I am not great at crossword puzzles and I have lost at least three phones to water damage. Now I do mini crossword puzzles and get water proof cases for my electronics. As with many people, my twenties have been a bit tumultuous, but I move forward and learn and grow. It has been years of discouragement as I push through getting a college degree and work jobs interspersed with great joy from learning contentment and, mostly, from a community of people who have refused to give up on me. I love stories as they are revealed in books and people and online literary journals I read when working my way through classes as a custodian. I am both an introvert and an extrovert. I want to be with everyone that I love all at once and I need to be alone for at least an hour after work. I am a great lover of strangers and of good quotes from books I have not yet read. Mostly I am in awe. I am in awe of the great beauty and increasing complexities I keep discovering in our world. I am in awe of the contrast of cruelty in this world and in the measure of mercy that bites at misery's ankles. I am in awe of the people in my life who see me for the person I hope to be and who are, themselves, clear bearers of the image of a great creator. As I move into my thirties I hope to find and do work that I am good at, which I enjoy, and that meets one of the worlds many needs (to echo Frederick Buechner.) Finishing up school in May, I will fly to Spain on my 30th birthday and take about six weeks to walk El Camino de Santiago. This is an open invitation trip where I will reflect, meet strangers, walk out ten years worth of academic stress, and immerse myself in a a culture not my own. I will come back to be in the wedding of one of my dearest friends who has walked much of this journey with me. What comes after is yet to be announced but is well in the works as I send out applications and seek the wisdom of those who know me well.