Decide to finally start

Phillip Phillips- "Man on the Moon"

Looking at the stars, looking back to you
Just to see if your world's still alive
Looking at the sun with the fire in your eyes

It's hard to know where I stand
Even the man on the moon couldn't tell me where to land
But, I wanted to fly in the sea with no gravity to pull me down

Hold on it won't take long
You can find yourself when you decide to finally start

So don't let your life start to slowly waste away

 So in the few days that have passed, many things have changed... Okay, no many, mostly just on but it is a big on so whatever. As some of you may know, the name Lisa does not adapt to nicknames I approve of very well. "Lis" "Li" "Li Li" are all names I have been subjected to and tolerated. Furthermore, in high school when there was Lisa B. and Lisa D. I never reaped benefits as I was always stuck with the dreaded last name initial tacked on the end. Therefor, when faced with an opportunity to receive a new nickname (this is due to the fact that there is another Lisa who is a team leader... What's weirder is that she is another Lisa D.) So, my team leaders and I spent ample time going over possibilities, but it turns out I am quite picky when it comes to this because I don't like anything that stems from Burgess either (ex. Burg, Burgers... you get the point.) Finally, one of the ULs (Unit leader- basically the person who will be in charge of myself and probably 5 other team leaders and our teams) said, "What if we just call you by a different name, like Molly?" And, thus it has stuck.. Sorta. Most of the other TLs have taken to calling me Molly and I think that's pretty cool.
On Friday, we got van certified! If I thought it was tough to drive the Big Green Van, I was wrong. Our vans seat 15 passengers, so it's kind of like driving a boat and a school bus all at once. Should be fun if/ when we have to take out teams across country to NY! Friday night some of the STLs (Support team leaders- team leaders who stay on campus and don't get individual teams so they can help with our teams if need be)showed us a typical night at the Lion's Gate, which is the hotel bar on campus. We had fun and we even sang some karaoke! Saturday we woke up, piled in a van and headed into downtown Sacramento.We explored Old Sacramento, K Street, and the capital area. Old Sacramento is basically an area of the city where everything has been kept old fashioned, as if it were still the gold rush era. There are tourist shops, restaurants, scenery, and the Railroad Museum. K Street is a very populated area of the city with an outdoor mall, restaurants, and tons of bars. The capital is really pretty. We walked all through the park behind the actual building and saw many memorials.
We got back to campus around 4pm. Some people took naps, however, me and my new friends Andrea and Allison worked on a 1000 piece puzzle for approximately 4 hours; although at some point I think every TL was involved. It was difficult and took 3 days to complete, but we bonded over it! After staring at orchid puzzle pieces for what felt like an eternity, the three of us along with two of the boys (Andy and Milan) and an STL named Megan decided to check out downtown Sacramento at night. We went to a bar called the Dive Bar where they have real life MERMAIDS. Basically, girls have mermaid tails on and swim around a giant aquarium positioned above the actual bar. It was pretty weird, but something we all felt we needed to see. From there we headed to Kay Bar which was full of hipsters, none of which turned out to be my future husband.......yet. Then, we headed home because....
Sunday we had our TB test checking at 7:30am. [spoiler alert: I do not have TB] We also went to a sports bar to watch some football games WHICH I STILL DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT.
Monday was our first day of service! For MLK day, FEMACorps members volunteered at three different places around Sacramento. My group volunteered with Hands- On Sacramento, a group focused on getting volunteers to maintain the city. We were leaders of their clean-up project at Shasta Park in the city. Our job was to not only facilitate the event, but help with some of the labor, as well. I pulled weeds for three hours and it was actually kind of fun. After getting back to campus, we met with a local AmeriCorps NCCC team to reflect on our service work. It was cool to talk to them because they have been working with AmeriCorps for about three months now and still seem to be loving it. Of course, their work is far different from what I'll be doing, but their belief in service and team-based structure is the same.We talked a lot about service and what it means to us each individually. It was really interesting to see how passionate people can be about helping those in need. Tuesday began our real training with FEMA, as well as more TL bonding and leadership seminars. I'm having so much fun and am really excited about getting my Corps members and assignments, but I know I'll be thankful for all this TLT (team leader training) when I need some support while on projects.

Talk soon! Enjoy some Phillip Phillips!!!!