Christmas Letter 2000

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Dear Friends,

We’ve survived the year 2000! It really is an amazing thing, when you stop to think about it. If we survived two months or however long it was without a president for the U.S., as well as surviving the Y2K glitch, and the numerous other events of the year; then I think it can be considered a good year.

As for me, I am reminded of the Pink Floyd album title "What A Long Strange Trip It’s Been." It has been an excellent year for me, filled with many gifts from God; including challenges, blessings, and opportunities.

Writing this letter this year has turned into sort of a long-term project. I’ve written (typed) in several places. One of those places was at my Aunt Kerry’s condominium in Breckenridge (an old mining town turned ski town), Colorado. Being off for Christmas break was good for me because it gave me an opportunity to be reminded of how blessed I am with not only material things of condominiums, skis, and free lift tickets (by using my uncle’s season pass), but also with the non-material things of family and caring people around me. It’s been very nice for me to have a chance to take some time off this Christmas break. This year, and this last semester in particular, has been challenging in many ways, not the least of which has been time management. Being able to get away and go skiing, and simply not having anything that I have to do has been great.

Skiing was fun the four days that I’ve been so far this season! I have skied three times at Keystone and once at Breckenridge. The snow has been great and the crowds haven’t been bad, so I have gotten to have some great ski-days! It’s been especially cool to be back out after tearing my ACL (Anterior Cruciate Ligament) last November. I only got to go skiing once all of last season!

I spent the first four months of 2000 in rehabilitation for my knee, which even yet isn’t quite back to where it was as a non-operated knee (without plastic screws). However, I have been able to do more and more with it as time has passed. I have a great knee brace that I use any time I’m involved with anything athletic (racquetball, skiing, running, etc.). Being immobile taught me a lot about patience, and about appreciation for the things that I’ve already started to take for granted again. Walking up and down stairs, running, handicapped access for parking, and ramps into buildings, were all things that I learned to appreciate very much in that time. Now it’s difficult to even remember what it was like to have to take one step at a time going up and down stairs. Which means that my doctors and physical therapists did a wonderful job making sure that I would again have a normal knee, which is great to be able to say that I do. Modern technology really amazes me. I now have pictures of the inside of my knee! Even 15 years ago, someone would have had a dramatically more difficult operation and recovery. I’m very grateful for the technological advances of the past fifteen years.

Betty J. Eadie has a wonderful book that I read this Christmas break called Embraced By the Light. In it, she shares the wisdom of the phrase, "Where there is no vision, the people perish." I’ve been struggling to find a vision to cling on to, or perhaps that is not really the truth. More likely, I have been fighting the visions that I receive about what I should be doing in the future for fear that they may be too difficult. Possibly it is for fear of what other people may think of me because of the path I choose to take, or for fear of what I may be leaving behind by accepting those visions. It’s one thing to have a vision, while entirely another to take action. Right now, while I am learning to accept my visions of the future, I am taking as many steps as I can on a path that will allow me to fulfill any vision that I choose to accept. That is why I am working on a degree in speech communications. It allows me the freedom and flexibility to apply the ideas to almost any career field. I added the Journalism degree so that I might gain some more practical knowledge in areas which I enjoy—writing and speaking—and as of yet, this has not lived up to my hopes of what I thought it would be. The program is good, and I am learning some concepts, it just seems that the majority of it is theoretical work, and a lot of it repetitious, while I really feel like I’m ready to be out in the world and doing some practical work.

The radio station allows me this opportunity, but it is a lot of work managing a radio station that has over 60 volunteer DJ’s and staff, as well as working with the requirements put on the station by the university and congruently the government (the school is partially government funded, as all state schools are). I have learned so much from my experiences at the station about working with computers and equipment, as well as working with people of all kinds of different backgrounds and personalities. It is a real challenge, and is where I am getting my much needed, and desired, practical experience. It’s just difficult sometimes, when I’m right in the middle of everything that’s going on, to see how this experience is going to benefit me in the future, even though I know that it will.

Something I’ve realized is that this past semester, I have felt largely unrecognized for the contributions I’ve made, or tried to make, to the station. It’s not that I’ve felt unrecognized by people outside of the station, because we get emails often from people congratulating us and telling us that the station is great. We even received awards at Live365.com and collegeradio.org, two big national web sites for radio. Where I sometimes feel unappreciated is in Greeley, at the university, by some of the students who listen to the station, and even sometimes by the staff of the radio station. It’s not that I feel that way about everyone, but I don’t think that some of the people who are associated with the station have much of an idea how much I’ve contributed. When I came to the station as a college freshman, I saw a lot of room for improvement. The station was only able to be heard by those who lived on campus and took the time to get a cable splitter for their TV/radio. It was a bit involved for most college students (mostly freshmen), who were busy accommodating to college life, getting involved, and/or drinking beer and watching Jerry Springer, to get one of these cable splitters. During my sophomore year, I got us a limited range broadcast signal via a small transmitter. I was told that this was impossible, and that it would be illegal. I did all the research and found out what we could and couldn’t do, and all the university had to do was supply the funding to purchase the $800 transmitter. This increased our range only 2-4 blocks, but it gave us an actual broadcast range, something the station never had previously. Last April, I was elected by the DJ’s and the then current staff of the station to be general manager. So this summer, I spent quite a bit of time cleaning up the station and making it a functional place. I also followed through on the commitment I had made in my speech when I had run for General Manager of the station. I got us more listeners through acquiring TV Channel 3 on the UNC Campus, and also through setting up an Internet broadcast. I did all the work to get the computers, which involved dealing with the university’s purchasing requirements, researching the technology, learning the technology, and working through the difficulties of setting up an Internet broadcast, and a TV broadcast with an audio and visual signal. It is also my Brian, my older brother, who got us the discounted computers, and Adam, my younger brother, who has helped us when we’ve had problems with the logo.  One thing that I am learning in this area though is that in order to be appreciated, you must be more appreciative.  The fact that I felt unappreciated showed me that perhaps I needed to examine myself and see how I could be more appreciative.  This was difficult for me, and I didn't even really think about it until after I started writing this letter, but really focusing on being more appreciative in the past (couple of weeks) of other people has actually increased the appreciation that people show to me.  Kind of funny how that works.

At the station, I did all of the equipment learning and set-up with a little help from the university engineer, but mostly alone. Which, I’m learning, is something that I should probably work on. The staff of the station came to me about one month into the school year and told me that it wasn’t that they didn’t appreciate the job that I was doing, but that they felt like they didn’t have anything to do. What I was trying to do was lead by example. This is what I’ve done in past leadership positions. In the past, the people around me have seen the example and have followed. I guess I expected that the same would happen with the station. I also was stepping on some people’s toes a bit, but most of the time it wasn’t intentional. When it was intentional, it was mostly in an effort to get them to move somewhere. What I’ve learned is that you can’t get most people to move by stepping on their toes. If anything, that often makes them more stuck. "Stuckness" is what I’ve wanted to avoid as general manager of the station.  It just took me a while to see that to be most effective, I had to learn how to motivate other people to not be stuck.  I also had to learn to be patient and to let people motivate themselves...this was and is a very difficult lesson for me to put into action, when I knew that I could get it done more quickly if I just did it.  But then I was stepping on toes, and that got us back to stuck.  Stepping on toes was not the right way to get most things done, but I hated stuckness so much that I couldn't see the toes I was stepping on.

For 17 years, UNC Student Radio has been on campus at UNC. In those 17 years, it has changed from KLAB (a station that broadcast through a window to some people outside the window), to KSRR (K Student Run Radio), to KSRX (the natural successor to the shut down KSRR), and now UNC Student Radio. For the first few years of its existence, the radio station could only be heard by a very limited audience outside KLAB’s window. Then KSRR was in existence through 1994 as a cable-access only station and was shut down for various reasons. Then KSRX came into existence in 1995, and was a cable-access only station until 1999 when I got the transmitter, and in the fall of 2000, I set up the TV broadcast that has given us easy access to be heard on channel three, and I did all the work for the Internet broadcast. In the past 2 years, I have brought about more change for the radio station than anyone had in the past 15. I would be foolish to say that I did the whole thing, because the station was there before I came, and the equipment and the time was right for someone to take it and develop it. But if I hadn’t done it, I’m pretty sure that the radio station would still be the little station in the basement of the Garvey Center that no one even knows about. Now at least they know about us, even if they don’t listen.

Because of the work that I did, the station has grown into something that is really of value to the campus and community, and not just for the DJ’s and staff involved. Not only are we providing over 60 students and staff the chance to learn a little bit about radio each semester, we are also providing the campus, community, and the world (through the Internet), the chance to hear an excellent news broadcast every day at 6:00, unique music, and interesting commentary about what’s going on at UNC, in the state, in the U.S., and in the world. This was all happening, I’m sure, before I arrived. However, what I have done is made it possible for all of it to be heard, which is where I think that the real value of a radio station lies, in its listeners. I just expected that the staff of the station would see this example and run with it, each going in a direction they desired, while still fitting in with the vision for the station.

The station is something I’m very proud of, and is something I have worked very hard at to see it be successful. What I have learned is that this semester, my vision of success for the station seemed different than that of some of the other people on the staff. Some of the others viewed us as an already successful station (with an inconsistent listener base of 150 people). To me, that was just the icing on the cake. I tried to convey my vision, and didn’t do as good of a job as I should have, but to me, it seemed that some had no vision to make the station more than what it was. I don’t think that that was true, but it seemed that some weren’t willing to work to make it more, while still having fun doing it, and if there’s one thing that frustrates me, it’s mediocrity. Mediocrity comes about when people either lack vision, or they don’t take the action to make their vision reality. My vision for the station is to be the most listened to and best choice in radio for students at UNC, as well as to provide students, faculty, and staff the opportunity to be on the radio. Really, that’s everyone’s vision, I think. But maybe that’s not what everyone’s vision is. I guess I don’t really know, and I don’t ever think that I directly asked. If there’s somewhere I’ve not done what I should have done as general manager, that’s it. But there was so much to be done for the station; and in my own life, both personally and academically (at both schools). I saw hearing everyone’s vision on the staff, individually, as secondary to getting those things done. I still think that this is accurate (that getting the work done was more important than sitting down and talking about it), but looking back on it, I would have treated things at the station this semester a bit differently had I known these things. Hindsight is 20/20. (I used that phrase in another Christmas letter I think.)

And I’m sure that much of this sounds egoistic. I don’t know what I think about egoism. This summer, I finished Ayn Rand’s book Atlas Shrugged. It’s over 1000 pages and I tried to read it twice before, only reading the first 200 pgs. or so each time. In it, Rand presents a view of the world where everyone has a right to have an ego about the work that they have done as well as about their life. It is not an ego that lords accomplishments over others, but rather an ego that congratulates, rewards, and acknowledges people for the work that they do. It’s a long read, but recommended if you want to learn more about why an ego can be an important and a good thing. (If you want a shorter version of the same concepts, try Anthem by Ayn Rand. It’s about 150 pgs. I read it in about 3 hours.) I really didn’t have time to digest what impact Atlas Shrugged has had on my life, as I started school at UNC the same week that I finished the book. The reason I even bring it up is that before reading it, I think I would have been willing to give and give and give at the station without much reward. But I think that this book has influenced my attitude to think that I should be congratulated and rewarded for working hard.

I also am used to receiving congratulations from my parents on a regular basis, as well as for an excellent performance on stage or on a sports field. In college, my parents haven’t been able to do as much congratulating, due to the simple fact that I’m far away, and I haven’t been in either sports or shows since high school. I realize that I miss that recognition, and also that I miss those opportunities for bonding that come through the many ups and downs of a show or a sports season. I wouldn’t ever want to go back to high school, because I’ve definitely moved on. It’s just those kinds of experiences that I miss.

I have bonded with a little bit different and unlikely group this year though.

Last May, I was still working for USWestDex. The company has a continuing education option for its employees, to pay for their schooling. When I heard about this, I initially intended to take summer classes at UNC in order to get some of my credits for my Journalism major out of the way. However, I have also had an interest in going to massage school since so many people suggested it to me in high school. So I started looking for schools and found one called the Healing Arts Institute. I didn’t really start asking about it until around the 10th or so of May, and classes started on the 22nd of May, so I really didn’t have that much time to think about whether or not I wanted to do it, which was probably good. I might have talked myself out of it, or let someone else talk me out of it. So this summer I worked Monday-Thursday 8:00-4:30 (30 hour weeks) at USWestDex in Greeley, and at night (and some weekends) I would go to class at the Healing Arts institute from 6:00-10:00 (20-25hours/week). It was not really a summer in which I got to spend much time outdoors, but I tried to make a point of eating my lunch outside every day.

In my first class at Massage school, I was told that I should look around, because the people who I was in that class with would become my family over the next eight months. I guess I knew that at that point, but it really became a true statement. When you spend 20 hours/week, plus some 6 hour days on the weekends, over the course of 8 months with a group of 5-6 people, you get to where you know those people pretty well.

There’s so much I could say about massage class and the changes it has brought about in me. I guess I don’t necessarily know that it has brought about that many changes, but it has brought about a new awareness for me throughout the program. I have felt very overloaded this semester, not only with my schedule, but with all of the new sensory input coming to me. I did it to myself, and fully expected to be burned out by mid-November, which I was. And it was absolutely worth being burned out, because now I’m learning to take that sensory input and use it in my own life, and I am learning to apply to myself the healing concepts that I’ve been taught to use for others, both physically, and metaphysically. My massage site is located at http://www.geocities.com/agreatmassage. You are invited to check it out and to come back often, as I plan to update it pretty regularly.

Also in May, I moved out of the house I was living in with James Laguana and Andy Kelso. It was a good experience to live with the both of them. I miss being able to sit and sing at the piano with James playing. But we all three had separate directions that we were going, and different plans, so it just worked better for us to move. Even though I haven’t seen that much of either of them this semester, I’m glad to know that we were able to move out and still remain friends.

So from there, I moved in to a condo, with one girl initially, named Elizabeth. Her parents own the condo. Mr. Rasmussen is a 2-star general in the U.S. Armed Forces. This summer, and into the beginning of the school year, we had a roommate named Andrea. It was interesting for me living with two girls, because I had never even lived with one before. But I really wasn’t around the condo that much anyway, with my schedule being what it was, so I didn’t have that much time to notice, or to complain about it too much. It actually was pretty easy to live with two girls. Some time in October, Andrea moved out and Josh, a middle school teacher, moved in. He’s 23 I think, and is a good guy. I haven’t had much time to get to know him really well because his and my schedules are set up so that we just pass each other all the time, but he’s been a good roommate too.

Going back to my employer for the summer of 2000, USWestDex is a whole other story unto itself. I started working for USWestDex in September of 1999. We sold exclusively Internet products on USWESTDex.com, now Qwestdex.com, which, by the way, is a great site for finding anything in USWest’s 14-state region. We sold links to people’s web sites/emails for $19.95/month, and sold fully-developed 3-page web sites for $50.00/month. This seemed pricey to me, and I guess I never really believed in the value of the product for the cost, because I know how easy it is to build a web site with more than 3 pages. However, I could understand the expense for the company because of the fact that I was making $14.00/hour to sell these products. So I tried to sell, and for a while did pretty well. When they raised the price of the web sites by adding on an up-front $600 development fee, I stopped believing in the product altogether. I couldn’t believe that they would charge someone $1200 over the course of a year to build them a 3-page web site, even if I was making good money. So I stopped making sales of web sites and sold only web links, which were good products, but my doubts about the quality of the web sites and disbelief at the prices led to less effective sales for me. So, in August, 4 employees of the office I worked at were notified that their sales were low. I was one of those four. USWESTDex was going to fire us based on low sales totals. However, the company scrambled in even putting our sales channel together, and had no action plan in place for remedial training or firing policies. Therefore, the union stepped in and said that the company wouldn’t be able to fire us for sales before an action plan was in place. An action plan takes two years to approve. So I was relatively secure in thinking I would have a job. However, one Thursday afternoon in August, I got a call from Qwest’s legal division. They wanted to ask me about three emails I had sent, from my Hotmail account, to a co-worker’s work account. This co-worker had been fired in April for inappropriate content on his computer and for falsifying sales information. The emails contained, in Qwest legal’s words, "sexually-oriented" material. One was of some people, guys and girls, skydiving nude. I remember that email and I remember thinking that it was funny. I never considered it sexual at all. I forwarded it on to a bunch of people, and perhaps some of you received it. Maybe if I can find it I’ll post it somewhere on my web site. The other two emails, I remember this co-worker asking me to forward to him. I do not remember what the pictures were of, but Qwest legal informed me that they were "pictures of people involved in sexually explicit acts." I can not say for sure that they were, but they were sent nearly at the same time as the skydiving email, so I don’t doubt or try to deny that I sent them. I probably just deleted them after I sent them on to the co-worker. (It’s not that rare to get items like this in your email, as many of you probably know.) I wasn’t even contacted about the emails until 5 months after I sent them, so I really have no recollection of what I sent, except the skydiving one, because, like I said, I thought it was funny enough to pass along to many people. Anyway, Qwest legal was going to do some investigation into it and let me know what the outcome of it was.

I spoke with Qwest legal on a Thursday. The next Monday morning, I was called into a meeting with my boss and took a union representative and a letter of resignation into the meeting with me. If I hadn’t had my letter of resignation, I would have been fired that morning. My boss even said in that meeting that the investigation had not concluded. If there was ever even a serious investigation, there were plans to fire me before it ever took place, and it wasn’t about the emails.  It was about sales. They could have just as easily attempted to fire me over anything else, because they couldn’t have fired me over sales, due to union intervention.

I know that being potentially fired over "sexually-oriented" email surprised some of my friends who have known me for a while. A point that I find a bit ironic is that as I was being called in to be fired/resign, I was stopped by two people. One guy showed me TheFox.com’s "stripper of the day," and a woman I worked with showed me this video file which was funny, but definitely worse than any pictures I might have passed on. Based on the criteria I was supposedly going to be fired over, most of the office that I worked in, had we been judged by equal standards, would have been fired. I wasn’t really going to be fired over an email or two or three. I’m sure that the content that I had received and forwarded on that day wasn’t anything that you couldn’t get simply by turning on cable TV any night of the week after 10:00.

Because the company couldn’t fire me based on my sales totals, they would have fired me based on anything that fit under any conduct or other company policy that they had. I maybe could have kept my record clean 100%, by making zero long distance phone calls, having no questionable content on my computer or in emails, showing up to work exactly on time and leaving exactly on time every day, and they still could have probably come up with another reason to fire me. They wanted to find some way to have me no longer be there, and they would have found whatever they could to make that happen. At 20, being fired from a company like Qwest would not have been a good start to a professional record, so I resigned.

In defense of Qwest and my boss, I understand that it is a company that has established sales standards that I couldn’t meet based on my belief, or non-belief, in what I was selling. It was really an excellent experience working there. In addition to the excellent salary, payment for much of massage therapy school, and good co-workers, I learned that in order to sell something to someone else, I have to believe that what I am selling to them is going to benefit their life, and be of good value to them. If I do not believe that of the product I am attempting to sell, then they will see through any attempt I try, because it will not be genuine, and it will not be real.

I think that being not real is something I haven’t been very good at this semester. In many ways, that is positive, but sometimes, it is also good to let reality go for a while, especially when we get so wrapped in our own reality that we neglect to see that our reality may not be the same as someone else’s. Also, just sitting back and imagining is really important, because imagining leads to dreaming, and dreams can never come true if someone doesn’t dream them in the first place. This is a difficult lesson to remember when you’re in the midst of major projects and time crunches.  That's kind of funny, because often that’s probably the most important time to remember it.  The next time you're in a major crunch, ask yourself the question, "Is this going to matter 1 year from now?"

I have no shame about the human body; maybe a little about my own, but that’s a different discussion. Some of the reason that some of the policies are in place in the corporate and other arenas is because someone does have some shame about the body. I think the human system, in general, is such an amazing thing and should be held in the highest regard. It should be used in every way that will not do any permanent damage to it. However, we must remember that the body is nothing if not for the spirit. I believe it is our spirit which moves our transmitters through our nervous system, and our cells through our blood. I think, and I’m not positive, but I think, that if the motivation for our use of the body is the development of our spirits, then that makes the use of the body positive. It’s when we forget our inherent spiritual nature, that we become so focused on and enraptured by the body, and that leads to us abusing it. So remember to remember your spirit in your physical action. I will be learning to as well.

Speaking of the body, sometime between summer and this fall, I lost about 20 pounds from weighing 200 to around 180. People have asked me how I lost that weight. I think that a lot of the weight was actually added on during my recovery from knee surgery when I was a little more sedentary, as well as beer and the sedentary life of dormitories from my second semester of freshman year. I think some of the weight has come off because of my new attitudes on health from massage school, and also some of it has to do with the lifestyle changes that came about because of my busyness this semester. I really didn’t have time to do much in the morning except grab a piece of bread, and I would be gone from the condo where I live in Greeley from 8:45 AM to 10:30 PM (when I got back from massage class), which would give me time to cook some dinner, do homework, maybe visit with my roommate(s), maybe talk to or visit Brittany, and go to bed. (Some nights after class, I would give a massage as well from 11:00PM-12:00AM. I had a client who liked getting the work done at that time, and was willing to pay for the work, so I figured, why not?

    I guess that I lost the weight by not having time to eat, by being more active, and by eating less. It’s not that weight is or ever has been really a big concern for me, but being healthy is, and being 20 pounds over (a healthy) weight puts many different kinds of strains and stresses on the body that it has to do more work to compensate for. So now that I’m again becoming more sedentary over Christmas break, I’m trying to eat not to being full, but to being satisfied. I’m also trying to pay attention to what I’m eating, although that’s a bit difficult with so much of Mom’s great food around.

What one of my end-of-year letters could be complete without a mention of relationships? In this area of my life, I have been challenged more this year than probably in any other. In January, I celebrated my first 1-year anniversary, in any relationship, with Becca. We celebrated by going to a town called Nederland (back up in the mountains behind Boulder), and spending some time in the town. It’s a neat little place, kind of secluded and filled with really nice and friendly people. We had a really great time there.

One night in April, Becca and I were in a sort of mini-argument and she asked me to bring up what was really on my mind. I had been thinking for a few weeks, in the back of my head, that maybe this relationship with her wasn’t the right place for me to be right then. I hesitated to tell her that because I thought it would hurt her.  Instead, when I told her, she told me that she had been thinking the same thing. So Becca and I broke up officially. But I don’t think either of us really knew how to break up, and I’m not sure that either of us wanted to break up at that point, even though we felt that we needed to.  I didn’t really consider us broken up, and we didn't really act broken up, until she moved to Vail in early May for the summer to work for a rafting company.

On May 28, a friend of mine from Phoenix, Brittany, came to visit me. Brittany and I had met in Lincoln, Nebraska during my senior year of high school and had written letters back and forth over the course of two years. She was coming to visit me because as a music and theater double major at her school in Phoenix, she didn’t feel that she was receiving the training she needed. She had asked me about UNC, which has one of the best undergraduate experiences for musical theater (from what I understand), and so she came to visit and check it out. In letters, I had told her all about Colorado as well, and since she had never been to Colorado, I told her she should stay a few days and check out the scenery.

When Brittany came to visit me, we hit it off very well. From communicating with each other in letters, it was like knowing her without ever really having met her, and it was a very awesome experience.

Because I thought that I was in the same place as Becca in terms of thinking about our relationship, my heart was free to explore those feelings with Brittany on her initial visit to Colorado.

When Becca came down to Greeley one night for a party, and I told her about my feelings for Brittany, I realized that Becca had not considered our relationship to be over, and it hurt Becca a lot. I really hurt her by not being sensitive to where she was at. That was and is hard for me, because Becca was my best friend for over a year. For a while, I thought that I had lost that friendship altogether, and that was really difficult for me to stomach, knowing that I would have been mostly at fault for the destruction of a very good friendship. I really admire Becca, because at some point this semester, she had to let go of me and let go of some of what we had shared, in order for our friendship to continue. That could not have been an easy realization to come to, and I credit our growing friendship now, mostly to that decision on her part. I am really glad to have someone as strong as her in my life, and to have her friendship.

Brittany came back up to visit UNC with her parents, about 1 month after her first visit. They liked the school, and Brittany still liked the school, so she decided to attend UNC. She has been at UNC this semester, and been very successful at getting her foot in the door of UNC Performing Arts.

From the outset, I had very strong feelings for Brittany, feelings unlike anything I had experienced with anyone else. She is an incredible person, with so much to share. Those feelings that I had, did initially, and still do, scare me a lot. They are feelings that I don’t know how to control, and have a difficult time understanding. This semester, I spent a lot of time trying to understand the nature of those feelings, and even though I have a better understanding now than I did at first, it really doesn’t help me that much when my mind begins to wander. I have visions based on my fears of how vulnerable I am. I am vulnerable because of these feelings, and in trying to understand these feelings, as emotions, I have attempted to deny my own vulnerable nature. As a male in society, as well as in many previous experiences I’ve had, I have been taught that it is not okay for me to be vulnerable. Vulnerable means allowing someone or something the opportunity to take advantage of you, if they choose to.

It also means that they may have the opportunity to connect at an incredibly deep level and share things that others can’t possibly understand. A vulnerable state allows us to have emotions and experiences which we can only describe as magic, or as the will of God. Men, in general, are not taught to be vulnerable, and my experiences have reinforced (meaning: built) a wall for me based on those teachings, to prevent this vulnerable state. So in my relationship with Brittany, I’ve been learning that it is okay for me to be vulnerable, and I also have been, and very much still am, learning how to deal with the fears that accompany that vulnerable state. That has been a true challenge for me. It is a good challenge, and it is not one that I have embraced with open arms...I’m learning. As a status report, Brittany and I have a friendship status right now, and I think that it’s very important for her and I to learn how to be good friends for each other in person, in addition to the letters which we’ve been good friends for each other in.  If anyone is at UNC or near Greeley and wants to come see her perform in a show, she is understudying the lead in UNC's production of Brigadoon!  It is March 8,9, and 10 at the Langworthy theater in Frasier hall on the UNC Campus.

So, what’s next for me? Well, In January, I will take my certification exam for my CMT (Certification in Massage Therapy). Wish me best of luck on that!

Also, from the 16th to the 22nd, the radio station will be filing its application with the FCC for a LPFM station. (Low-Power FM). This will give the radio station an actual broadcast range of up to 10 miles when we’re approved. Keep UNC Student Radio in your prayers as receiving a license via this opportunity would be unprecedented for the station.

During January and February, I will work in Denver doing whatever work I can find to try and get myself out of debt so that I don’t have to worry about money while in Germany. Then, as I’ve already mentioned a couple of times, I will be in Germany. I leave March 1st and return August 1st. I’m quite anxious about this experience. I know that it will seem to fly by because I will be enjoying it so much, and at the same time, I fully expect some major challenges while I’m over there. Considering that I have never even been out of Colorado for more than three weeks at a time, and have never been away from my home in Aurora for more than five or six, there will be some definite growth that comes from being absolutely on my own, in a foreign country, and speaking a foreign language.

It will be nice to have the ability to communicate with home for free via email!  I can’t imagine what it must have been like for people to study abroad when there was no Internet or email. I have been able to do so much research for costs of airline tickets, rail passes in Europe, information about the University of Oldenburg (where I will be studying), and asking questions about the exchange and communicating with the exchange organizers in Germany. It’s very difficult for me to imagine what people did before email or the Internet. I know that there are some reading this who don’t have email or ever want email. That’s okay, but it just continues to amaze me! You should get email so I can email you from Germany, but if you don’t, I will be more than happy to accept and send ‘snail-mail’ letters while I’m there!

Well, I think I’ve just about summed it up, once again. Thank-you to those of you who have sent me cards and/or letters letting me know what’s new with you. If you haven’t, please do. I would love to hear from you!

"I’m starting with the man in the mirror.

I’m asking him to change his ways.

No message could have been any clearer;

If you want to make the world a better place,

take a look at yourself and then make the change."

- Michael Jackson

I’m wishing you and all who you come into contact with a very successful 2001! May your life be as wonderful as you imagine it to be in your dreams!

Peace Always,

Jonathan Kraft

25324 E. Kettle Place

Aurora, Colorado 80016

(303) 693-0872

 

http://www.geocities.com/strive4impact1 (A definite work in progress)

http://www.geocities.com/agreatmassage                 (My massage site)

http://www.unco.edu/ksrx                     UNC Student Radio web site)

 

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