Eight months. Four projects. Three countries. One adventure.

There is no feeling like knowing you have made an impact on a person’s life, however small. To leave your footprint, your mark, or even the tiniest piece of your heart in another place is to truly make the most of life. To walk along a dusty road and find the local kids sharing a game you taught them with their friends at school. To see little boys, teenage girls, and grown women weeping as you wave goodbye. To hear a four year old say, “I’ll never forget your name.” It makes every miserable plane ride, every grossly large spider, and every heartbroken tear one hundred and ten percent worth it.

I can’t claim to have changed these people’s lives. They live just as they did before I came. Their clothes are just as dirty, their houses just as ramshackle, and their lives just as difficult. But if I brought them one smile, one laugh, or one necessity they didn’t have before, I made a difference. And when you add up a hundred little differences, maybe three hundred or a thousand, you see an impact. And is not an impact the first step on the road to a greater change?

Who am I kidding, though? I can’t even pretend to think that I influenced these people half as much as they influenced me. I gave them shoes or some new English vocabulary or a glow stick, but they gave me passion. Purpose. Life. How do I even begin to reflect on what I’ve learned?

It started in Peru. My first adventure. A world of new experiences from flying alone to leaving the country to riding in a taxi. My first real look at poverty and my first broken heart.

There is some small part of me that got off that bus in Huancayo and never made it back home. Whether it was a sliver of my heart or a piece of my innocence, my naivety, I feel its absence. I feel it when I wake up from a dream about the kids there, and I feel it at the mall when guilt wraps its arms around my ankles as I walk to the register.

In Peru, I saw that my life MATTERS. Those kids -- those precious, amazing, hilarious kids that love Hannah Montana and Justin Beiber and soccer and the Titanic-- loved ME. I had something to offer them. And not just my language but my culture, my hobbies, and my childhood favorite everythings.

To them, I was rich in a million ways. I, a graduated high school student with no job, had more money than any of them probably ever would. My life was full; I had two parents, a house, an education, a future. But I believe the kids saw that I was willing and eager to share my possessions, material and otherwise, with each and every one of them. And today, as they wear my shirt or play with the teddy bear I bought them, I hope they remember me.

For three months, I lived with a Peruvian family. I ate their food, experienced their culture, and painted their fingernails. I despised their lack of punctuality and planning, but I saw that it led to a comparatively stress free life. I befriended volunteers from Australia, England, Utah, and Florida and made a lifelong friend in my polar opposite. I rode a horse through the actual Middle of Nowhere and climbed waterfalls in the Amazon. I roasted marshmallows over tea candles and had a blast playing Capture the Flag with a bunch of little kids. I spun kindergartners around until I was beyond dizzy, taught kids the Chicken Dance, and directed my class’ theatrical rendition of Shrek2. I made memories that will last FOR.EVER.

And them? They begged me not to leave. They gave me bracelets and necklaces and random little ornaments. They wrote me letters, drew me pictures, and cried on my shoulder. They made me promise to return. And I did. I will.

Although I may have been depressed after leaving Peru, working with the Hoss Foundation Gift Project kept me too busy to dwell on it. It was my first “real” job (or as real as you can get without being paid). I worked in an office and took a lunch break just like a grown up (though I can’t deny that my heart is still trapped in Never Never Land). I reviewed applications for Christmas aid that were heart wrenching and found that poverty was not merely a distant issue but also a problem in my own community.

After New Year’s, I headed off on my second trip. I expected Honduras to be like Peru, but it was a totally different world. The Spanish was different. The culture was different. And the “city” I stayed in was beyond different. Ojojona redefined my definition of “rural.” We got homemade tortillas from the neighbor across the street. We bought eggs from Karla whose chickens laid their eggs all over her house. Oscar cut the knee-high grass with a machete, and deadly poisonous snakes lived in the backyard. I even found myself out in the field with big rubber galoshes feeding the goats like a good ‘ole farm girl.

Although I taught Sunday school, recorder, Bible study, art, and English in Honduras, I learned much more than I taught. Lesson number 1: The world does not revolve around Josy Tarantini. Of course, I’ve always known this to be true, but it didn’t carry real meaning until I spent three months living with two and four year old girls and a baby. I saw that having a family is a lot harder than it looks and that it involves a great deal of self-sacrifice. I learned so much about being a servant and putting others’ needs above my own. And this led to lesson number 2: Life is better if the world DOESN’T revolve around Josy Tarantini. In being a servant, I found that selflessness actually brought more satisfaction and happiness than doing things my own way. For the first time, I began to understood Jesus’ whole “first will be last and last will be first” paradox.

Throughout my three months in Honduras, I met a lot of people who live HARD lives. I befriended a single mom who lived with her whole extended family and only got paid every 3 months. I taught little boys that would work on a chicken farm (cutting their beaks off or something awful like that) to make extra money for their families. I talked to a guy who believed he was possessed by demons. I went to church with a family that spent their “free time” picking coffee (a job considered to be the lowest of lows) to support themselves. Not to mention that I lived with a family who works harder every day than I work in a week at home. This led to gratefulness for a million and one things I’d always taken for granted.

Honduras being my first real mission trip, it was definitely an eye opening experience. Spiritual warfare always seemed to be throwing a wrench in our plans and hopes. Isolation led to a constant hunger for fellowship. Finances were always high on our prayer list, and we had to explain the most important things in the world–salvation, faith, repentance – in another language! I saw that starting a ministry is a long process that can be slow to yield fruit. It’s tough. But serving God with all you are and all you do is certainly worth that and more!


Coming back home was difficult in a lot of ways. Even now I feel restless, eager to get back out there and do what I was made to do. Keeping busy has helped me ease my adjustment to normalcy. When I first got back, I worked with WVU Upward Bound. Once again, I found myself in an office doing administrative work but this time to help low income high school students who want to be first generation college students. I spent a lot of time requesting food donations for their summer program. This might sound like a tedious task, but it was good for me. At a time in my life where it was easy to judge the world, to stereotype Americans as rich, greedy, and selfish, it was helpful to see tons of businesses around Morgantown donate food and gift cards to help these kids. Seeing their generosity was a reminder that I am not alone in wanting to make a difference.

Now, though, even my internship with Upward Bound is over. It’s hard sometimes, knowing that this gap year has come to an end and that four years of books and exams lie ahead. It’s hard to be a world away from the children who first captured my heart and to move from the house of missionaries to a college dorm. But I suppose it’s just time for a new adventure. Although I may not find 21 people living in a mud house in Lexington, Virginia, who’s to say that a homeless man with no family is in any less need of Christ’s love? After all, it’s not location that makes me who I am but the hands of the Potter. And He has made me many things.

I am a dreamer. I believe that I have the power to change people, to change lives, and to change the world.

I am a realist. I don’t seek to do the impossible. I simply follow God and leave those things to Him.

I am a rebel. I am not satisfied with conforming to what everyone else does. I choose the narrow way.

I am a follower. I pursue Jesus Christ and His plan for my life.

I am a warrior. I seek to fight poverty: to loose the chains of injustice, feed the hungry, shelter the wanderer, and clothe the naked (Is 58).

I am a peacemaker. I aim to heal broken relationships and bring unity among friends.

I am a missionary. I take the message of salvation wherever I go.

I am a daughter, a sister, a friend, a student, a teenager, a Christian.

I am a piece of clay that is slowly becoming a holy vessel.

I am shaped by everything. Shaped by God.

Isaiah 64:8 “Yet, O Lord, you are our Father. We are the clay; you are the potter. We are all the work of your hand.”

A Sword and a Dream

This is a revised compilation of some essays I wrote for an application.

To many people, service is about “giving back to the community” or “doing something worthwhile.” Those things are true. Serving does benefit the community, and it is worthwhile. But that is not what serving is to me. I do not serve to be a better person or to satisfy my conscience. I do not serve to justify the things I do solely for myself. Instead, I serve because I have seen people trapped within the walls of their circumstances and have learned that I have the power to hand them a key. I serve because, in doing so, people have changed the world. And so can I.

My desire to serve, though, goes way beyond wanting to leave my mark on this world. More than anything, my heart to serve is rooted in my faith. The Bible defines religion as “looking after orphans and widows in their distress.” Isaiah says to “spend yourselves on behalf of the needy.” Jesus calls us to be a servant of all, and James says, “Faith without deeds is dead.” I believe obeying God means serving others.

However, while I consider serving my duty, I also consider it my joy. Some describe the joy of serving as “warm and fuzzy.” I disagree. Puppies and kittens are warm and fuzzy. Serving is a different feeling altogether. When I hand a piece of bread to a hungry child, I feel a million things at once. My eyes fill. My lips smile. My heart breaks. My hand shakes. My soul sings. The feeling is a perfect paradox: heart wrenching, yet ecstatic. But joy nonetheless.

There is other joy as well -- joy that does not inspire tears but fits of laughter and toothy grins. For me, this unadulterated happiness is found among children. To carry them into an imaginary place far from the troubles of this world is a priceless entity. To be their hero and friend is an honor. To earn their love is a privilege.

In other words, although I serve to bless others and honor God, I also serve for myself. Because it makes me happy.

Most of the service that I have done addresses poverty, and I hope to fight poverty throughout my life, especially among children. To me, poverty is not just pictures of malnourished children in Africa or stories of families living in garbage dumps. It is children that I have known. Children with names. It is Araceli devouring the food I brought her every morning and crying when it was gone. It is Nexer’s toes poking out the front of his brown school shoes. It is Mauricio living in a tiny mud house with twenty other relatives and Jaime being raised by his twelve year old sister. I have seen poverty. I have hated it. And I have fought it.

I have fought it, but I have also seen how hard it is to make a lasting stand against it. Yes, I gave Araceli food, but when her family left the area, she was just as hungry. Yes, I bought Nexer new shoes, but his feet will keep growing, and I will not always be there to buy a new pair. It is easy to touch the lives of those in poverty, but changing them is a challenge.

For this reason, I want to learn as much as I can to make a difference in as many lives as possible. I dream of taking my passion, creating a vision, and changing the world. I want to care for these people, but I also want to learn from them. I hope that, by learning more about poverty, I can go beyond touching lives and start changing them. I want to fight the dragon that is poverty, but I also want to rescue children like Araceli, Nexer, Mauricio, and Jaime. To see them support their own families. To help them achieve a new life. And to hand them a sword of their own.

I do not yet know what form this will take, but I believe education is the key. In Honduras, I saw children “finishing” school after sixth grade. These children walked in the footsteps of their parents, right on track to make tortillas or dig ditches for the rest of their lives, unaware of the options outside their snow globe of a world. I saw lives wrecked by preventable diseases, solely because no one had ever taught them healthy eating and living habits. Distressed by what I saw, I hope to show these people a way to a better future, one that lies above the poverty line.

My passion for serving has become one of the driving forces in my life, and I believe serving is a huge part of who I am and who I want to be. Some might say I’m forsaking my potential—opportunities to be a doctor, a lawyer, or a scientist — and perhaps I am forsaking the American dream. But if so, I’m taking up the dreams of every child born into a life of poverty, and hopefully, one by one, making them come true. So I’d say it’s worth it.