I've decided to officially stop writing titles for each blog post. They will all be untitled but they will all be completely worth your while (yes, definitely).

This week, I've been running about 3-4 miles per day, trying to build up a base to start running longer runs. I'm pretty sure this makes sense, but I could be making stuff up; I basically just like to run for however long I feel like. If this is not the key to sucessful marathoning, I don't know what is. I woke up yesterday and my leg felt weird - it hurt, but I couldn't tell if it was my hip, my knee, or my hamstring. I also considered the possibility that some sort of blood vessel had burst. Yes, I legitimately considered all of these options. You'd think that I'd be able to tell the difference between pain in my hip and knee, but I couldn't. Is there some sort of medical terminology for the complete inability to figure out what part of your own body hurts? Because I have that. I'm no doctor, I'll tell you that. I had to just sit there and put pressure on different spots of my leg to see what actually hurt. I wish I could ask for advice for what to do, but I literally don't even know what the problem was. I only knew that my leg felt funny. So, I took the day off from running and today it feels a little bit better. Am I already at the age where I get weird aches and pains from doing moderately strenuous things? Yikes.

Today I'm going to pass on a link to Annette's blog: http://annetteruss.blogspot.com/. Annette has spent a lot of time in Kenya, and writes about some very interesting and enlightening experiences in her blog. I encourage you to take a look. I'll leave you with one of her comments from a post this past summer:

"Knowledge and encouragement are valuable contributions to the JOP young women and their families. It brings the gift of self esteem and self reliance to people who have, by relying on foreign aid, come to believe they are not able to do for themselves. We hope that as time passes, our JOP girls and their families will start to believe that “yote yawazekana”….everything is possible."

I don't want to sound overly naive or idealistic here, but I do truly believe that it just takes a small effort to give a person the encouragement they need to achieve goals that they may not have thought possible. Our society is far from perfect, of course, but I am amazed when I think of all the people in my life and childhood who encouraged me to grow and learn and try new things - to be involved in clubs and sports and academics. I was encouraged to work hard and I never had to worry about not being able to receive or afford an education. Yes, I've worked hard, but I've also had so many opportunities just laid out for me. I am just now getting to the point in life where I am realizing that certain career dreams might be a little out of reach... And yes, it took almost 23 years. However, many girls don't even have the encouragement or societal support to have these dreams as little kids - much less to hang on to idealism well into their 20s. There are a lot of girls in Kenya who don't have any of these opportunities that I've had, but we have the power to help change that. OK I am just rambling now - I'll get off my soapbox. That's it for today - thank you for reading!