Practicum Work

Practicum placements were classes we were assigned to go to just for experience. We did some observing, and then we helped out, kind of how an aide would. Sometimes I made copies, or put together bulletin boards, and sometimes I taught small group lessons or projects. These were my first experiences in “real” classrooms. I wish I had taken more pictures of the different classes I worked in, but these two will have to do.

A Ride Out To Sugar

One FHE brother, who was one of the only guys I was great friends with and had a crush on, was Jason Eggers. Jason was just an all around million-dollar guy. He was super fun and happy, all the time, and he didn’t care who you were, he was your friend. We spent a lot of time with Jason and his roommates, and it was just plain awesome. Jason was really physical, and he loved, loved, loved bike riding. He had a super good bicycle, and he rode it all the time. He kept his bike in his upstairs apartment, and he would get on it upstairs, and ride it down the staircase and right out the door, down the porch stairs and onto the street. To this day that is still unbelievable to me.

So I had a crush on Jason, and one summer when I was home in California for a couple of weeks, I decided to take an old, broken bike that I found at my parents’ house and restore it. I fixed it all up, and took it back to college with me. I’ll just say right off the bat that I had no clue how to fix a bike. No clue at all. I saw what needed to be fixed, and did what my inexperienced, non-tool-savvy brain could come up with to do. I even painted it. Honestly, I was really proud of myself.

I told Jason I was up for a bike ride, and he wanted to go long. So we got up a plan to ride out to Aunt Dorothy and Uncle Grant’s farm in Sugar City. I’m going to guess it was about 5 miles one way.

Jason, being the pro bike rider he was, with the super expensive bike that he had, rode circles around me. I was so embarrassed! I have never been in stellar physical condition, let’s be honest. Combine that with my poor, sad bike, and it was an extremely ambitious ride for me. Jason handled it well, I must say. He probably had no idea before hand how slow going it would be. We made it to Aunt Dorothy’s, visited for a while, and started the long journey home. I’m pretty sure that part of my bike broke on the way home, but it was still ride-able. Poor Jason! We did make it home though, and the good news is that Jason was still my friend after that, and we continued to have a lot of fun together, and he never ever made me feel less than awesome for accomplishing that bike ride.