aww crap.
what do they say about good intentions?

alright. let's review, shall we?

got to new mexico on a wednesday. i figured for sure there would be people here already, and i was right in a way. i was the fifth person to show up, but two were in el paso, one was the returning volunteer in the las cruces house but was home for the time between the two terms, and one was staying with some other friends for a while. so, really, i was the first one to get to the house. i stayed there by myself for two days, and i was trying to get settled, used to the time change, etc... so i didn't explore much.
buuuut it wasn't long before everyone showed up and things went crazy!
becca (last year's habitat volunteer, now working at the church) showed up on friday, and we hung out, went to barnes and noble and whatnot. saturday we got up and went to the farmer's market, which was pretty awesome. i'm pretty sure we did something else all afternoon, but it was a while ago and i forgot... whoops.
most people came on saturday, which was becca's birthday, so we made calzones and went to high desert, the local brewery/bar, with all but one of the people in bsc.
sunday i went to the quaker meeting, which has an amazing worship space, but is a bit smaller than the meeting in columbia and doesn't seem to be quite as active in the community. overall, i like them, but i am thinking about going to the unitarian church to check things out.

monday training started, so i spent the whole week with all nine of the ladies and ryan, our director, talking about our tenents and rules of being an americorps member, visiting our worksites and all that... we visited juarez, which was really awesome but deserves its own post. i'll get to it... i hope. i think we learned a lot, about each other and what it is we are really striving for down here, but it was a little overwhleming to be with everyone non-stop for a whole week. saturday and sunday we were in silver city for a retreat, which couldn't have come at a better time because i was starting to get really upset about how flat las cruces is, and silver city is a little bit more hilly. it was a cute town, too, with little antique/thrift shops and a gelato cafe. yeah. i was pretty happy.
on the way back we drove through gila national forest, which was GORGEOUS.

i put in one week of work already, but i'm still not exactly sure what they expect/anticipate from me. this week they sent me up to albuquerque to this habitat for humanity international leadership training conference. on the one hand i'm glad to be here, to see what other affiliates are doing and to know that other people are facing the same kinds of challenges that i am, and to kind of re-focus my efforts. on the other hand, this training is put on by the corporate heads, and it's not the side of habitat i've been involved with in the past. it's not the grassroots effort to change the world. it's a pragmatic organization with rules and guidelines and pr.


i guess all i can say for now is that i'm doing fine. it's still weird to me to be here, away from everyone i know and love, with a (kind of) real job and no homework. it's a transition. i'm not sure i like it?

i'll put pictures up when i can, but my camera's broken right now, and i haven't convinced my roommates to let me steal theirs yet.