From The Beginning

I have never been one to make New Year Resolutions. But the year is almost a month old now, and these are more like things I would like to accomplish soon. Basically this is my giant to do list!

•Wake up 15 minutes earlier each morning. (Eat Breakfast/ JOURNAL)
•Draw or doodle something every day. (Note to self: New sketch book)
•Dance!
•Save at least 50 bucks a month... Think Australia!
•Drink more water
•Listen to a new band a week.
•Take a weekend trip once every 2-3 months
•Keep up on current events
•Land a summer internship
•Start and FINISH more craft projects
•Focus on school

I basically want to add a bit more to my life... what can I say!

The season of snow

*I hope it snows this week, a snowflake on your cheek would make this Christmas so beautiful*
It is hard to be anything but beautiful. Snow is something that is hard to be explained for me. Frozen water drops, YET each has six sides, and each one is completely different.

I recently was at the mall (a consumer's paradise) and discovered that YES, even in the middle of the desert, with global warming taking place, there is snow. It is simply a powder that you add to water, and like magic you get the look and feel of the real beautiful thing. I was tempted to buy some and try it out for myself, BUT the price tag was about the budget of one person on my list.
I casually passed by, upset at the lame attempt on something so naturally beautiful.
I some how came this fake water-powder, and brought it into my home The difference between this stuff and the white stuff I love was clear. BUT honestly when something smells like plastic, it just doesn't like so beautiful on cheeks, or eyelashes.

In a Blonde Daze

I have blonde hair. I have never dyed my hair blonde, it is all natural. I don't get offended easily and I must say proudly that I do not feel that I fit the stereotypical blonde. But I must admit that I feel like lately I am in a daze... a Blonde daze...

I painted my nails tonight. I only did it because I felt like I should do something that was girlie. This is after I cut out a pattern for the dress I am about to start sewing, and after I ate ice cream out of the carton. I must say that I am not girlie enough for colored nails. It could just be the fact that the color is nothing short of a shiny purple blue, but I think that it is past this hiatus color choice. I am constantly glancing down at my hands as I am typing because there seems to be something on them, or the keys but no it is just the color is a distraction.

I also finished a book to day. I might have to mention that it was about a oyouknow 7th grade reading level. BUT it was about a girl in college. The problem it was the 3rd in a series and I can't wait for number 4, which is a work in progress at this time. I also finished this journal type of novel in o about 3 days, and one of those I was working. I guess I can't explain the entire book, because it would prove that it was about a sex driven college aged girl that even have graduation from Columbia (in NYC) had no idea what she wanted to do to her life.

I am dazed. My mind is thinking of that stupid letter that is going to determine my future. It is the one with a return address from ASU. It seems to be arriving in everyone's mailbox but my own. So I daze around trying to keep busy not to think of it, not to wonder if I should actually figure a schedule for next year, or if I should just forget the rest of it. Should I sit in the front yard and chase the mailman when he is driving away if I do not have the letter in my hand.

So until I will sit and stay in a blonde daze and yet still not fit into that STINKIN stereotype.

hand it my way

I don't think that I know the back of my hand very well. It has 14 knuckle type of things, a lot of lines and 5 nails. I am not sure where that expression came from. I mean Honestly if you could draw a picture of the back of your hand and have it look even half way as similar you are my new hero, my best friend. I think that is should be something like the scars on my knee. I got them when I was 5 years old. But even though I have had them 5 years less than I have the back of my hand, I could tell you about them a lot better. I know that much more than something that is as detailed as the back of a hand.

I hear someone used that phrase, or maybe it was in one of my beloved country songs but either way.... I know it like I know that back of my hand... Needs to be used when you don't know something rather than when you do.

I am shot for interesting thoughts. Shoot some may way if you have some.

Stuck in a Pit behide the wheel and ready to drive off

A coal mine is the one place that I don't feel like I belong, yet for the second summer in a row I find myself behind the wheel of a 240 ton haul truck. I can't say I am excited, however I can say that I need the money. I use the money to continue my education. I also learn to appreciate that my father as done this job for so many years to make life better for me.
The main reason that I feel like I don't belong here is because I long to be doing something creative. I would rather sit and render 20 drawings a day, or pick materials for an entire complex than sit and think about the road conditions, and if I need to slow down to provide more use on my tire.
It feels like I am stuck in a hole, or should I say a pit with the high walls coming down. There isn't anything that can dig me our except that fact that unlike the men and women that do this for a living, I will be able to go back to school and gain knowledge past how a wheel motor works.
I must say that anyone that can do this job for more than a few months has my up most WOW. I am also glad to know that their are those that will dig up this energy source, even if I complain now, I know that when I am sitting in the truck. It is my job and I will do it with the hopes the of future in the front of my mind.

after the rain

In my hometown we have a bike path that runs with the North Platte River. It is a nice escape for the "city life" and into the nature environment- okay really just nice to see the river rushing by, the trees and allow my dog to run without a lease and not get yelled at for stepping onto a lawn.
The other night when I took Gabby down there for a walk, it had just rained on that side of town. (Interesting fact of Wyoming is that the weather is different in every step, it is very independent of itself) The smell of rain and fresh mowed grass was in the air, the entire time after our embarkment.
It was nice to go for a walk after the rain, once I got over the fact that my feet were numb, and bottom of my pants wet. I was able to see where the clouds had lifted and cleared a crystal sky of blue. There was also a half visable rainbow that a step down from the clouds. It was just a sky of beauty.
The path was wet, but the dirt around it was not the mud it normally is. It seems that all the world just came together.
It was an after the rain walk that lead me to see the beauty around me once again.
The setting sun was present when we finished the loop through the park. Even though Gabby did not enjoy the presence of other dogs, and even when she wanted to turn around half way like she always does, it is something to see how even she seems to appreciate the beauty of it all. The place that glory dwells

I sold my soul

I recently created more of a myspace profile, after I said I didn't. I am owned.

I have been thinking that if tomorrow is a brand new day, when what is today when it is finished.

Cheyenne Frontier Days (The DADDY OF THEM ALL) has a lot of big names coming to plan this year. Big name COUNTRY singers, what could be better. What I enjoy most about the idea of Cheyenne Frontier Days is that fact that it is bigger than the Wyoming State Fair. When I had to present my ID to someone in Arizona she asked me about Frontier Days. I was like well I have only marched in a parade for it, never been to it, but it is the BIGGEST celebration of the Old West.
Aww Yes the Fun in WYoming. Drunk Cowboys. Dust and Mud- that dang old rodeo.

Like Degrassi INTENSE!

OKAY OKAY I KNOW! I went to see what happened on the ONE episode that I missed of Degrassi. I just HAD to! But then The N always has dorky quizzes. I thought I would share my results. I thought it was nice to be an indie film. I mean next I might send you a Degrassi video postcard! O YEAH it GOES THERE!

Wasted Space and Time

I am not going to lie. I am on myspace ( http://www.myspace.com/nelfer) and facebook.

It is a waste of time. Both sites. It does give people a part of me but these pages don't really show exactly who I am. They give parts and pieces but really a false image overall. I spend some wasted time on myself today. Just looking at people's pages. Thinking that I will waste time doing this again and again.

so overall it these sites have millions of members and visitors to them each day. When I would go to the library or the computer lab that is what most people would be looking at. I am not sure that I would say I am that into. I am pretty embarrassed to look at my page or anyone else's in public. I could be called a closet myspacer. I will use it on my own computer but that is all. I haven't added fancy colors, or songs to my page. I just try to keep things simple.

One day I tried to delete my page. It was to hard, I got sucked in to looking at my friends. I wanted to know what everyone was up to. I just don't like giving people a part of me. I want them to know ALL of me. I do tell things, and I do show myself. But it isn't like you can really get the person I am from a few things I like, and a few I don't.

I hate when people tell you who they think they are. I am sure that I do this, but I just can't stand it. I am a down to earth girl who loves to hug trees. It is like telling people that they need to see these characteristics in you that you think you have.

But what can I say. I am attached to knowing that someone might have left me a comment, or that I can see who is doing what. Overall I can just say that I am into it. I will waste much time with it. But I will work on showing more of who I am and not tell who I am

focal restart

The time has pasted, and I am here again. I bring myself back to a place of comfort when things start to change. Back to a place where I can change a face, and let the time that has slipped by be left in place. I can pick up right where I left off, because my writing doesn't change, just the person that is writing it has.

Summer is coming. I assume I will be writing more to pass the time. It does feel that time sits still when I write, but the clock never fails me to change the hands around. A normal occurrence when you are in a comfortable place.


I changed the background, because I am much simpler than the green. It was overpowering the person that needs to shine through. That is something I am a lot more aware of these days, who to let what needs to shine through, come through.

I went shopping today. I don't have money to spend, and with the credit cards bills piling up, was it truly something I needed to do. But I went just the same. I was waiting in the dressing room, where a girl had a shirt and was trying to find the perfect top for it. It was a stripped shirt, lots of layers of cloth, but simple colors. She tried a white shirt on with it, and then a tan one the same style. I noticed that the white was to bright for the shirt, it took away from the already busy shirt that should have been the eye catching factor. She asked me what color I liked better, and I told her what I thought. She was like thanks that is a great point, I love this shirt and want people to notice it over my top that needs to just be simple.

I think that I do that a lot. I forget what is most important, I draw a lot of sparkle and flash into the smaller things trying to make them just as important, but truth is things do need to stand out.

I purchased a shirt today. It is pot-a-dot of all bright colors. The back is open with the top and bottom connecting. You need to just where a tank top under it. I was think about when I was buying it how the tank top would bring out whatever color I felt was the most important at the time. It was just a simple shirt, but it will focus more attention.

I have learned about emphasis in design. It is drawing the attention to a specific area, or feature. It can be done in many ways, just like it can be done in life. I feel that with the white simple background. My writing is the most important part.

Glances through a straw

As I sit and drink the world through a straw, I see my life in clear view. Above my desk I have magnetic strips on which I keep important paper, or things I will loose if they are not right in front of me. I was leaning back admiring all my life. I noticed what I had up there, and couldn't help but think that it was my life.
It is colorful. organized, easy to see when something is wrong, and it is full of expressions. There are many different colors that encompass the wall. Organized in the fact that the things I need to look at the most are right by my monitor and then things I don't need to notice as often are farther away. It is easy to see when something is out of date, or not in the location it once was, or if I have forgotten something it is easy to see that I should have taken it. Expression of my life. Up there is my class schedule, spring break plane details, contact information for organizations, the portfolio information for ASU and CSU, a few photos of friends, 25 dollars to Amazon, plus a few other coupons to local places. It is my life in front of me.
I am not sure what I share it like I do, or if it helps to give me the feeling I know who exactly I am, when I really don't/ Perhaps it is the fact that I am "freakishly" organized and having things at a glance help to keep me motivated. The only thing is I am not sure.
I am not sure if I could drink my world through a straw. The chunks of worry might get in the way.
Worry that I won't find my class, miss my plane, forget to contact someone about an event, NOT GET INTO UPPER DIVISION, or know what to spend my gift on.
I suppose I won't open the umbrella until it starts to rain.... or I won't suck harder until I know there is a chunk in the straw.

12 months..12 minutes

Looking back on 2005 seems like a way to reflect and really come to see what happened in a year...

Jan---
Thought about how it was a New Year, and much like the Death Cab for Cutie song, I didn't feel any different. It was the weeks of wasting away in Wyoming, wearing snowpants for about 2 weeks straight until it was back to school time.

Feb--
Really started into the overwhelming time of 2nd semester at a huge university. I tutored preschoolers, and fell into the thoughts of feeling for others.

March--
Figured I should step up my school, and get more into my classes. Went back to Wyoming for a week, at Spring Break to snow and preschoolers. Found out that I was getting better at drawing, but it was still a skill that I needed to work on. I know in 2006 know that I still need to work on it.

April--
Started the first "romantic relationship" of college. Discovered that allergies are a year round event in Arizona, and that meds are the only way to not want to rip your eyes out or to be able to get through things..

May--
Finished the first year of university from Arizona State! Look back on dorm life with the feeling of NEVER going back. Took a week break and began training for a summer job...

June-July-beginning of August
Days and Nights spent in a rotating shift work schedule of driving haul drive at a coal mine. Learned to sit for hours, and drive in circles. I figured out how my mind wonders but was also able to have some time that focused thoughts that helped my mind grow with ideas of future products.

Late August
Returned to Tempe for 3 semester at ASU. Moved into an APT, and build a room of IKEA furniture. Discovered more than I would have liked to about what an organized freak I am. The dreaded semester began...

Sept-Oct-Nov-Mid Dec
Consumed my self with school. Did hours of drafting and drawing. Built first projects that were 3D. Discovered that people were dropping the major because of the dedication it took. I was remind that I was passionate about design, and thing it could do..

Late Dec
Spent my time on my parents couch in Wyoming. Covered with a red and green blanket, and a remote in hand. Got out with friends a max of 5 times... thought about doing something, but truly lacked motivation


2005 was a year that brought more to my life that I could think of. I did have experiences that affected my life, and changed how I thought of things. I saw how the earth was being used at the coal mine and how it needs to be helped or it will quickly become nothing.
I discovered how easy it is to fall off the planet, or at least one person's plant. It is like hiding yourself into something and knowing that it will be something different.



I took time this break to read some of my old journals. It was interesting to see the person that I came from. I know I am the same with just things different. I have grown out of a lot of things, interests, or ideas. I also found that things are much the same with my habits and feelings. When I am busy I am happy, because I feel like I am needed and useful. It is also like I used to write, or create something for hours and loose track of everything, I still do this.
One year might not change a lot in my life, but it sure does give me a lot to look forward too...


2006 seems to be the year of surprises for me... being excited about trusting

This is the New year.... explosions off in the distance... problems with easy solution...

Holiday spills

Christmas is in the air... I can feel it now... I leave Arizona tomorrow and head back home. Something I have experienced lately though is how holidays can feel for those less fortunate.
I helped out at the Holiday Fun Festival this past Saturday. I got there early and helped inflate a ton of balloons to make an arch, and about a ton more for them to let go. (I was completely against this idea, I mean the birds tangled in strings, and the trash it would put back on the ground...but past that) As the song ended and the balloons flew into the air, all the children in the crowd cheered and had the smile on their faces like I would for my best Christmas gift. I then helped the children make Christmas cards. The older girls would read my nametag and yell Spanish at me. I would responded with I don't speak Spanish handing them the exact pattern they had asked me for. Then I was taking to one lady who had brought her nephew to the event. I asked this little boy if he would like to make a Christmas tree. The lady told me the only ones he had ever seen were in stores, or around town, never in his home. I gave a card for this boy, and a card for herself. The boy grabbed a different card from my hand. His smile when he took it was better than the balloons in the air. He hit at me and I tickled him. His aunt told me that she had never seen him open up to a stranger like that before. With the stolen card in his hand, he opened his arms wide and reach up to hug me. All he said was thank you, and then he grabbed my neck as I leaned down.
Things I have learned this holiday season---- mainly from attending events like A lighted boat parade, Zoolights, Holiday Fun Fest, and donated food, and my time are
-electricity costs more than the tree, and a tree without lighted bulbs isn't a Christmas Tree.
-Children, ages 3-5, enjoy Hot Chocolate-- not the special kind made for adults
-Sometimes 6 cans of Cranberry Sauces, and 8 cans of asparagus is to much to put into one food box.
-People want to pay you back if you have done something for them.
-If a kid doesn't see there dad much, he is still going to be the one that the Christmas card is made to.
-Buying a gift for one of the names that hangs on the tree might not change the world, but it can change the world of that one child who got a gift for Christmas.
-Traditions are for those who have had a past that is worth remembering
-Balloons flying in the air might be something I am against, but it sure can make a crowd cheer.
-Holiday shoppers don't care if you found the right gift, if they have it first.
-Students stress more about finals when they don't have to worry about getting home for Christmas, of if their plane will be delay due to snow.
-Everything tastes better in green and red
I have really learned that no matter the circumstances of the family, or person everything will be set aside so holidays can be celebrated.
One thing I have also come to find it is that knitting is done best when a Christmas movie is playing and hot chocolate is on the stove...

"Time to Say it , Time to Say it...Goodbye, Goodbye"

It is one of the hardest things to loose someone from your life. It is something when they are your age, and not just an elderly person you knew.

Time to say it...
I have memories with these people. I have regrets of how I treated them. I know there are a thousand things I could have done for them, but never did. But I also have the funny memories, and the times that will live on through the photographs-- I miss that time!

Time to say it...
I feel like I should be someone else right now. I should be in the place that I grew up, the place that reminds me of them, with the people that need a shoulder to cry on. It is time to say that I should have put school, and money to the side and gone to Wyoming. I feel today that I should be somewhere else. I couldn't even handle going to my afternoon class.

Goodbye, Goodbye
Goodbye to my friends. Goodbye.


It is more real today than since I heard. It is real that I don't be able to hear Casey's laugh, or Josh truck driving in front of my house. It is real that people are saying their goodbyes, and having closure in the town that raised us all.

Spillover DTR

I am in the middle of studying for a test that I have on Thursday, in my Leisure and the Quality of Life class. (Side Note) It is a recreation credit that counts towards my minor of tourism. I was just reviewing the benefit factors of having leisure in one's life. I was trying to look at people I knew and relate them to the different categories in order to remember them better. It made me look at how I am living. I am totally emerged in school. It is leisure for me though. I can reach the level of "flow". It is a right side of the brain activity, and it is one of my favorite, so it is a good thing that I am spending a lot of time with it.
This is the type of work you want to have, one that overlaps with your leisure. My problem with this is that I don't feel like I have a lot of anything else. Reading about the Spill of theory: where my work and leisure are basically equal, I know that I will be able to each eudaimonia (a full life lived well that has each of the partial goods-- bodily, social, wealth, external, pleasure, soul). I suppose that I just need to work on staying active, and "playing games".
It is something to think about though, just working on balancing more leisure into one's life. I never thought of it as more than "free time" before since I am totally into school, and school work.

Something else I have been thinking about a lot is how people define relationships. DTR-define the relationship. I am beginning to think that it is totally something that everyone should do, because it tells you want the other person thinks of the relationship, where it should be going for them, or they want it to go, and also it just helps to rebuild trust. I am beginning to think that it would be more helpful for friendships than "romantic" relationships. If you were to sit with a friend and talk about your relationship, parts that need to be worked on, or even the parts you enjoy- that friendship is going to be one that grows a lot more than one that hasn't one that but just struggles through the differences, and fights.
The disadvantage of DTRs is when the people don't see the relationship that same way, it can end the relationship all together, or get them on the same page. It is overall a plan. So have a DTR today!

weekend above

This weekend I should have been doing homework like crazy... In fact I should still be doing it right now... BUT I am not. I figure I have a good start on it, and in fact I am doing well with it.
I don't usually give details of my life, but I want to share my weekend, not that I don't have something to say about each thing I did... so it really is more of a reflection on the weekend just the same...

Friday night...
I skipped my first class.... I am still amazed that I did it. I doubt that I missed anything, yet I don't know if I did or didn't.. I just know that once you miss one, it is easier to miss another... BUT I am not going to do that. I know I won't.
I skipped for the reason that if you went to the fair before 5 it was 5 bucks... Yes that is correct the Arizona State Fair. I am still not sure what I thought about it. It was like the Wyoming one that I am used to. The main difference was the size of course. The rides still looked like they were going to kill an innocent child, and I am sure the carnies smelt the same. The vendors were selling the same things, except there was a much more south of the boarder here, Wyoming is more Cowboy. I was very upset about the petting zoo. It was all exotic animals. The poor ones that will never be able to live on their own. I was okay, until we got to the last animal, it was a Kangaroo. It was laying there like a baby bird that had fallen. Misery was all over its body. The muscles in its legs were hardly developed. I must say the "Trip to the Farm" was a good experience for city kids. It was unrealistic but it gave a good idea of animals, even if goats were the focus animal. I watched some Native American dances... and pig races. The entire time I was having empathy for the animals. It was hard to not let them all get out an run.
We then went over to my "old lady" friend's house. She is an amazing woman, and her husband and her are so welcoming. It was such a good time to spend time with her, and just talk to someone like a grown-up and not be treated like a child. Her husband took my boy, and had him watch football--- the kitchen was for women. A game of dominos, a bowl of ice cream later we were back on the way down home.

SATURDAY:::
After about four hours of sleep, I got myself redressed, and went off to meet up with some friends. We then made a quick stop for some coffee and donuts, and then it was off to the HOT AIR BALLOON SHOW. I must admit this was my favorite part of the weekend. I took a ton of pictures, and in Nov. I will post some (my flickr space for Oct. is full). There were about 40-50 balloons in the sky at once. It was just not a site you get to see often. We watched from the side of the road, and didn't get to go up into a basket or anything, but was just something to experience. I am not sure why it was so awesome, but it totally was. It really made me want to do something adventurous. (more on this... once I can share photos)
I then came back for a nap...
I didn't feel like doing homework all day and night, SO I then totally went to dinner with my boy. It was at a Mexican Restaurant that I had a buy one get one free meal at. It was decent... The exciting part of the meal, was when my little baby cockroach friend joined us on the table... We then questioned with we were eating, but both of us cleaned our plates. We then drove to get ice cream, at my favorite ice cream place ever. It is called the Sugar Bowl. It has been around for about 50 years. We were eating our ice cream, and just enjoying the talking of the older people in the place. It was funny when 3 ladies sat across from us, and complained about almost everything. One was saying how it brought back memories like crazy because that is where for grandma would take her. It still feels like you are in the 50's when you enter into the pink palace!
Thinking that I really should get some homework one, I rented "The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants" I have been wanting to see it since it came out. I read the book about 5 years ago, but I just recently read the 3rd Summer. It was similar to the book, and I was not disappointed. It left out some details that were important for the sequels, but I doubt they will have movies of the others. I got work done, and I still was able to do something that I didn't feel totally lame for a Saturday night.

SUNDAY:::
Church this morning, lunch with college group.... homework..

Can I tell you that I am going to go and finish reading "The Perks of Being a Wallflower". It is a really good book. Young Adult Section. It is a quick read, and it really makes you think that you don't understand everything about the pain that people have in them. You just don't understand unless you are them.... I suggest it. Makes you think about the shy kid in your classes and why they did what they did. I guess it helps you to want to reach out more...

I will post pictures, and a paper on my hometown soon..
I am going to the Ace of Hearts for Halloween... really for Fall Festival, because that is all I am doing for tomorrow night, maybe wear it while I do homework... It is a super cute then! My roomie is the Ace of Spades!

When the rain comes

It rained. It finally did. I had my window open last night and I just listened to it as I fell asleep. I thought it was going to rain more today, and it did. I love the rain, so I didn't take my umbrella just my rain jacket. As I waited for the bus to come there was a steady stream of rain, and then it started to pour down when I could see the bus down the road. I was soaked when I finally got onto the bus. the bus had the AC on, pointed right at the sit I choose to sit in. Much to say it doesn't seem like a day to get warm after you get wet.

I love to listen to Third Day's song "When the Rain Comes" each and every time it rains. I think it adds to the experience of the rain falling.

There was a rainbow yesterday. the colors were so true. You could see each and everyone of them.

The rain makes me look to the sky more often. It is so cloudy now, compare to normal, and you can see beauty. It isn't the crystal clear life that seems to be made. My fascination for the sky comes back, because when there are clouds, or rain... anything but blue it adds to it. I could sit and watch it for hours.

I punched God in the face

I punched God in the face....
The thing is I have done it more than once.
The amazing thing is...
He comes back for more...
It is like he blocks each and every punch I throw.


I think think about this sometimes... Think about how hard it would be to forgive someone that punched you in the face, because MAN that would stinking HURT!
I then thing of the marks it would leave... The bruises and scars maybe even a broken nose...
Blood or cuts...

I am glad I don't get punched in the face... It is an awful thing... yet I punch God in the face...
and He comes back for more... never leaving my life...

"Black Boogers"

Pushing the strap of the clean vinyl lunchbox back onto my shoulder, I reach for the door handle of expectations. My mind is racing as I re-read the sign: Training In Session.. 1-2-3, I count in my head; fighting heavy eyelids, I open my green eyes. Yellow hardhats sat on the tables in front of backbreaking chairs. I breathe out with a sigh, and choose a chair, knowing it will be my fate for the next twelve and a half hours. The indoor-outdoor carpet barely seems suitable to place my new lunchbox on. I fear that I will never find the gray and black box again in the years of coal dust, and dirt that had been packed into it. You can’t tell the original color, or tell if there is carpet there at all. Now that I am seated, I have sleepiness even more.
Against my every intention, I turn around when I hear a mucusy throat cough from behind me. He used every effort he had to smile through his untrimmed gray speckled facial hair. I smile back as I brush my hair from my face, but quickly stare down at the ground. I notice my out-of-the-box steel-toed boots. I follow the ground over to his worn, and steel exposed boots. I am then again reminded I am a beginner. I have no experience; I am merely here thanks to my father and the years he has contributed to this company.
It doesn’t seem like your average summer job for any teenager, but the coalmine was my work site. Around an hour and fifteen minutes from my hometown, at Jacob’s Ranch Mine was where my father helped to get me on. During the summers, the coalmines in the Thunder Basin of Wyoming hire college students to work in the office, clean in the shop, or drive 240-ton haul trucks. When it came down to the money, I choose to drive haul truck. Although my dad works out at the mines, we were placed at different mines owned by the same company. My dad did not like this idea at all. Out at the mine there is a different way of life, and he did not see how his baby girl fit into it. He prepared me by telling me to remember it was only a few months, and through stories I had heard throughout the years. My dad didn’t think that anyone could be completely ready for a job of driving an oversized Tonka truck for a twelve-hour shift, much less be prepared to enter into a coalmine of middle-aged men. After my first day of training, I was not sure I was ready for it either, especially when we could climb around the truck like a toy at an amusement park.
Not being able to reach the top of the tire even on my tiptoes, arm to full extend aids in the process of my stomach acid turning and twisting so much I think it created a pretzel. “Check to make sure all the lugs on are. Run with two missing, unless they are next to each other. Got it, girl?” Todd yells over the top of the engine as he faces the tire, and doesn’t even turn to face me. I nod expecting him to see it, even though I don’t understand the difference. Two is two, isn’t it? He glances over his shoulder. I return an understanding smile back at him. I understand more about Todd than the tire. The wrinkles that his serious smile brings are years of knowledge about this job , of little challenge; it shows the joy of his family on days off, and the hardship his body has endured from the rotational shift work. These are the wrinkles like those I would touch with my finger, as my dad would come in late at night to make sure I was asleep. Staring at a tire of a 240-ton haul truck was not what I wanted to be doing this summer afternoon, but Todd with his skills, and his out going personality brought the day alive for me. I was no longer only a rider in this truck of my fears, but now I was beginning to take the wheel. I still had many days of ride/drive training left, but none of them would be with Todd.
“Hey Jesse, what is that YELLOW hardhat doing in your window?” a scratchy voice comes over the little black box that sits on the dash. A green number, 2075, flashes on the screen, as I turn to see the reaction from a guy I just met about five hours ago. Through his smile, I feel like I can read his thoughts.
“Do you get offended easily?” His gap toothed smile asks. I shake my head no, but wonder why. He reaches for my bright and shiny yellow hardhat. “Well if you are lying, turn and look out the window, not my direction. Impossible for me to be able to just look the other way, when I knew somehow this was going to involve me, and that yellow boundary. As truck 2075 cruised closer, Jesse began to move my hardhat up and down, in and out of his lap. I felt the laugher start with a snort. In the perverted part of my mind, Jesse pretending I was giving him some pleasure captured what this day of ride/drive training seemed to not say.
“ It don’t work like that, buddy. She is too much for you.” 2075 remarks after this awkward scene is presented. I am not thrown by this talk like many other nineteen-year-old girls would be. This would be dinner talk around the table. My brother and I would be talking about whose poop would be the chunkiest, or otherwise the whip cream would be flying through the air. My mom would be pick at whatever the delight was she made that evening, counting the time down to when she could leave the chaos. My dad would just tell us to knock it off, or slam his face back into the book he was reading. It was a story I could share with everyone at the table, and get a laugh out of each self-focused person there.
I experienced the coalmine, before the day I stepped into the training room. My hometown is built around the railroad, and coalmines. The requirements for these jobs are the same; skills that come over time on the job. I grew up in this type of culture with blunt, distasteful talk, much like the “locker room” talk of males. To create a shift at the mine it was usually around seventy-seven people are on at a time. Out of this seventy-seven somewhere between eight and twelve would be women. None of which are lady-like, or could be identified as different from the guys. The men did not look down on the women working there, nor did they treat them any different than each other. The only thing is that it has spread through the community, not been controlled by the metal gates of lockers.
The man of the house are the not only ones with these values of the mine, but the community is not what you would imagine from a small town. Working at the coalmine is a job any people have, because you can get hired on with no experience but make enough money to support your family, plus medical benefits. Out at the mine, I was encouraged to go back to school, not get pregnant until I am married, and to marry for money at least the first time. They men seemed to give me advice like I was their own daughter, since our coworkers become your second family. The men out there did not want a young girl to end up like them, unhappy and having to do a mindless job day after day. More than anyone, my dad did not want me to.
“You got family working out here, girl?” John questions me as we stand like rocks carefully placed in a circle, waiting for the kick-it-to-start-it reused short bus on my last day of work for the summer.
“My dad works at Antelope.” I responded without hesitation. It was the question I had been asked multiply times throughout the summer, it was a no thinking answer by now.
“Bob Curtis, is it?”
“Yes, that is my dad.”
“Farmer Bob. O man, that is what they called him. What does he do out there nowadays?”
“He drives truck.” I am set on my answer. Knowing that this summer, I had the same level of position in this dirt hole that my sixteen-year experienced father still does. I was celebrating my last day of a mind-numbing job of driving twelve and a half hours a day, in half circles. It was the life of a coal miner, something I didn’t want to do the rest of my life, but that I knew many, including those standing in front of me, were submitted to until retirement could reach them.
The wrinkles on their faces, the “miners’ guts”, and the struggling to pay their bills was all they would have to show for the years of hating their job. Looking onto my father’s grease stained jeans, and his dirt smudged face, when I get home, I know that my dad will celebrate with me the fact that I don’t have to work out there with him but will get an education. When I see the wrinkles deeper on his face when he comes home from a twelve-hour day, I will be able to say, “ Someday daddy… someday you won’t have black boogers anymore.”



This was my first english paper this year.... good old Coal Mine....

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LINES
Originally uploaded by jjjanelle.

When I said a while back that school controlled my life, this is why I wasn't kidding. LINES... horizontal lines that get densier and heavier as you go down the paper. In sets of eight with 1/8" between them.
This photo can not show the pain... the thicker lines are just made up of more thinner lines. I suppose you could say after 6 times I would have it by now... but we will see.
I took more photos of them, but I enjoyed this one the best EVEN with the top corners.... at least I don't post a ton of photos of my boyfriend all the time.

I am looking for another job. I applied for some earlier this year, but now I need one more than ever. I love the job I have and I am not goint to quit that, but just maybe a weekend or tues/thurs morn one would be nice. We will see what I can find.

Should be a fun search.... I am thinking Work Study for one reason... I will be able to get the time off I need to because they are based on school schedule.. YEAH!