The Fourth of July began as a bright and early Thursday morning. There were hardly any clouds in the sky that morning, and so the sun shone with that particular intensity that happens whenever there are celebrations. Even though it was a holiday for the fellows, I was asked to get up early so I could buy some sodas for the party before guests arrived. Blonde Anna had offered to help me, so at 8:45 a.m. we got into my car and made our way to the Mandala House. Mrs. Bortins gave us a debit card and gave us some generic instructions before sending us out to the local Food Lion. We managed to get enough of the ice and soda that we needed, with less than the allotted amount that Mrs. Bortins had asked us to spend, so we were pretty proud of ourselves as we pushed our loaded grocery cart back to my car. Elizabeth and Red Anna helped us unload the refreshments into a bin on the back porch, and my job was done.
It was absolutely gorgeous outside, with only a few gray clouds peeking out from behind the trees that line the horizon. Days like that are the best days for swimming in a lake, so once I was done helping Mrs. Bortins, I rushed home to change into my swimming suit. A few of the other Fellows wanted to come to the party too, so it was some time before we all got into my car and went back to the Mandala House. By that time, all of the parking spaces in the driveway were taken, so I had to park on the empty lot across the street. The house was bursting with excitement as we walked through the door, kids running across our path and between circles of adults talking and holding plates of food; the teenagers and young adults were easy to identify as almost all of them were in their swim suits and towels. A beautiful young woman was playing the piano in the lobby, and above her the loft shook with the pounding of feet as people played ping-pong, Foosball, or pool. There was a feast lining the kitchen counter, and the tables were grouped into one big square lined with matching chairs. Sitting in one of those chairs was a stunning young woman with short black hair and an awesome dress. She called out to me as I passed, complementing me on my Doctor Who pins that I keep on the fedora I wear. This opened up a conversation, and soon I was sitting next to her and talking to her like I would with an old friend. I learned that her name is Mary and that she is Blonde Anna's sister before we got into more personal subjects like boyfriends and career preferences. Her family came over to sit with us, and her grandmother joined into our conversations. She was an absolute joy to be around. She talked to me about my blog, mentioning a sweet comment she had left on one of them, and told me about one of her grandchildren and how much she enjoys writing to him. Before I knew it, more than an hour had passed. So I bid farewell to my newest friends and went outside.
The surface of the lake was riddled with float noodles, the heads of swimmers, and the small vessels like Kayaks and a SUP (Stand Up Paddle) Board. The mortar boat had gone out into the main part of the lake, captained by William who was taking guests out for tubing. The water was constantly shifting from the remains of wakes thanks to all of the boats and jet skis out in the main body of the lake. I dragged one of the orange kayaks out into the water and hopped in, braving the choppy waters and joining the others under the sun. I met a lot of new faces, and splashed around with some of the other fellows who had dragged themselves out of bed to join in the festivities, despite it being long past noon. At one point I even got to try out the SUP Board. It took me a while to figure out the balance of it, but pretty soon I was all the way to the sand bank-- which is almost 100 yards from the dock-- and back. Hours flew by, and pretty soon dark had fallen. Inside the house, Barnabas and a lovely young woman named Emily had started a swing dance in the classroom. The room had a variety of Fellows and guests dancing within it and music echoing off of it's walls. Seth surprised us all by exercising his own amazing swing moves, danging with a good number of the females, both young and not-so-young. Laughter abounded throughout the house as the party continued on into the night. Up in the loft, the games grew more and more intense as players challenged each other again and again. Blonde Anna's brother, Russel, was playing the piano; the notes wafting throughout the house. Back near the docks I tried to help with the lighting of a massive bonfire, but the logs were cut too recently and we ended up needing lighter fluid to get them to catch.
The sky was deep black by the time things began to wind down. It was later still when I drove myself and a few of the other fellows back to our villas. We were all exhausted from all the activities, yet elated from the excitement. That night we fell into our beds, eagerly anticipating the next day.
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Friday's party was much the same as the day before, except that I slept in much later. I managed to get a seat on one of the tubing trips by offering to go with some of the younger girls who had never gone tubing before. Tubing is one of my favorite things to do, so I had a lot of fun. The hours were spent mostly in the water, either boating or swimming, but things began to wind down even before the sun set. Most of the guests were leaving by dinner time, so the house grew a bit more quiet than before. At dinner, I took my food out to a circle of chairs where a mixture of guests, neighbors, and Mandala Fellows were all having friendly conversation. It was right after I cleaned my plate that I noticed the faint echo of music drifting from the lake. I immediately recognized the tune to be the Cha-Cha Slide, and I brought it to the attention of my companions. We deduced that the music must be coming from the marina, which was visible from our dock. Some of the other girls and I got up and danced to the song on the dock. I knew the next song as well, and I got to teach a bit of it to my fellow dancers. By the end of the second song I decided that I was going to go to marina so that I could join in the community party happening there.
After a quick change of clothes, I drove myself to the marina. It was there that I, unsurprisingly, found Blonde Anna and Barnabas cutting a rug under one of the joined gazebos. I was a little disappointed that the music style changed, and so I couldn't dance to most of the songs; but there was a live band and it was really fun to watch my two friends swing dance. At one point they even got a round of applause! Eventually, Zack showed up and he tried to dance with me a bit. The swing lessons we had done as the Mandala Fellowship helped a lot, but I was still not very good. After the dance, the rest of the Mandala fellows showed up and we all went for a swim under the stars. All in all, it was a wonderful evening.
We finally got to see some fireworks on July 6th, as Mandala Fellows drove up to the dam after sunset. The fireworks were set off from the island in the lake, and the show was absolutely breathtaking. The last of the guests left the next morning, giving the people of Mandala a chance to rest.
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The next week flew by, as always, in a flurry of music and math papers. The Mandala House was especially populated those days because Mrs. Bortins had a group of writers living with her and working on a book together. We were blessed to have those same people teach us some writing lessons on Friday. Even after taking advanced English classes, I learned a lot from them. We even did a super cool poetry slam before lunch! Not a moment of time was wasted, as even our lunch was coupled with group discussion on topics like 'Women in the Military' and 'Which is more important- music or color''. After lunch, we said goodbye to our tutors and turned our attention to an SAT writing practice video. By the time all of our lectures and videos were over, it was after six at night.
Throughout the week, fellows searched desperately for some free time just to get in their respective groups to work on projects. The most pressing assignment that we all needed to work on was a music piece called White Winter Hymnal. There were only two groups for this project, and so we all had to work together to make sure we had a good harmony with all of the voices and instruments. It was frustrating at first, but when it was time to perform we were all proud of the work we put into it.
The publishing team has gotten a new agenda aiming us at getting our names, and the name of Classical Conversations, more widespread onto networks. Today we are working on getting some connections and becoming part of the education media. There is a lot of work yet to be done on our math project, but I'm really excited about what my team is doing with it. Each day here brings new excitement and experiences, and I'm so glad to be part of each one!
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