Well… that was …interesting.

As I’m writing this entry, I’m flying home to Texas from Columbus, Ohio. I’m still not allowed to announce the National Young Women of Distinction Award. It’s been months and it’s KILLING ME!!

I just got back from a lot of interviews, video shoots, getting a tour of Ohio, and meeting SO MANY new people! I got the chance to meet the other women (except one because she’s in China right now) who earned the NYWOD scholarship as well. They are all so beautiful, talented, and inspiring young people. We all got along very well… maybe a little too well. I think perhaps our chaperones were overwhelmed with our rambunctious energies combined in one room, haha!

It’s ethereal up here in the clouds. It’s nice to finally get a chance to sit down and just… think. I woke up at 3AM yesterday to make the plane to my first stop in Atlanta, Georgia, then to take the next plane to Ohio and it was… well… a ride. I was feeling sick all the night before without eating dinner (mistake) and that morning. I showed up at the airport at 5AM in Houston in my heels and nice dress (also a mistake.)

I was half awake and somehow managed to follow the signs to the wrong gate. I didn’t realize my mistake until I was on the other side of the terminal and my plane was boarding in 10 minutes. Off come the heels and on I sprint down the empty hallways of the airport, receiving the occasional double-take from strangers. I made it, sweating, barefoot, and feeling sick to my stomach, just as they were calling my zone to board.

I get on the plane and we’re off. I managed to throw up my breakfast from that morning in the bathroom. As I’m apologizing profusely to the flight attendant as she’s sanitizing and locking the bathroom, a man who was waiting to go in after me looked me straight in the eye and asks, “…why couldn’t you just hold it in?”

I was speechless. I didn’t know what to say. Um… I’m… so rude for… not waiting to throw up until you were done with the bathroom? Sorry? That was awkward.

We land. I kick off the heels again because they’re hurting me. I’m waiting in my chair by the gate for the next plane to Ohio. Just then, sirens start going off. A lady comes over the speaker phone, “Security alert. Please hold onto your belongings.” Carts and flashing lights are all over the place and I’m thinking, “Wow, this is it, this is where I die.”

Then they pull this guy several rows down from me up to his feet and take him away and everything dies down. I have never, in my life, experienced anything like that and it was almost anticlimactic.

I start feeling sick again and like I need to barf. Of course, just then, we start to board. We sit, we wait, and we’re up in the air again.

And I’m in the bathroom again. Didn’t throw up this time, though. Yay me. I think I made the guy sitting next to me nervous though, because I was holding five of those “motion sickness” bags the flight attendants give you in my lap.

I finally get to Ohio and everything is a whirlwind, from meeting my chaperones, to getting a tour of the Columbus Convention Center, to getting my interview taken with the other NYWOD’s, to dressing up fancy for a private dinner at a fancy bar to meet Ohio’s Girl Scout CEO and staff, to walking out late at night in downtown for ice-cream, finally getting some sleep on one of the MOST COMFORTABLE beds I have EVER slept on (I literally teared up because I had never felt so comfortable), waking up, dressing up for a fancy breakfast, more interviews, more video shoots, and back on the plane I go back home.

My first stop, I get to fly with two other NYWOD’s, Elizabeth and Rajvi, so that made the flight much faster. We said our goodbyes in Michigan, and now I’m currently on my flight back home to good ol’ Houston Texas. The plane got delayed an hour and a half, so I won’t land until 10pm-11pm probably… kudos to dad for staying up late to bring me home.

It was fun… but I’m ready to be in my own bed. I’m ready to cuddle my kitty and old pupper. I’m sick, I’m tired… but happy. The convention in October is going to be 10x worse apparently, sooooo… we’ll see how that goes!!! Hhahahahahaha…hhhaa….haaaaaaa…