Thankful

I didn't get a Thanksgiving post done yesterday because I was too busy being thankful. ;-) We had a lovely afternoon and evening at my grandparents' farm, enjoying good food and even better company. Unfortunately, my brother-in-law and two of my nieces had colds, but my oldest sister and her middle daughter were able to join us. Young MM was the life of the party, beaming and chattering about how happy she was and how much fun she was having.

My middle sister flew from their school in South Carolina to New York to spend the weekend with my Aunt and Uncle and some cousins. It was nice for her to be able to spend the holiday with family, but not have to spend some nine hours coming all the way to Washington State. She was worried about the plane trip because of her severe dizziness and sight problems, but a friend flew with her, and she's been doing much better this week, so things went quite well.

The loveliness of the day ended around 7:00 PM when Mom was suddenly struck quite ill. By 9:30 or so, when it was time for her to take her anti-rejection medications (she's a transplant patient) and she was still throwing up every few minutes, we ended up having to take her in to the hospital. By that time she was so weak she could hardly walk. We spent about four hours there. They gave her liquids and anti-nausea meds through an IV and she was finally able to take her meds. She's still rather sick, but doing much better. Please continue to pray for her recovery (and that it's not something contagious that the rest of us will get).

Another thing I am thankful for is that Mom and I finally got the Peculiar People website up and running! Check it out for an opportunity to win a free copy of Struggle Creek!

Interpreting

We're done talking about how to interpret and are actually starting to do it now. It's exciting and scary all at the same time. This semester we're working on interpreting in it's literal sense--taking a frozen text like a video tape of signing or cassette tape of voice and analyzing it and then pausing it in spots to do the interpretation.

Our final for the Interpreting Process class (in just a few weeks, yikes!) will have a written section, a sign to voice section, and a voice to sign section.

I got a bunch of tests back this week and found that for all but one of my classes I am doing better than I thought. :-) Fingerspelling is going to be the major issue, though, that could get me thrown from the program. Even in English, if I rattled off a whole set of numbers, most people wouldn't be able to remember them all and write them down, so switching that into another language is difficult, even without my added learning problems. But I'm going to start spending even more time at school so I can work more with the tutor and other students. With prayer and hard work I'm trusting I'll pass the class (though I can't promise I won't stress out about it! ;-)

Right now I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving break. Our whole class is in desperate need of a break however short it will be, tee hee!

Presentations and papers and quizes, oh my!

As you may have guessed from my poem in the last post, I'm getting a bit overwhelmed with the constant tests one after another and my own struggling grades. Last night I stayed up until 1:00 AM studying and such. Then I forgot to change my alarm time from the day before when I only had afternoon school. That's right, I overslept. OF COURSE the one time in my life I miss class from oversleeping was a day we had a test first thing in the morning.

I woke up around 7:10 and my class starts at 8:00. That doesn't sound too bad, until you realize that it takes an hour to get to school if you leave between 6 and 6:40, and closer to an hour and a half or even two hours if you get to the freeway after 7:00 AM, due to traffic. Also, that teacher does not allow us to enter the classroom if we are late, especially if a test is in session.

I thank God my teacher is letting me take the test on Monday! It probably would have knocked me out of the interp. program if I had gotten a 0 on this test. So, I pray I do all right on the test on Monday.

Monday I also am seeing a counselor at the learning disabilities center at school. I have some minor learning disabilities (stemming from eye problems) that, among other things, make taking tests and spelling difficult for me. I should have seen the counselor at the beginning of the year, but last year in my prerequisite classes I did just fine, so I figured I'd be fine this year.

Not so much.

I'm praying that the counselor will have wisdom to know what will help me, and that I will know what to ask for. It's also good to know that I'm not alone, for much of the class is struggling. So we are doing a lot of study groups and spending as much time as possible with the program's private tutor. It's also great to know that ya'll are supporting and praying for me.

Though I am struggling and get discouraged some, I'm still so glad to be in the program. I was never planning to go to college because of my learning styles. It was totally God that stuck me in this exclusive program, and I know He has plans for it.

This afternoon after we had been working on fingerspelling for a while with the tutor, we got off on a rabbit trail and he was telling stories on himself. Funny stories are ten times more funny in ASL because the whole scene is acted out with all the facial and body expressions of yourself and those around you. He had the group of us nearly rolling on the floor laughing. Hopefully we weren't too loud since we were, after all, in the library. ;-)

Of Tests

I see a mountain looming near
Its very shadow causes fear
Foreboding, oh how close its base
How quickly I must mount its face!

I strive all night with panicked cry
To reach the top with weary sigh
I meet my challenge right on straight
Then wait aside to meet my fate

When I have conquered that tall peak
It's now for restful peace I seek
Yet all I find is vale so deep
And there beyond it one more heap