Wow. I only have one-ish week left! I won't give a term wrap-up blog entry because I'll probably do that next week, with some pictures posted from our Christmas party.
Today is Tuesday, but that's obvious, you know that. I've been slightly dreading this day for a long time (pretty well a month). Tonight I'm presenting my very first study project and I'm super nervous. My LTS says that I have no reason to be, but I'm still nervous. It's not the presenting that makes me nervous though because Capernwray Quebec is a very comfortable and familiar place, but it's the material that I'm presenting. I just feel like it's not good enough. But realistically, it doesn't really matter if it's not academically good. Study projects are just sharing with other people what God's been teaching you through a specific passage. There's no right or wrong answer really, but at the same time there is. Because people can right out tell if something is wrong. I'm just nervous because I hold some beliefs that I've found out that people here don't share.
So I'm just gonna keep telling myself this tonight: I'll be fine, if I let God do the talking and not me! Janessa's just gonna have to shut up for a little while and let God speak through her!
I realized today, while being driven around for community help outreach, that I really miss driving in Manitoba. Quebec is so hilly and curvy and twisty (which are all very beautiful things), but Manitoba's flat and straight. And Manitoba driving gets along with my stomach a lot better! I cherish the times when I would be driving without feeling nauseated every time. Oh, good old Manitoba.
Another thing I realized today was that I'm experiencing something totally normal out here. This is my first real adventure away from home. Even though my permanent residential address is my parent's house, I'm still living outside my parent's house. It struck me yesterday that I'm growing up. No more high school, no more junior high, no more being a child, and no more being tolerant to people treating me like a child. I really miss home. The funny thing is: I really thought that I wouldn't. But I do.
I thought that, if I did miss anything, it would only be the people I love. But I've found myself missing everything else, as well as those people. I miss the buildings. I miss the familiar atomsphere. I miss my church. I miss taking trips to go shopping in Winnipeg. I miss hanging out with friends. I miss going to see movies. I miss sitting down on a Saturday night around the television as a family and watching a movie. I miss watching Reba with my dad. I miss hanging around the junior high, bothering my mom while she works. I even miss working at Smitty's.
Something I never thought that I would miss is high school. But I do. Even though I'm at bible school and I'm actually doing something besides working the year after high school, I feel like I'm still experiencing the "post-high school syndrome", as someone I once knew called it. My coming years from now seems rather empty, not because I don't see life in them, but because I don't see new and exciting experiences in them.
Here's another thing that hit me today in the realization that I'm growing up: life's going by at a rapid pace! I feel like it was just yesterday that I was in grade 9. It's crazy because I've experienced SO many things since that time. I've experienced hurt, love, broken hearts, wonderful friendships, death, faith, Christ's love, Christ's grace, graduation, leaving home, Europe, and living in another province. All of which are things that I am more than grateful for, even if I wasn't at one point in my life. So this conclusion I have come to and this is my advice to you:
Don't blink. Or else you'll miss it.
