September 18th 2011

Wow it's been a long while since I've posted a new entry. Sorry about that y'all. With school starting and being in the Army Junior Reserve Officer Corps, job huntin and all that jazz I've been slackin a little.
But A LOT has happened since I left off. Well the trip to New Orleans was long as heck. Just about a 24 hour driving trip. Not including all the time we spent at Gas Stations, eating, hotels, or whatever. It was long. Of all the things to happen, several stick out the most, and I will cover them all here, right now, today. So get ready to read.
So when we left I decided to sit next to two of my close buds, one being my best bro Will. When we stopped just outside of my home town Cruces, we switched up our seat and I was in the back sitting next to a girl I knew in my youth group, but didn't really get to know. She fell asleep on my shoulder so I was stuck in a rather weird position and my arm fell asleep, but I didn't want to wake her up. so after a couple of hours we stop in Texas somewhere, which is when I woke her up. We stopped for gas, and I bought a hat that said "BADASS BIKER BEER" and it had a bottle cap opener on the bill of the cap. After this we went to Dairy Queen, which was honestly very nasty. So we hit the road again.
As for the rest of the trip there are a few details like the most disgusting restroom in the planet, walking through a graveyard and making it to the hotel at one in the morning. Just keep in mind I spent a lot of time sitting next to this girl. And at this point we are halfway through Texas and the humidity starts to kick in.
So it's wet, and hot, and muggy. "New Orleans is going to just so ******* AMAZING" was my only thought at that time. But I got used to it rather quickly and I REALLY love Louisiana. So now we have eaten bags of Beef Jerky and drank A TON of Monsters, now we are rolling into Great Bay, there are SO many lakes and lots of water are trees and Grass... You don't see that back home in New Mexico. Then we see a "lake" that basically has no other side to if for MILES.
Skipping ahead again and BAM we are in Now Orleans. The first thing I saw was a dude watering his porch... Yes, his porch. Then there are these weird chips called "Voo-doo" something or other. I thought they were gross, Will loved them. So we head to the church, get split up into out groups, and tour the place, get to meet the Youth WOrks staff and we play the largest game of "Never have I ever" I have ever seen. But we were in a circle and had to run across to the other side when someone left and if we failed we were in the middle and had to ask a question. It was chaotic. But then we got to know people, make friends and sleep. Guys slept in the Fellowship Hall/ Dining area, girls got the sanctuary.
The next day we are doing our devotionals and we split up to our groups and head off to our work stations. I was lucky enough to work at a school painting.It wasn't very fun but it really helped. Then the next fun thing we did was go to the French Quarter. We had Beneits, they were AMAZING.
Then skipping several days we went and saw the most damaged part of New Orleans. It was crazy, they have the level of the toxic water that used to be there and how many people were dead. The toxic left the place un-inhabitable, but homeless stayed in these houses. We only saw one house they had people dead, it was 3. It was depressing to think you were looking at a place that had three dead bodies in it. We went to where the levies broke and prayed.
The next thing was that Thursday night, when our Youth leaders washed our feet. You might be thinking "So what?" or "That's weird...".. I thought that too. But it was actually humbling. It used to be the slaves job to wash feet, but at the last supper, Jesus washed his disciples feet. The master washing the feet of his followers. It's a humbling experience. After our feet were washed, our leaders would pray for us. It was a moving experience and made you think about they way we live and how we should live. My best friend Will was balling his eyes out the entire time.. Needless to say he has a new found strength in the lord and a brand new shiny courage to stand for his faith.
But before that, we went to a Southern Baptist Church, the one with the crazy black people screaming and praising like mad men. I LOVED THAT CHURCH! We need one here in Las Cruces... But I looked over to the other Balcony and saw one of my new friends from Florida, Sierra, crying her eyes out. I had no idea if something sad got to her and she found release, or if all of her guilt, pain, anger and so on was lifted off of her shoulders or what, but she seemed to be happier and freed of something. We had these pare bags pinned up to where we left messages to people, I wrote her a note, not saying what was on it, but I guess I made and impression on her because she and I are still friends to this day, two months later.
Now we are leaving the church and we are all saying our sad goodbyes and keep in touch. I'm sitting next to that girl again and we have gotten to know each other better during the trip. on the way to the hotel she falls asleep on me and puts her arm over my stomach. She said it was because she likes to feel heart beats. But we had a pillow covering our legs and she sat up to talk to someone and her hand "accidentally" slides down and our fingers are almost entwined. But we end up holding hands eventually, I made the move, but she took credit for it. Then we are at the pool in San Antonio, flirting a lot. We spent the whole day together at the Alamo and on the river walk during the day before we went to the hotel.
We held hands on the bus trip back the whole way to New Mexico, under a blanket so no one would see. Blah blah blah... I hated that. But we have been together the whole two months and she didn't want to "date" so we were "involved" and only a few people new about it. Friday night she texts me saying we should only be friends, she didn't want me finding out on Facebook(hmm what could that mean?) and she didn't want to hurt me but she didn't want to get involved the way we were so on and so forth.. I say okay that's fine, but I am a little hurt about it. I get to my friends house and get on Facebook to see she in a relationship with some other guy. Now I am crushed. She said she doesn't like being in relationships or dating, but her she is dating this dude she must have barely met because four days before last friday, she said there wasn't anyone else and she goes out with him. I am crushed, telling her I am not. But she tells me she feels horrible about it, if that were true she wouldn't be with him after getting involved with me even though she didn't want to and i told her I loved her, i really did, and I still do. This just sucks. and that leads up to today on important information I wanted y'all to know.
Concluding this, I am currently hurting from that and stressed from school. So until next time, take care y'all.