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Today was my second day of distance learning. Today I had Pre-Calc and physics, which took me about 2-3 hours to complete. Yesterday I had my CIS Anatomy and CIS Spanish classes, along with pottery. It’s a weird system and I’m not sure how we will finish our curriculum when we are only having class twice a week instead of 5 times a week. I’m worried that I won’t be prepared for my math and physics classes next year and that I won’t get credit for my University of Minnesota classes that I’ve worked hard for all year. I just need to relax and trust that the situation will work itself out. 

This reminds me of the time that, on the trip shown in the photo above, our canoe was stolen. It sounds ridiculous but it actually happened. We were portaging across a highway in northern Ontario and had to set one canoe down by the highway in order to go back and get the other canoe through all the fallen trees. When we came back the canoe was gone. We walked up and down the highway but didn’t see any sign of it. We had to call the camp we came from and work out a way for us to get a canoe so we could make it to our pickup point. During that experience it was hard to not be stressed out. What if we didn’t get another canoe? Would our trip be over? Would we have to stay on this lake for the next two weeks? I had to make myself calm down and accept that the situation would resolve itself however it was supposed to. It wasn’t worth my effort to worry about something I had no control over. This is something I need to remember as I worry about my credit transfer and what content I might be missing out on. 

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I’ve been quarantining for a week now, and it’s going better than it was at the beginning. I’m staying positive and trying to be productive. I’ve spent a lot of time finishing random tasks that I otherwise probably wouldn’t have time for. I have applied for scholarships, worked on finding a roommate, finished most of my online class, and other random tasks. I’m trying to find a way to be productive despite being stuck in my house. 

This reminds me of this picture above. I had an ingrown toenail (ick) and my trip leader had to dig it out of my foot. I kept my foot in boiling water and had to deal with her digging in my foot. Despite my discomfort, I made the best of my situation by eating pancakes, my favorite trail food. 

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Most people have had a significant change in pace in the last week. I went from an extremely busy schedule to doing nothing. I would wake up, go to school, head to the gym, go to lacrosse, come back home for homework and studying, eat dinner, and go to bed. Then I would wake up and do it all over again. I rarely had enough time to complete all the tasks I wanted to finish, let alone have relaxation time. Now I have almost all relaxation time and currently no schoolwork to do because it is still spring break. This change of pace is unfortunate but unavoidable.

During all this downtime, I’ve been reminded of the unexpected changes I’ve encountered on my trips. Things don’t always go as planned or as expected and the best thing to do is to roll with it and adapt. Sometimes you realize you’ve run out of pasta or that a lake on the map doesn’t actually exist. There’s no point in dwelling over the unchangeable. It’s best to just move on and look forward.

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This week my family had to cancel our spring break trip because of the coronavirus. I was extremely disappointed that I wouldn’t be able to go on this vacation because I had been looking forward to it for so long. I was especially disappointed because we found out we couldn’t go the day before we were supposed to leave. This frustration and sadness reminded me of an experience I had on my backpacking trip in Wyoming. 

Our plan was to wake up early in the morning and climb to the peak of a nearby mountain. This mountain in particular was exciting because it had the ruins of a WWII bomber that had flown into the mountainside. My group and I were all looking forward to climbing this mountain and seeing the plane. We woke up that morning to snow falling outside (in July). This meant we couldn’t hike because the rocks would be too slippery to safely climb on top of. We were all so disappointed that we couldn’t climb this mountain but knew we couldn’t do anything about it. 

These two experiences both have taught me that doing the right thing can be disappointing and frustrating. Although I was looking forward to both of these events, I know I need to find something else to look forward to. 

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This week I came to terms with the end of my high school hockey career. The last four years playing hockey were so fun and rewarding, and its hard to believe they are over. I’ll miss playing hockey so much, but I know its time to start a new chapter. This week I am reminded of how it felt to end my trip last summer after 30 days paddling the Allanwater and Kopka rivers. 

This photo was taken on my last day. It was a bittersweet day because my group was sad the trip was over but so proud of how far we had come. How I feel right now is how I felt back then. I’m sad hockey is over but very grateful for the experiences I had. On this day I learned that endings don’t have to be sad. Just because something is over doesn’t mean you have to mope over it. It is much more enjoyable to look back and laugh at all the good times you had instead of being sad about what the future will be like. 

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I took this picture during a 4 week long canoe trip I took two years ago. This photo was taken on the final day of our trip. We had to cross Lac de Mille Lacs, a huge lake in Ontario, Canada. The wind picked up and the waves increased in size as we tried to keep our canoes from being pushed into the shore. It was a very exhausting and stressful day of paddling because we had to continue paddling in order to make it to our pick up point in the morning. Although it was frustrating and stressful, this day taught me that enduring stressful moments make the relaxing ones even more enjoyable. It is the moments of stress that make the peaceful moments that much more enjoyable. 

This week I was in charge of a carnation event for the National Honors Society at my school. Running this event turned out to be much more time consuming and stressful than I anticipated. The flower order had to be cancelled and a new vendor had to be found at the last minute, meanwhile I had to organize over 200 paper slips into the correct 6th hour teacher so that the flowers could be organized efficiently. I had to give up a lot of my study hall time in order to make sure this event ran as smoothly as I could. I spent a lot of time worrying about what would go wrong...would the correct number of flowers be delivered on time? Would the payment be made on time? Would we be able to deliver all of them on time? After finishing this event, I had time to decompress. I thought about how stressful running the carnations event was and how good it felt to just do nothing. Once I stopped running around so much, I was grateful to have had such a busy week because it made me enjoy the weekend so much more. Whether it’s heavy wind and waves or a busy week, the stress always makes me appreciate the relaxation time so much more. 

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For my first blog post I decided to share one of my favorite camping photos. This photo was taken on a backpacking trip I took throughout the Big Horn Mountains. I learned many lessons about optimism and determination on this trip that have helped me in the last few weeks. With finals week behind me, I can see how the lessons I learned on this day, one filled with several difficult uphill stretches, have stuck with me. Last week when I didn’t want to study any more or fill out any more worksheets, I remembered what I learned in the Big Horns: You only get the best view by climbing the highest mountain. Even though the walk uphill is hard, or in last week’s case, the late night studying is grueling, the feeling when you reach the top of the mountain--or get an A in the class--reminds you that the work it took you to get there was worth it. 

As I begin my second semester, it has become difficult to stay motivated because I feel like I’m so close to the end of the year. This lesson I learned reminds me that my hard work has paid off in the past, and it will continue to do so as long as I continue to put in the work it takes to reach the peak.