I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry...

Yes I am really sorry I have not posted in so long. This summer has been flying by and internet access has been sketchy to say the least. This summer has also been absolutely amazing!!! I have officially about 5 weeks left. Isn't that crazy? 5 weeks, that's it. I don't know what to do with myself. We are camping onsite 4 days a week trying to finish up our survey. Complaints about camping have been rampant but to be honest, I absolutely love the camping. I also loved getting stuck in the rainstorm on Wednesday. I'm really not being sarcastic, promise. I loved it. The lightening was less than a mile a way and we ran about a mile to the car. I have never been so completely soaked in my life, and I was a swimmer! I loved it all though, it was so beautiful, it smelled so good, and I was so completely happy! I love it here but I am excited to move on, move forward and move home. This is my last year of my undergrad and I'm blown away by how fast life is moving along. Good times. Well I'm still trying to put up pictures from the last few months but it's not working well but I will try to update a little more regularly. Adios!

Hola from Tonopah!

Well Tonopah has been pretty fantastic so far. Training took FOREVER but we are finally starting to get to the grit of things. At least a little bit. This week we have been doing district cleanup while Mark is moving his family from Utah but hopefully by the end of the week we will be back in the field recording sites. We drive about an hour and a half to site everyday but at some point it is going to be longer. The majority of the drive is done on dirt roads which is pretty awesome. Time flies when you have to watch out for boulders and drop-offs. :) Speaking of, on the first day I was driving the truck--trucks are HUGE by the way, at least compared to my little Ford Escort. Anyway so I was driving the truck back from site and was doing ok until BANG! POP! (except mucho, mucho louder). I'm not used to the width of the truck and so I was trying to avoid this very big rock but it hit the tire wall and took out a fairly good chunk out of the tire. Everyone was really nice about it but I do claim the first flat of the season. Kudos to me. :)
Well everything is going great and there will be updates to follow! At some point I will also post some video and pictures. Yep, yep.

Exciting updates...well at least a little bit.

Well I am moving to the middle of nowhere in Nevada in two days!!! I can't decide whether I am excited or nervous or a little of both. I am so excited to be hiking out in the middle of nowhere, working hard and studying for the GRE that I am taking at the end of the summer. I hope I'm not making it sound like I am dreading it because I actually am so excited that I can hardly contain myself. I actually didn't feel that way until Sunday to be honest. Sunday was pretty miraculous that way. I have been dealing with getting this job for months and months and have questioned whether this is the right thing to do but I prayed for weeks before I found out whether I got the job thinking that if I got it, which seemed highly unlikely, I should take it. Well I miraculously got the job but felt no confirmation and so I have been struggling with leaving but on Sunday I got the spiritual confirmation I was looking for. You know it seems like other parts of my life are developing in unsuspected ways and I have been worried about leaving, wondering if all that progress will disappear. Now I feel this amazing peace and incredible joy knowing that I am in the right place, at the right time and doing what I need to be doing. I am so happy where I am right now!!! Well if I don't write before I leave my next update will be from Tonopah, Nevada!!! Night guys!

GRRR...

I just realized that somehow my list of blogs has disappeared. This makes me super mad. Curse you blogger!
Due to this unforeseen complication I have decided to change my template. It will take me awhile but I am learning how to do simple template coding and so I think it will be more than a little bit fun. We'll see how this craziness goes. Maybe this is a good thing in the disguise of a very bad, frustrating and infuriating situation. :)

List of Madness

GUESS WHO IS APPLYING FOR GRADUATION!!!!
...and studying for the GRE,
...and working on grad school applications,
...and is working on another paper, massive research paper, and crazy final,
...and is writing a talk for next Sunday,
...and is now unemployed until that hopefully wonderful call from the forest service,
...and has not showered in a few days...oops. :)

and yet with all this stuff to do in this crazy next few weeks I am feeling so wonderful today because of conference. This has probably been the most wonderful and seemingly fast conference I have ever watched but I am so grateful for the blessing of being led by a prophet of God and the hope and joy that the gospel truly does bring, even in the midst of all the craziness I am trying to live through right now.

AAAAHHHHH FINALS!!!

Wait, so finals aren't technically here for another week and a few days but I am getting hit with a major work load right now. I am taking a small break from writing a paper and thought would update just a little bit.
I'm still waiting to hear back on the job in Nevada. I'm a little nervous but we'll see how it goes. I just want to do the right thing with it but I'm not quite sure what that is so I'll just wait a little bit longer (which seems like forever) and see how it goes.
I had a major miracle in studying for a test this past week. Long and amazing story short; I had been really sick and was unable to study for the biggest test of the semester and I really suck at memorizing things. So after a great deal of prayer and ulcers I spent the morning studying what I thought would be on the test and trying to take mental pictures of everything I could study. Memories are so weird by the way. Took the test, it took 4 hours and 45 minutes and it was an absolute miracle. I knew mostly everything and was able to write the essay. I was so grateful for such a miraculous blessing. I get my score, hopefully, on Tuesday.
Also I quit my job but that's not really exciting news, just stressful. We'll see how everything goes.
So there is the 2 minute update and it is back to my paper!
Aliswan over and out. :)

What a nice break!

So this past weekend I had a major blessing in that I was able to go to California for a field trip for one of my classes. It was so nice to have a break from everything even though the weather wasn't the best and it was only for 3 days and 2 of the 3 days was spent driving. But it was an absolutely wonderful trip and I feel like I've had this huge weight taken off my back and IT IS WONDERFUL!!!

Really rough day.

I wish I was happy.

The Necessities of Life

Miracles.....yep that seems to be the greatest necessity in my life right now. The beauty of this necessity is seeing how amazing God is and the many diverse ways in which He saves me. I don't want to say that there is a bad side to this....I don't think there really is but there is a slight downside in that I worry and the worry literally is killing me. I mean there are worse things than ulcers and not being able to eat or sleep but right now those are pretty rough things for me to handle. I have been so blessed in these last few weeks of the semester that it would be wrong not to recognize them and in my love of lists here are two new ones. :)
Miracles
1. I was able to complete 2 research papers in just over 2 days. When I say I was able to complete them that means that I did all of the research, writing, proofreading, re-writing and turning in for two major papers in 2 days. Talk about miraculous.
2. My lab partner dumped our site report paper on me. Like the majority of it. Now is this a miracle? Heck yes it is. She had insisted on writing the entire paper but she is infamous for not getting things done and while I love her I was not going to sacrifice my grade for her stubbornness. So miracle number 2...my grade is in my hands, just where I like it. :)
3. I had a meltdown...I realized that I had burnt myself out and as I was collapsed on the kitchen floor, alone and not knowing where to turn I heard a thought, "Allison you need to take a semester off." As much as I don't want to this it is the best option for me. I'm taking one class but this way I won't be in debt before grad school, I'll have savings and not be starving and broke and I'll be able to put the pieces of my life back together.
4. I got asked to apply for a job...a real job, not some student job but a real job for the summer. Here is the scenario and try to pass it off as anything but miraculous. My mom is a teacher and the father of one of the students in her class in an archaeologist looking for 4 archaeologists for a summer position paying a minimum of more money than I have ever had on a job. He gave her his card to pass along to me. We'll see how it goes.
5. My family. This semester has been absolutely insane for me. I really think that I am half crazy and any other group of people would have put me out of my misery like a horse that had shattered their leg but instead they have been there for me, let me crash on their couch and allowed me to raid their fridge since I can't afford to feed myself. They are my miracle.
Miracles to be
There are several things that have to happen before I can breath again. One, i have to somehow miraculously finish my paper today. I don't have enough money to pay my bills because of constant illness this semester. I can't, in good conscience, except this amazing job without selling my impossible to sell apartment contract. While I am dating a few people right now for some strange reason someone I'm not dating has complete control of my heart and he has absolutely no idea. I don't have any idea what to do in that situation. Actually I don't know what to do in any of these situations.
I wonder if it is bad to worry if things will actually work out...I guess faith is not necessarily an expectation of a miracle but the belief that God doesn't wish us to fail. I guess that is what I am trying to learn. It's hard to relinquish all control and have complete trust in something that I cannot see. I'm trying though. :) I definitely have the desire and Alma said that that is the start.
So the biggest miracle? God is there, He hears me and He will never abandon me. This will all work out in the end.

I always found it telling that humility and humiliation both come from the root word...humble. In that spirit here are 5 thoughts to ponder today.

So I am sitting in the library working on one of my 3 research papers and I am finding it increasingly harder to concentrate on the task at hand. I have so much to do this week! At work today I had these little 1x1 cards that I was writing a schedule on for the next few days, hour by hour and my friends, it is not looking to promising. The fact that the hour by hour schedule was not detailed enough to get everything done and I had to start going in 15 and 30 minute sections is not to promising in regards to my sanity or amount of sleep. I thought that maybe if I wrote down the jumble of thoughts in my head from top to bottom then they would leave me alone for a few hours in order for me to finish my homework. So here goes.

5. This weekend I went to LA and got to see a bunch of exhibits at 3 separate museums. It was phenomenal and so overwhelming. Some pieces seriously brought me to tears and while I was looking at the Egyptian exhibit I thought to myself, Aliswan, what the heck are you getting yourself into? What on Earth made you think that you could possibly do this?

4. This thought is more of a precursor to the last. Last week I took the hardest exam that I have ever taken in my university career. I was not feeling well but after 7 hours in the testing center the muscles in my body began to spasm and eventually I realized that for the first time in my life, I would be unable to finish my exam...literally. Physically, emotionally and mentally I was completely fried. My penmanship looked like it was from a third-grader. I was trying to transfer my roughdraft over to my bluebook and I could no longer continue. Talk about a humiliating experience. I was barely able to walk out of the testing center and had to have my mom come pick me up outside, and then I proceeded to bawl my eyes out and feel completely worthless.

3. 4 days after the previous experience I got my test back. I had received 103%. I was absolutely stunned. During the test when I was identifying objects I had the impression to write down all of the artifacts that coincided timewise, culturally and artistically with the artifact that I was identifying. I thought that I needed to do this to create a more solid essay. Next, when I was about to start my essay I felt very strongly impressed to write down a detailed pharaonic and artifactual timeline as well as the Heliopolis creation theory with a chart of the gods involved. Was this all time consuming? You bet, but because I followed the Spirit all of the background that I was writing for my unfinished essay gave me more extra credit vocabulary points then anyone has ever gotten on that test...ever. It was the most humbling experience of my life as of yet.

2. These experiences that I've had as of late have really awakened me to how amazing God is and how worthless I am. I know that God would never have me feel worthless but that is how I have felt recently. I have been so overwhelmed by the blessings that He has given me that I feel completely unworthy but unfortunately to a detrimental degree. I feel as though I have nothing to contribute and at some point God is going to throw me aside for another tool that is smarter than I am, braver than I am and does not struggle so much with doubt and depression.

Then this morning I was reading in the Pearl of Great Price in the book of Moses. Here are the verses that touched me and made me realize that the above statement was wrong.
9 And the ^apresence of God withdrew from Moses, that his ^bglory was not upon Moses;and Moses was left unto himself. And as he was left unto himself, he ^cfell unto the earth.

10 And it came to pass that it was for the space of many hours before Moses did again receive his natural ^astrength like unto man; and he said unto himself: Now, for this cause I know that ^bman is ^cnothing, which thing I never had supposed.

11 But now mine own eyes have ^abeheld God; but not my ^bnatural, but my ^cspiritual eyes, for my ^dnatural eyes could not have ^ebeheld; for I should have ^fwithered and ^gdied in his presence; but his ^hglory was upon me; and I beheld his ⁱface, for I was ^jtransfigured before him.

Also these verses by two of the most revered of prophets gave me great comfort.
Ex. 4: 10
10 ¶ And Moses said unto the Lord, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor since thou hast spoken unto thy servant: but I am slow of ^aspeech, and of a ^bslow tongue.
Moses 6: 31
31 And when Enoch had heard these words, he ^abowed himself to the earth, before the Lord, and spake before the Lord, saying: ^bWhy is it that I have found favor in thy sight, and am but a lad, and all the people ^chate me; for I am ^dslow of speech; wherefore am I thy servant?

1. Basically the number one thing that I am trying to understand and believe is that God does have a purpose for me. He loves me more than anyone ever could and unlike others, He will never abandon me, especially when I need him the most. Because He loves me He wants me to grow and gives me the experiences that I have to initiate that growth in the best and most efficient way possible. His work and glory is to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man and my part in that is what He is consistently preparing me for. I feel very much like Enoch and Moses but with God I too can do great things.

So basically those are the top 5 thoughts that have been overwhelming my mind for the past while. To be perfectly honest it does feel wonderful to get them out and I feel this wonderful sense of peace as my understanding of my current situation begins to develop and deepen.