Hey everyone, I'm back! It feels like ages since I've posted here. The cause of my absence is because I was at camp and on vacation.

The camp I went to was nothing recreational. I was volunteering. It was pretty hard work. Along with ten other guys, I helped build eight campsites and two fishing pods for three weeks. We slept in tents the entire time. We worked about full-time, 40 hours a week. The work was pretty intense, but I had a great time anyway. Plus I got 120 community service hours for it and a $500 stipend.

The camp was a totally new experience for me. I had done so much physical labor before. I was exhausted after the first couple of days. But I forged on through, and got nearly perfect on my evaluation at the end.

I never knew so much work went into creating a campsite. We first built the picnic tables, which consisted of bolting the frame together, bolting on the boards for the seats and tabletops, sanding all the surfaces down, and allying polyurethane. We then primed and painted lantern holders and sanded down the ends of wooden beams (for the frames of the campsites) in order to fit into metal joints. After that came the really tiring work - clearing the ground for the campsites. With hand blades, rakes, and a couple weed-cutters, we cleared about a quarter-mile long and fifty-foot wide stretch of riverbank that was grown ofer with weeds and shrubs. Then we had to level the ground usiung rakes and shovels. When the ground was level, we had to connect all the beams and level them. Then came leveling the gravel that was dumped into the frame. Finally, after the gravel was level, we installed the picnic tables, the lantern holders, the grills, and the canoe holders. We carried 80-pound bags of quickrete down a 45-degree slope to the campsites and filled up the pits we dug for the lantern holders and grills, four bags per campsite. We dug four-foot deep holes for the canoe holders. Finally, after all that, we were done. And that's what I did for three weeks.

Afterwards, I went on vacation with my parents. It was like paradise after camp. A bed, a jacuzzi, my mom's food, what luxuries! But then the bombshell came: my dad is being relocated to New York. We have a year to move, but the more we put it off, the more difficult it will be for my academic life. If we move in a year, I'll be entering the new school in my junior year, which means I'll only have a year to establish myself before applying to college. We're trying to find a good school district, but unfortunately, there is a direct relationship between education quality and housing costs, which is very frustrating. There is another possibility, which is my dad moving to New York and my mom and me staying here in Richmond. This will be much easier financially and on my academic life, but there is the obvious disadvantage of only seeing my dad about once a month. So the two options are: 1) move to New York, financial difficulties, and academic difficulties 2) stay here, away from dad. Neither option is too appealing. Of course, if my dad finds another job in a year, then all is well.

I ask you for your prayers and, if you have any, advice. Thanks.

knivetsil