saying goodbye part 3

We have been packing all day...and saying goodbye to people. I'm sad...and I can' believe I will be driving away from heart butte in the morning, in Denver on Sunday and back home on Tuesday.

This summer has absolutely flown by!

saying goodbye part 2

I'm having deja vu....I remember packing up my dorm room after freshman and sophomore year...and then packing up my house after senior year...now I'm packing up my room at Heart Butte Elementary School. I'm taking down bulletin boards and putting resource boxes back together. Collecting the gifts I bought for family, and generally getting ready to leave on Saturday. It is sad...I realize how much this horrible little room has really begun to feel like home.

sadness...again.

I feel the same way that Lido felt after kid's club yesterday "I don't want to go home! Why do I have to go home? I'm just sad sad sad."

Lido is the one in the picture with his hand raised...he is my favorite!

saying goodbye part 1

So I’m sitting on the couch…I’m supposed to be doing staff evaluations, but I just keep thinking about everything that has happened during the summer and all of the wonderful people I have met. And after a few minutes of reflection…I’m leaving teardrop stains on Heather’s evaluation paperwork.

I never expected to come here. If you had asked me 6 months ago…I never would have said that I would be living in a town of 730 people with no gas station on a native reservation in Montana. Never. In two days Destiny won’t be able to throw open the door of my office looking for me, Francis won’t be able to come find me for her daily hug,

I won’t be sending people driving all over with directions like “turn at the blue house after the bridge and go to the green house with the broken down chevy pick up in the driveway”, I won’t be seeing people’s faces light up with joy because we mowed their lawn….something they just couldn’t do.

I won’t be dancing with MeKenna, or chasing Cobyn around. I won’t be joining in the drum circle or yelling at my staff to go to bed. I won’t be laughing at Smokey or learning how to bead.
When we tell people in other places around Montana where we live and what we’re doing ….they look at us like we are crazy and tell us to be careful because we are in danger and that they would never even dream of stopping in Heart Butte Montana.

They are the crazy ones. Crazy for not stopping. I’ve landed for a summer in a beautiful little pocket of the world and now I don’t want to leave. Don’t get me wrong…there is drama and craziness up the wazoo and sometimes I want to pull my hair out and just walk away. But it has been worth every single tense conversation, every time I’ve been yelled at. Worth the dark circles under my eyes, the airmattress, wearing dirty clothes, and eating nasty food.

Heart Butte Montana is a place you will never see unless you go looking for it….I’m glad to be found here. Even for just another 3 days.

Get Ready

This week is our last week.

This week is like prep week but twice as bad.

We have to do everything we did during prep weeks....backwards...with participants here.

I anticipate a lot of late nights.

Here we go....