1. Always bring earplugs on a pilgrimage expedition. You never know whether you'll be tenting it comfortably near a tranquil lake or sleeping with your head 5 feet from the traintracks and 10 feet from the highway.
2. Your arm hurts? Drink more water.
3. Always bring a headlamp.
4. It's all good. It's all right. We've got love.
5. There are good, true, beautiful, and FORMATIVE conferences out there for intellectual Catholics who are fed-up with remedial, comic-book catechesis and over-emphasized praise and worship. It's called the Glory Conference.
6. There's a point during expedition when everything gets pretty funny.
7. There comes a point when I've experienced so much painful beauty that I just can't take it anymore and I bawl over everything.
8. The Glory Conference, in my estimation, is a perfect place to fall in love. It's pretty much all they talk and sing about. But not in a treacley, pathetic, Hallmark way. In a true, good, beautiful, and holy way.
9. Silence. Simplicity. Stillness.
10. I get to have an intense, intimate look at the musicians through my camera lens. It is baffling.
11. This. And this. And then this. And then a little of this. Then, of course, this.
12. AQUINAS WAS EVERYWHERE. I JUST COULDN'T HANDLE IT.
13. Holy Boldness.
14. Beauty before Truth. Beauty speaks for itself and can convert more hearts because it softens them to make them ready for Truth.
15. Beauty does not seek attention.
16. I'm glad I only brought 1 card for my camera. I would have taken 10,000 photos.
17. Two signs of an amazing photographer: timing and ninja skills (not being noticed).
18. SO MUCH AUTHENTIC MASCULINITY I COULD JUST DIE.
19. Father Quinn. He knows me. All of it. And I am safe.
20. MEETING KRISTIN HEIDER!
21. Being called beautiful in front of a huge crowd of people on the 5th day of expedition when I feel like the most repugnant troglodyte ever is pretty much my idea of a good time.
22. Two words: Nashville Dominicans.
23. Eating lunch with the Heiders, Chris Cole, Alanna-Marie, Fr. Huff, and my future spouse was the most hilarious thing ever.
24. Watching Chris Cole and Kevin Heider do sound check was just as side-splitting.
25. Watching Kevin and Chris heckle one another when each was on stage was quite entertaining.
26. Pulchritudinous was used in everyday conversation.
27. Catholic Nerds. Catholic Nerds EVERYWHERE. I LOVE IT.
28. Confession with Fr. Quinn is unexplainably the most beautiful thing I experience when on expedition.
29. SOLEMN HIGH MASS. (and actually feeling like I'm the one who knows what to do! hah!)
30. My pulchritudinous spiritual Mother. Thank God for her.
31. Long hair + women on expedition= early morning beauty parlor to keep my hair up.
32. Why, yes, I did camp and wear a skirt at the same time. Every day.
33. Minimalism rocks...until the 5th day when you start wearing certain things 3 times. Heat and humidity, Bless The Lord.
34. I seriously have to get rid of the pathetic foam roll passed to me from my brother's scouting equipment. I'm a side-sleeper, and it was like sleeping on cardboard. Yay! Mortification!
35. It took everything I had to force myself to bring body spray. Camping and body spray don't mix. I'm so glad I brought it though.
36. I never get to hear Fr. Quinn speak publicly at conferences. It was such a joy to hear him (knowing him the way I do). I recorded all 45 min of it on my phone.
37. Schola, ur doin it right.
38. People have actually heard of the confraternity of angelic warfare, and several are enrolled. (That's when my heart exploded).
39. TJ feels the same way about Santa Claus.
40. People getting my movie references and understanding that I'll never get a nook because it won't ever smell as delicious as my Summa.
My mind is just blown. I'll write more when I come to my senses.
These don't even begin to do the weekend any justice:
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