October, 2025
National Book Month - share in the comments if you got any new books in October!
Highlights
October 2nd, we ladies of Halcyon joined our brother hall, The Brotherhood of Lawrence, for dinner in the Great Hall. Nearly everyone from both halls came, it required four tables to seat everyone. The halls mixed fairly well, guys and girls sitting together and the class years were mixed as well. It was a fun event and there should be a few more over the rest of the school year. Tisha and Tjabe are doing a great job this year at getting the two halls together to keep the bro-sis hall bond strong.
October 4th, Elizabeth, her brother David, and I auditioned for Mountain Affair, Covenant’s campus-wide talent show of sorts. We performed a fun version of Imagine Dragon’s Warriors. Elizabeth and I traded off singing the verses and the two parts of the chorus, ending with the both of us singing the final chorus. David accompanied us on the keyboard, which he put in the harpsichord setting. It was terrifying but thrilling at the same time. We did not end up getting a spot in this year’s Mountain Affair (which we found out the week after), but we did perform the song again that night at Open Rowan, but this time without the harpsichord setting as their keyboard didn’t have one. That was also fun, and the people liked it a lot. I’m glad we auditioned and performed at Open Rowan!
On the 9th, I had my second counseling session of the year - I know, people don’t usually talk about their therapy sessions, but this is as much for myself as it is for my friends and family, these updates - where my counselor and I discussed how I approach friendships and relationships with others. As an introvert, I don’t make friends quickly, though I am getting significantly better at being social when I need to be. We realized that I tend to take on an older-sister role in my friendships and relationships (more so with girls than with guys, but even then, that role still can come out). We talked about that in and of itself is not a bad thing, rather that is how God made me as the oldest sister to function; but that is not and cannot be who I am. I just don’t have the strength to be that for everyone I know and care about, even if I would like to. So, we had a conversation about dependency. Part of being a Christian is a recognition that I am completely dependent on God, but also on the older or wiser people that he puts in my life. My counselor and I came to the conclusion that I needed to find a “big sister,” a woman who can and wants to function like an older sister to me in prayer and in life (I already have two “older brothers,” but she said that because my struggle is in my relationships with other girls, I need an older sister more than older brothers, though they will and already do help). This is a prime example of my knowing something in my head but not realizing the full implications of what I know to be true: I was made to be dependent, but I wasn’t depending on the people God has put in my life just for that purpose - which makes it hard even to be dependent on him.
So, the following day, I got dinner with my Big Sister. It was wonderful, and after having processed everything the day before, I could feel how our friendship already was in some ways one of big sister (her) and little sister (me). Since then, we’ve been more intentional to hangout and talk after classes. She really is one of my closer female friends with whom I feel that I can relax and just enjoy our deep conversations without any background feeling of older sisterly duties. Of course, that doesn’t mean that I don’t care about her as a person, we pray together and I pray for her requests, and I offer to help out when and where she needs it. But our friendship is easy and always has been. For that, I am incredibly thankful.
The morning of October 11th, Emily and I went and helped out the Walker County Code Enforcement Department with a service project along with at least 25 other Covenant students and a professor. It was a long two hours, a lot of work - the situation was sad and there were some risks (the officer was armed and alert; there were some places he told us to stay far away from) - but it felt good to work with our hands, even in the filth, to help out the community and hopefully help these people get a leg up and to start fresh. I’ve never really had the opportunity to do that sort of service project before, so I was very grateful for the experience. And it was a great time of bonding between my roommate and I as well as the whole group, including some of my Grounds coworkers. I see people differently now, which was the point of the experience; I have found myself to be slower to jumping to conclusions when I see run down places or people who look to be in desperate situations. I still don’t have the right tools to help them, but now I actually want to, and it hurts that I don’t know how to.
Also on the 11th, we threw our friend Elijah a surprise birthday party. We were donated a cake, and we put up turtle decorations and invited his roommates and friends, all under the guise of a regular Saturday Afternoon Tea. He was thoroughly surprised and while he did initially try to escape (his brother caught him) he said he appreciated the celebration and time we spent together as friends.
October 12th was Halcyon’s Hall Pictures Day! We dressed in floral, brought props that represented the vibes of our rooms/suites, and gathered at the Overlook for photos. Hall pictures is always a fun time of seeing each other, getting a taste for the personalities of each of the rooms/suites, and getting to hangout as a hall. I can’t wait to see our entry in this year’s Yearbook!
I also led Prayer and Praise that night. We talked about choosing to be curious about the people around us rather than being judgmental from first impressions, and how that is only possible through an understanding of our identity being rooted in Christ, not in ourselves. I borrowed some sources from CDM’s Woman’s Ministry website.
On the 14th, Caroline and I were joined by Elijah and Elizabeth on our quest for dead people to research. One of our first assignments for Intro to History was to go to the Forest Hill Cemetery and find someone to write a short biography of. I found a rather boring but at the same time interesting person, Robert Barr the Second. His father, grandfather, and son all did famous things in Chattanooga, but Robert the Second kind of just existed. He was an interesting character though!
October 16th, Covenant’s Board of Trustees was on campus, and because of my position as a DA, I was invited to join the Board for dinner. I ended up sitting with one of the elders from my church back home and my RA, as well as two other students and three other Board Members. We had a great conversation about things that the school is doing well, is changing, and could do better at. I really appreciated that as student leaders, we were given a special opportunity to interact with the Board, and they said that they loved the touchpoint they get every time with the students. And we just had a fun time getting to know one another.
4pm, October 17th, was the start of my Fall Break. Elizabeth and her brothers and I drove down to my house where the boys dropped us off and then went home. Elizabeth spent the weekend at my house, it was fun! Us and my family (minus my dad and middle sister) went to the Stone Mountain Highland Games on the 18th and were joined by Caroline, Elijah, and Shiloh. We spent a couple of hours there, exploring the different Scottish things there, listening and watching the pipes and drums corps, and Scottish dancing (done by some friends of my family). We got to see two of Covenant’s pipers perform with the Chattanooga Pipes and Drums Corp. They ended up getting second places overall, which is really exciting.
The 21st was Elizabeth’s birthday, so we made her cinnamon rolls and accidently sang “Happy Birthday” very off-key, but she said she enjoyed it, so I’ll take that as a win. After lunch, the boys arrived and we drove a little south to pick up Shiloh before all five of us drove back up to campus, arriving just in time for dinner. We were the last ones of the room to arrive, which was very abnormal as the other two are usually late in coming back.
October 25th, Founders Hall put on Around Founders, and this year’s theme was Fantasy Founders. The halls did wonderful jobs at decorating their halls according to their chosen theme and the residents were all very entertaining actors. My personal favorite was 1st Belz because of their Monty Python and the Search for the Holy Grail theme. They executed the decorations and the acting wonderfully and I really enjoyed it. (And that’s my dad’s hall and the hall of a good friend of mine (another Elijah) so I am a bite biased.)
October 26th, Mac/Rymer’s RD invited Lawrence and Halcyon to her apartment for a dessert social for the hour leading up to our joint Prayer and Praise at 8:30 in the Caudle, which was a sweet time of singing and scripture reading for both halls.
On the 27th, I met with my mentor, Sarah, and we talked about philosophy and femininity. Both of us grew up tomboyish and both of us experienced the desire to explore what it looks like to be tomboyish while still holding to a Biblical definition of what it means to be a woman - a process we are both, though I more than she, still in. I really enjoyed the conversation we had!
On the 28th, Elizabeth and I showed Emily The Force Awakens as she was going to Kilter as Rey but had never seen any movie with her in it before. She liked the movie!
Kilter was the 31st, at TopGolf. We had a fairly large group that went. It consisted of Elijah and Caroline (the vibes of Doctor Who), Elizabeth and Tristan (Rocket and Starlord), Stephen and Kaitlyn (Obi wan and young Anakin), Emily and Justus (Rey and Poe Dameron), and Shiloh and I (Anakin and Ahsoka). There were so many friends there, it was so much better than last year’s, though the zoo was fun. It was also a very late night as the dance didn’t end until midnight. But we all had a great time!
Writing
While on break, I wrote the eighth chapter of Legacy, but that was it. That was a hard chapter to write and had been in process for close to six weeks. Now, I’m a little stuck as to what to do next, but I have a few ideas. Sundays after PnP, Shiloh and Elizabeth have a plan to write for a little bit so I’m hoping that will help me stay on task to get this book finished at some point.
Reading, Music, and Cinema
I started reading the Maze Runner series - by start, I mean I have read the first page of the first chapter because I keep getting interrupted by school - and I have read a few more pages of my WoW book as well.
My music hasn’t changed much, though I did discover that listening to music from other cultures is good for studying. K-pop and Russian music are both really cool, have fun beats but no distracting lyrics. I’ve also returned to one of my favorite playlists, my Endevour Soundtrack. I opera so much!!
Over break, I rewatched Big Hero Six with my sisters and Elizabeth. My dad even watched part of it with us. And then The Force Awakens with roommates and a couple of Ghibli movies with friends.
Common Place Quotes
(Coming soon!)
Looking Forward
November is the month of paper writing, and yes, I am looking forward to writing these papers, as much work as they will be. I am also excited to go home and spend Thanksgiving with my family!
