Dear Friends and Family,

How are you all? In this letter, I have several bits of exciting news among other things I’d like to share with you. Please check out www.michellesjourneys.com where I’ve posted more pictures.

Where I’m at
It’s been a while since some of you have heard from me. Currently, I am in my last week of school as a student at UC Santa Cruz. The return back to Santa Cruz after a year in New Zealand has been great. I enjoyed my old, familiar workplace (my cohorts and I nicknamed it our ‘home away from home’) with the Academic Excellence Program as a sort of T.A./tutor in math. I also continued attending Santa Cruz Bible Church and singing with my choir, For Heaven’s Sake- another ‘home away from home.’
On April 17th, I was baptized! What a joy to share my statement of faith with the Church and friends.

What’s changed upon arrival in Santa Cruz?
Mainly friends and living situations. I chose to live at the International Living Center on campus, which is a pretty tight-knit community of international and exchange students living in apartments. I have housemates from Japan, England, and China, and it’s so neat exchanging experiences and helping to enlighten them to the American culture and language and vice-versa. I even brought a couple of my Japanese friends home to sunny So-Cal for a weekend so they could see the ‘typical American lifestyle’ (I guess! Ha!). They liked Redlands, with its wide open streets and lots of sun, way better than Santa Cruz.

My classes this quarter:
Peregrine Falcon Internship
One of my classes this quarter was an internship at the UCSC Long Marine Lab that is right by the ocean! I spent 4-5 hours a day for two weeks in April watching and tracking three newly-fledged peregrine falcons in a mitigation program, noting when they ate, driving around Santa Cruz tracking them via radio telemetry, answering questions from the public (who frequent the laboratory which also serves an aquarium/museum), and making sure the birds were safe from harm at all times. Why did I do this? I have always had a slight infatuation with big birds (my sister will attest to me chasing pigeons around New York), and seeing as this was my last quarter as an undergrad, I sought out the opportunity to learn about them. I learned so much! (Did you know birds have a gland near their tail that produces oil that they spread around their feathers to make them waterproof?! Gnarly, eh?!)
This internship was probably one of my grandest experiences of my college career on three levels: 1) I just got to sit and watch birds (who went from beginner clumsy to dynamite flyers in two weeks!) 2) I got to sit and talk to people: the general public, and mainly the full-time peregrine-watcher, Gordon, who had the same sense-of-humor as me and was communicative and thoughtful and 3) I got to drink deep of the beautiful setting of the marine lab: there is always a bird making a nest, an elephant seal crying, and the ocean splashing up waves onto the cliffs. The whole experience gave me time to rest, reflect, and made me way more away of nature and its day-to-day change.
Senior Seminar
I finished my math major off with a physical and mathematical presentation on the formation of the terrestrial planets to my classmates. It was a blast teaching them about astronomy, as usual.
Theater Arts
At last I delved into the long forgotten theater world. I was part of run crew (involving movement of scenery and props) for the production “Tango.” It was a very small cast and crew (about 7 each) but it was a blast to dig into that realm once again.

My future:
Well, at least I know what I’m doing for the rest of 2005, and I am dang excited. In fact, I could not have imagined anything greater, honestly!
On June 11th, the night of my graduation, I will be flying out to Washington D.C. to work at NASA Headquarters under Sharron Sample, head of the Science Office until September. NASA will be 50 years old in 2008, and this summer they are launching the team that is developing the website that will educate the public about NASA’s previous missions. Thus, I will be doing a combination of website development, research, and writing. I love science writing, so I’m excited to further this skill. On top of this, I am elated to work with Ms. Sample. Every time I get off the phone with her I bounce around (my roommates wonder…) She is very kind and professional.
Directly after, in the fall, I will be participating in the UCDC program, where I will intern part-time at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum under David DeVorkin, participating in several facets of astronomy education. Also, as part of the program I will be taking several general classes that are meant to enrich my D.C. experience.
You can imagine that all of this was a long, thought-out process of applications, telephone calls, and waiting, but as it all came together in the last month, even into this last week, I can now lay back and stretch out my arms. It’s funny because I never knew what I was to do after graduation, God just told me to wait and see because He had something waiting. And as usual, it was better than I expected.

Personal Growth:
Well, I typically end with a bit of personal growth sharing, so I won’t go against my norm… Recently, I’ve read or been reading the books Every Man’s Battle (Arterburn, Stoeker, Yorkey), Every Woman’s Battle (Ethridge), Every Young Woman’s Battle (Ethridge and Arterburn), Wild at Heart (Eldridge), The Grace Awakening (Swindoll), and The Sacred Romance (Curtis & Eldridge). Crickey! In the first few books listed, I’ve learned about being modest around guys, and understanding their battle and the goodness in their desire to be adventuresome and wild. I’ve also learned a lot about the how’s and why’s of doing away with the feminine inclinations to fantasize and become emotionally attached to anyone I feel attraction to. Sorry for being so blunt, but I’m so relieved that I hope you’ll read them too. The Grace Awakening has taught me about living in the freedom that God intends for me to have, and how to bestow it on others. Finally, The Sacred Romance is throwing me for a loop. It’s very much exposing the ultimate, personal Love Story that God has written for His followers, for me! I have to read almost every paragraph a few times, in order to understand my flawed thinking: I realize I’ve been seeing the Lord’s action in my life through a dirty lens, and I can’t believe how fooled I’ve been. I love these books!

With that, I say, thanks for letting me share! I hope you are well and that I hear from you!
Lots of love,
Michelle