For Annie ;)

I'm leaving tomorrow. At this time tomorrow, I will be in Paducah, Kentucky about to take off for the big, bad city of Nashville with two wonderful women named Emily and Brittany.

I'll be spending this weekend reunited with a group of people who fast became family back in April during The Rescue: St. Louis. For those unfamiliar with the event, it is the international event hosted in 100 cities worldwide to advocate for the release of Joseph Kony's child soldiers in east Africa. Tens of thousands of people gathered in these cities, slept outside, survived off donated pizza and coffee, wrote letters to their Congressmen, and withstood anticipation and uncertainty, not to mention the elements.

This group of Nashvilleans, which I realize is not exactly a term, drove into Saint Louis at 6am to join our group of 150 just waking up from a fitful night sleeping in front of the arch. We got better acquainted throughout the day and ultimately drove with them to Wichita, KS and then on to Chicago, IL where the event ended on May 1.

This is our reunion that we've had planned since our return from Chicago back in May.

In short, it's going to be a thrilling adventurous weekend with its fair share of reminiscing as well as excited talk of the future!

Tuesday morning at 6am I fly out of Nashville with my dear friend Tyler Jones (a fellow roadie) as we head for San Diego to begin our five-month internship of crazy work and crazier fun. We arrive at 11am PDT to be greeted by interns from the office who will drive us to "The Villa" aka the roadie/intern house in La Mesa just outside San Diego.

I guess you can say I've enjoyed this last day in Saint Louis. I saw a few people I was hoping to; I got all my last-minute errands done save for two which can be done tomorrow before I leave; I am completely packed and 97% mentally prepared. It's been a busy day of cleaning and running around, but at the same time wholly relaxing to not have to worry about anything.

My parents leave town tomorrow morning at 7am for Beijing, China. Naturally, the house is going crazy right now with three of us leaving the same day. My sister is planning a birthday party at our house tomorrow night for one of her friends, and my poor brother is getting dragged along to all of the festivities.

What's life without adventure?
The stories will come. You can be sure.

Mini-Update

Contact

I'm leaving in 3 days for this grand adventure! And while this blog is wonderful and a fairly good condensation of everything I do over a period of time, I truly do not know how often I can update it. I'll do my best, but I can see it going downhill very fast.

For quicker, more immediate, and more easily attainable means of contact use any of the following:

• Twitter username--radx97
• Skype username--radx97
• Facebook name--Becky Dale
• email address--radx97@mizzou.edu
• email address--whathappenedhere77@yahoo.com
• email address--beckydale.dale@gmail.com (use the emails in this order, that's how I check them)
• phone to call or text. If you don't have my number, my parents do or you can ask around. I'm sure somebody you know has it.

These three days are going to take forever. I can't wait to get to Nashville!

Why are you here?

I have officially just finished all my pre-arrival assignments for being a Roadie. IC created a blog with a series of activities and questions to do and answer respectively before we arrived in San Diego. Here I am, one week from that date, and I have finished them all.

To be truthful, however, I had them all done a long time ago. There was only one question that kept tripping me up and that is the same one I have titled this post: Why are you here?

I was told to keep it to a maximum of 200 words. Already the alarm bells were ringing in my head. 200 words? I have been around for 4 years and have seen and done more with this organization than some of my teammates and I'm sure even they can't contain their explanation to 200 words!

I've been writing and rewriting that response for weeks now but to no avail. Nothing I've come up with has been anything less than 400 words and most of them are much more than that.

I got onto that blog this morning and decided to throw aside everything else I'd written and to just put words on virtual paper--see what came out. Here it is, one word shy of my limit, in all its glory:

There's a great big world out there. It's a beautiful world filled with the laughter of children and the spray of water crashing on rocks and creatures yet undiscovered stalking through the underbrush of some long-forgotten rainforest. It's a sad world filled with the uncomforted tears of mothers and the hatred of brothers and the accidents of those who throw caution to the wind. It's an exciting world filled with wonder and adventure and incredible impossibilities. I love that world.

I am here to learn--to see the majesty of that world wherever I am, to hear the words and the stories of the people who walk it, to recognize the similarities between us.

I am here to face a challenge--a personal challenge to keep fighting, a greater challenge to promote change, even greater to inspire.

I am here because I was changed and challenged years ago. I was shown a beautiful world so different from my own and invited to be a part of it. I am here to join that world making it a part of who I am and to share it with everyone I meet.

I am here to love and to hopefully bring peace.

Region Assignment!!

So I've been antsy with anticipation, and I'm sure you've been at least mildly curious yourself. It's finally here. My region assignment.

I have waited for weeks to hear where I would spend three months of my life on the road, and as I looked at the calendar of projected dates (September through November) I realized that winter probably isn't my thing. Maybe Florida or Arizona would be nice.

Alas it was not meant to be.

I am headed to the northernmost region--Pacific Northwest. And what does this entail?

1. Oregon
2. Washington
3. Idaho
4. Western Canada
5. ....and ALASKA!

If you are unsure why that final one might be just slightly more exciting for me in particular, then you have not yet watched my application video (below) and I highly suggest you do so!

Expect an inundation of pictures!

Love you all. Peace.

Why I want to be a Roadie

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Application Video

Some people in my family have been asking if I could post my application video. It's nothing special, but here it is!

I'm A Roadie!!!

It's finally here! I've been waiting for this chance for four years. Before, I was too young. But this past fall I realized that now would be the perfect time. I'm not heavily involved in school yet. I don't have loyalties anywhere except with the wheelchair basketball team and to my IC club, which will be in good hands anyway.

Furthermore, after The Rescue, I've realized that Invisible Children and I are not quite separate anymore. It's not me working alongside an organization for a while, then continuing with daily life, then coming back for a while more, then continuing with daily life. No.

I was in physical pain when I didn't think I could go to Chicago for The Rescue. I had to refer to myself many times as a "representative of Invisible Children" just to be taken seriously. I had just as many folders on my computer desktop and my physical desk at school for both schoolwork and for Invisible Children-related things. It's not just a favorite topic of conversation; it's the only topic of conversation that I will initiate at any time of day with anybody--whether I know them or not. Point in case, I talked with Marcus (Brandon's roommate in Brussels) about IC for at least 45 minutes during a welcome party at Gareth's house.

In short, I cannot believe this is truly happening to me after so long a wait. I'm booking my flights today, calling Tyler to see when and from where he's flying, canceling classes and housing for the fall, contacting my new adviser to let her know what's going on, and starting a huge list of things that I'll need to collect over the next 3 weeks.

I. Can't. Wait!