the verse means to you, it matters what the verse means!"
-John Stonestreet

"If you don't have an attention span, grow one."
-John Stonestreet

"The problem isn't that we love pleasure, the problem is that we're easily pleased."
-C.S. Lewis

"When people stop believing in God, the problem is not that they believe in nothing, but that they believe in everything."
-G.K. Chesterton

"Pause you who read this, and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or gold, of thorns or flowers, that would never have bound you, but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day."
-Charles Dickens

"The most dangerous ideas in society are not the ones being argued, but the ones being assumed."
-C.S. Lewis

"Father, Son and Holy Spirit, may Your kingdom come in all the earth as it is in heaven, may Your will be done. In all the world, in all our hearts, Jesus You are King. We wait, we hope, we trust, we know, Your face we soon shall see."
-Josh Bales, A Hymn For All the World

"If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning."
-C.S. Lewis

Miss you Summit.

(P.S. to those of you who are reading this: I will be posting a YouTube video soon all about Summit. Watch for it. Wait for it. Anticipate it.)