For His love endures forever...

I have a couple updates with how things are going down here. I'm still struggling with a few things regarding my job at Best Buy. But I'm listening to hear what the Lord has for me to do in that situation. About the purse situation: one of the cell phones (not mine, the other girl's) was found the next day, smashed in three pieces on the side of the road. A graciuos citizen picked up the pieces, put the phone together and contacted the owner; so my friend now has her phone back. As for all the other items: still missing. However, an investigation has been underway to identify and find the suspect. Today, I met with the investigator to try and pick the guy out of a line-up. I was pretty nervous about it. I narrowed it down to 2 out of the 6, and chose the one I thought it was. The investigator immediately corrected me, pointing to the other of the 2 of whom I had narrowed it down. I looked at the investigator, surprised and said, "So you know who did it?" He told me Yes in fact they know who it was, they have his name and know where his parents live. As it turns out, the other guy that was there Saturday night: Person B, admitted to knowing Person A and gave his name: Person A was Person C's ex-boyfriend. I asked if it was bad that I couldn't identify the guy, and he said it wasn't that big of a deal, because I didn't have a face-to-face conversation with him, like one of the adult chaperones had. And that adult chaperone did indeed identify the correct guy, so everything turned out okay. Now, it's just a waiting period until they can find the guy. So: we wait.

In the meantime, I've been checking out the a-mazing trees down here!! This past weekend a friend and I went to the top of one of the mountains here, and watched the sun set. It was BEAUTIFUL! And everything was sooo quiet and still up there. It was a really cool time that reminded me how BIG our God is. These two pictures are products from our journey up the mountain. Enjoy them! Think Brown County + autumn x 10 = East Tennessee in October (hey, what can I say? I'm a math major :)

My Life? or His?

"Majesty, Majesty
Your grace has found me just as I am
Empty-handed, but alive in Your hand."

Last night was Milligan fall formal...YAY! Brett and I + 2 other girls got all dressed up and made our way over to one of the most expensive hotels in the area. So there we all are, amidst 75 or so other shnazzy students, dancing our little heart away. The Macarena starts playing--obviously this requires a couple pictures. I walk back to the back of the ballroom --which also happens to be the entrance to the room--to retrieve my camera from my purse. As I approach the table and scan for my purse, two girls quickly come to me, "Are you looking for something that was on this table?!" I told them yes, that my purse was there. "Well someone just took something off this table and ran outside."

Three young adults had been walking in and out of the room, clearly not dressed for a dance and were definitely not Milligan students. The chaperones/doorkeepers asked them for I.D. and they left...but not until one of them had time to take a "party favor" with him as he walked out the door. One of the chaperones (also a Milligan professor) saw the guy pick something up and walk out. She followed him, said something to him and then he bolted in a running frenzy out the door. Five minutes later, I came to the scene. The ONE hotel employee on duty that night was already on the case, trying to figure things out. Person A is the one who actually took my purse. Persons B & C were boyfriend/girlfriend and B actually works at the hotel but was off-duty. They all three conveniently disappeared to nowhere.

I called the police to come to the scene. When he arrived, I started doing my reporting of what was all in my purse: debit cards, 2 cell phones, 2 sets of keys, digital camera; some mascara, hand sanitizer, batteries, extra-strength tylenol, baby pinecones I had picked up the other day because they were really cute, among other things. Before the policeman arrived, I had already called the banks to lock my cards. However, the guy decided to go the gas station first. As I was talking to the policeman in the lobby, four bright white strobe lights begin flashing throughout the hotel: fire alarm. The front desk has no control and are rushing around dealing with burglary, newly arrived guests, and now a fire. The professors from the dance start ushering people out into the lobby and towards the door. Meanwhile, the fire engine rolls up and 4 or 5 firemen in full garb walk into the lobby. Simultaneously, the lone desk clerk realizes that "fire" is actually the smoke from the smoke machines out on the dance floor. At this time, my policeman looks at me and says, "I feel like I'm on the Titantic." It was a crazy scene!! After the uproar died down, Persons B & C returned to the hotel to talk to the police, claiming not have any connection whatsoever with Person A. But one of the doorkeepers saw all three Persons A, B, and C together talking amongst each other.

So anyway, my things are gone, no damage too serious...I'm missing my camera and phone big time, but things could have been a lot worse. The next few days will be filled with police reports, talking to banks, new phone, and sorting through chaos. If you think about it, pray for me: there's a lot of frustration, confusion and on top of this: some problems at work. But this has become my prayer:

"My whole life
I place in Your hands
God of mercy
Humbled I bow down
In Your presence at Your throne

In my life,
Be lifted high
In our word
Be lifted high
In our love
Be lifted high."

Amen.

Hot springs, Norma and Asheville.

This weekend is fall break. Since I am blessed enough to have a job, I am required to work this weekend; because of that, I was not able to come home and see my family like the rest of the 98.6% of Milligan students. So Brett, Leah and I all decided to take a road-trip to Asheville, NC. This is about an hour route--if you're going straight there on the interstate. However, down here in the hills of Tennessee, it's better to drive through the countryside and take in nature and all of God's beautiful creation. We loaded the car with the essentials and started our journey and picked up Leah on the way out. We headed to Hot Springs, North Carolina, hoping to find none other than: natural hot springs. However, when we got there--we found that "hot springs" was actually a yard with 4 hot tubs sectioned off for "relaxation with nature." Nothing natural about it. It was complete with chlorine and everything....how disappointed we were to find out their "natural springs" were anything BUT natural.
Our route there took us through some back hills. Imagine the stereotypical Tennessee hills and the yards you find there....that's what we saw. There were many abandoned cars. At one point we began counting them. There was a little Ford escort crashed into a dirt enbankment; a jeep thing from 1948, stashed on the side of the road, sprouting shrubbery; many random trucks...you know, those kinds of things. Also, almost every barn (except the one pictured left) had tobacco hanging from within it to dry it out. I don't think I realized how much tobacco is down here, but apparently there's quite a bit. It seems to be the cool thing for men to chew ther tabacky. Most of them have a "fat lip", signaling the juicy, brown flaky stuff in their mouth--kind of gross if you ask me--.
While driving through the hills, we passed a field and noticed an elderly lady bending over and stuffing hay into a garbage bag. We all saw her and kind of had the same thought. We debated for a few minutes before turning around and driving back past her house and pulling into her driveway. She looked up and noticed us, but returned back to her work. As we walked up to her we said "hello" and introduced ourselves. We asked her if we could help her rake the rest of the hay and put it into the bags for her. She was a little reluctant at first or maybe she just wasn't quite clear as to why
3 young girls were on her property? She let us take over for her and went to "the building" --aka: the shed---to retrieve more trash bags. Leah raked a couple more piles for her and Brett and I began filling the three trashbags. She introduced herself as Norma and she told us she was 88 years old. Norma was in really good health for being 88 years young! For heaven's sake she was outside raking hay and bending over putting it into trashbags. It was cool to get to talk to her for a little bit. We stayed with her for about a half an hour. She talked about her family and how some landmarks around the area were named after her grandfather. Brett asked her if she could take some photos of her for her photography class. Norma said it would be alright but only after she took her shower cap off. Haha! We told her we liked it on and she should keep it on. She had been wearing it because she has just washed her hair and wanted to keep the gnats out of it. (By the way: I've never seen such a perpetual attack of gnats before! It was pretty nasty! ;)



















We stayed at the Comfort Inn in Asheville last night. Today we walked around down
town Asheville and found a cute little cafe to dine for lunch. We then headed back to school. It was a good and relaxing time for us all, even though it wasn't long enough and we each wish that we could've been with our families. The trees are changing and fall is coming upon us. I miss you all and love you so much!!!