By Elba Montoraya
There I was. Finals had just come to an end, the sun was bright and inviting, and my last summer of college was looking to be amazingly promising. My friends and I would be shooting for the moon, camping under the stars, and making memories that would last a lifetime! This would be the final summer of not being grown ups just yet. We had to make it count.
And yet, somehow I found myself midway through July working two jobs, struggling through my one summer class, and wondering where all my friends were after dozens of failed plans.
My epic summer was starting to look like an epic failure.
The days flew by and all I could do was stand there and watch. What happened to the life changing road trip? To adventure and living on the edge? Well paying bills and flaky friends is what happened. Frustrated at my minimum wage summer job and lack of fun left me feeling abandoned and cynical. I was trying so hard to live up to the expectations in my head about what my summer was going to look like (okay maybe holding an eagle was not exactly completely realistic) that I forgot to just enjoy what I had.
And what did I have? This question kept creeping up on me every time I was confronted with discouragement and disappointment. However, I could not quite focus on the question because I was too busy being a brat and sulking. Then, of course, it hit me. After church one night, a good 20 or so of us went out across the street to our favorite post-service hang out spot. It was one of those nights that just seemed eerily perfect. It was well into the evening but the weather was warm with a slight breeze and the moon was shining just right on our table in the restaurant patio.
Once again, there I was enjoying my cold drink with some of my favorite people in the world talking about our week, Christology, and how dreadful the Oakland A’s were playing this season. I recall sitting back in my sit and feeling so grateful and excited that I was able to enjoy true friendship/community or whatever you want to call it. This is the stuff epic summers are made out of. Though the roadtrips eventually were taken and I finally made it out to Yosemite to sleep under the stars (okay, I was in a tent, but it still counts), I look back on my last summer of college and think what a fantastic collage of failures, joy, frustration, peace, disappointments, and blissful beautiful laughter.
There was a lot of laughter.
It definitely did not go the way I had intended it to go (but what ever does?) It went a whole lot better. Instead of discovering excitement on the open road, I was able to find it in the seemingly incredibly mundane. And as the new semester unfolds, I’ll take all the adventure in the mundane I can get
And yet, somehow I found myself midway through July working two jobs, struggling through my one summer class, and wondering where all my friends were after dozens of failed plans.
My epic summer was starting to look like an epic failure.
The days flew by and all I could do was stand there and watch. What happened to the life changing road trip? To adventure and living on the edge? Well paying bills and flaky friends is what happened. Frustrated at my minimum wage summer job and lack of fun left me feeling abandoned and cynical. I was trying so hard to live up to the expectations in my head about what my summer was going to look like (okay maybe holding an eagle was not exactly completely realistic) that I forgot to just enjoy what I had.
And what did I have? This question kept creeping up on me every time I was confronted with discouragement and disappointment. However, I could not quite focus on the question because I was too busy being a brat and sulking. Then, of course, it hit me. After church one night, a good 20 or so of us went out across the street to our favorite post-service hang out spot. It was one of those nights that just seemed eerily perfect. It was well into the evening but the weather was warm with a slight breeze and the moon was shining just right on our table in the restaurant patio.
Once again, there I was enjoying my cold drink with some of my favorite people in the world talking about our week, Christology, and how dreadful the Oakland A’s were playing this season. I recall sitting back in my sit and feeling so grateful and excited that I was able to enjoy true friendship/community or whatever you want to call it. This is the stuff epic summers are made out of. Though the roadtrips eventually were taken and I finally made it out to Yosemite to sleep under the stars (okay, I was in a tent, but it still counts), I look back on my last summer of college and think what a fantastic collage of failures, joy, frustration, peace, disappointments, and blissful beautiful laughter.
There was a lot of laughter.
It definitely did not go the way I had intended it to go (but what ever does?) It went a whole lot better. Instead of discovering excitement on the open road, I was able to find it in the seemingly incredibly mundane. And as the new semester unfolds, I’ll take all the adventure in the mundane I can get
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