National Convention and Alabama

National Convention
Was AWESOME!!!!
Not only did it give me an opportunity to run a real life simulation of a campaign, but I got to meet some very awesome people. I was able to hang out with some people that I knew from blogging. I got to hang out with Alex King, who is the editor of Regenerate Our Culture ( http://www.regenerateourculture.com/ ) and has a good blog ( www.smarthomeschool.com), Michael Drye who has a brother in the USMC, and Nathan Chartrand who is from FL during the convention. Then towards the end we all went out boating with Jared Gebel, who has competed in NCFCA and his sister debated at Regionals this year, and another girl from Alabama named Sarah Blackmont. I met up with some other bloggers and some people I knew from the GA State class as well.

One of the girls in our cabin was elected VP of TeenPact, so we were all very excited about that.

I didn't make it out of Primaries, but I was the newbie, not many people knew who I was or anything and I had 16 people running against me, so I knew my chances were slim going in.

We were split into small groups in the morning and we talked about God and what he was teaching us, and in the morning and night we would have this AWESOME time of worship. I gained some experience, AWESOME friendships, but more importantly...I was able to grow closer to God there, and give up EVERYTHING that was holding me back.

It was extremely encouraging to be able to socialize with people that think the same way I do and to be able to worship God together, as well as learn.

Alabama Student Project
was a ton of fun, and a TON of hard work. If there was ONE thing I learned this week, its perseverance!

Because honestly, when you are going out into the heat walking door to door for 10 hours a day and over half aren't home, and you have more against the candidate on your list than for, you begin to question if its worth it.

But then you realize, that it IS worth it, that we're doing this for God, that we need Christians involved, and you press on and move forward. So, if anything, God REALLY taught me how to persevere and rely on Him.

Now for the Stories of the Student Project
My team really didn't have a whole lot interesting happen until Monday and Tuesday.

On Monday:
We went door to door again and had some interesting remarks.

FFirst Story:
One of the girls on my team runs up to a door knocks and runs back. I'm like "what?" and she says "there's some creepy guy in there, and he just gave me this mean look" so I respond, "ok, should we leave lit?" "no, I'm not going back there" "ok then, we should probably just skip it" so we do, and we wait for the other girl to get back before we move on (we were working duplexes). So while the other girl is at the opposite door, the guy comes out and says "what do you want?". So, I start my speel and he interrupts saying "I"m a REPUBLICAN, there's no way in the H* I would vote for that man!" so I respond, "Ok sir have a nice day" as I run up to the other girls who decided to walk a little ways ahead. My reaction to them was "a republican who cusses?" The guy turned to go back inside and then peeped his head back out and starts yelling at us "That man is MAD..." So we were almost laughing at the way the guy was acting and replied "OK sir, have a nice day" and moved on.

Second Story

We went up to this one lady's house and she was a supporter, so we were JUST about to leave and she tells us. "Now you know, tomorrow is 666, so be careful because that's the devil's number. Tell your parent's NOT to do anything or write a check tomorrow, tell them to do it tonight or postdate it, because its the devil's number" and she went on...And on..And we're like "yes ma'am" "yes ma'am" trying to find a way off the porch without being rude. Finally we did :D. But we laughed about how superstitious people could be......

Third Story

Originally traumatizing turned HILARIOUS.

We were doing out LAST area for the night, our driver dropped us off at the bottom of the hill and us girls had an easy straight shot. Our van was down the road, the guys were in the general area and we were ALMOST done with our project! So one of us goes up to this door...With a dog. A kid comes to the door and gets his dad who then comes out and says "Get off my property" so she did. Then, the dad and his dog came out and followed her up to where we were waiting, and came up close to us and said like he owned the place "There will be no canvassing for Roy Moore in this neighborhood!". By this time the person across the street let THEIR big dog out too. So we said "Yes Sir" and turn to go, and then he FOLLOWS us WITH the 2 dogs. Keep in mind, this guy is a 200-300 pound hippie, and we're 3 tiny little girls, so we are walking extremely fast up the hill with this guy yelling behind us. So I do the first thing that comes to mind, I sang the Star Spangled Banner at the top of my lungs while the other girls called for our van. While I was singing, the guy was still chasing us UP THE HILL with 2 DOGS and yelling stuff about Francis Scott Key and Tories or something, and it made NO SENSE. I was trying to drown the guy out with my screeching, but I was bursting out laughing at the same time....Once I finish that song, I switch to Battle Hymn of the Republic, by the time I switched songs, he stopped yelling, but I kept going anyway. We made it to the top of the hill and then all three of us just started singing a worship song to calm ourselves down, and then we started chuckling at the situation and how weird it was.

I got a nice pocket knife out of that ordeal too. After, we told the story in the van when we got the rest of the crew, one of the guys who brought 3 pocket knives gave me one of his. :)

The Fourth and Final Story...Tuesday Morning

Tuesday morning we went Signwaving, and this guy comes up and yells "go to h*" at 2 of our people and then circles back AGAIN. Afterwards, we were all in the Parking lot awaiting our next assignment and the SAME guy pulls up and starts yelling at us. I thought he had a gun, because he was sitting at an angle. I was the first person on the curb and if he had a gun would have been at point blank range. Thankfully, one of the guys recognized him from earlier and jumped up from where he was sitting to ask the man in the car to leave, and then some of the other people in charge followed him and told the guy to leave also. So finally the guy leaves, but not before saying "SEGREGATION, SEGREGATION NOW!!!" and we're all looking at each other trying not to laugh. He finally left and we just started laughing.

We figured that all those people were on drugs or something, because they all did something that was weird.

Anyway, Judge Moore didn't win, but it was worth it. I learned a lot from this past 2 weeks, and I wouldn't have opted out even if I knew the outcome.

KP