Warning: This is not a drill

Yesterday was the best day I've had since coming to Palau! Enhanced by the fact that my dad was here, it was exciting and spectacular. We started off at 8 am and headed down to Surangel's dock. We were supposed to leave (my dad, the other sm's, and I) at around 8:30, but didn't actually leave until 10! There was engine trouble so we just sat around and talked and walked to Sams for a while. Even though we waited for a while, it was still a nice little break. When we finally got the boat started, we headed off to the Milky Way! It was amazing! It was the first time I've been there and it wasn't really what I expected. It was a lagoon of white, sulfur-like, sand that covered tons of the ocean floor. It was fun to rub it all over our faces and arms and other people! Then, of course, we started a sand fight! I was having such a good time, and just hit Jeff in the face, when suddenly I felt a venomous, shooting, pain in my foot. Hundreds of tiny spikes were sticking out of my left foot! Apparently, a crafty sea urchin was hiding under the sand and decided to shoot my foot with his spines. It was quite unpleasant pulling all the thorns from my foot. It almost felt like having lye in my veins, and you could see red tracks as the poison moved through my system.
After that wonderful adventure, we headed off to shark island! We docked and let a few people off for lunch, and the rest of us went to drop off a few boys to go spear fishing and head to jellyfish lake! It was fun hiking up and down back to the lake, and I couldn't wait to show dad the jellyfish! It wasn't a bad day, with the sun just peaking out from behind the clouds. There were tons of jellyfish, so I got to take tons of pictures of my dad and I playing with them! Right as we started swimming back to the dock it started pouring rain! There was tons of sheets of rain pounding down on the lake, making it look really cool! When we left jellyfish lake we headed to clam city. It was about this time that I noticed that my foot was turning black. Nelson said not to worry about it, so I just ignored the pain and kept having fun. There were tons of giant clams at clam city which we got to enjoy. Our last stop was cemetery to feed the fish. There were even more than last time! They were swarming all around us and bumping into us all the time. For some reason, we all felt this stinging feeling all around us, so that kind of killed the fun and most of us got out of the water.
Oh man, the way back to Surangles dock is a whole different story. As we got ready to go back, the rain picked up and started pouring. This created waves in the ocean like I couldn't even imagine. We started off sitting on the floor of the boat, but with the boat bouncing off the ocean, our backs were not feeling so great. One bump even threw me so high in the air that I could have been standing. The waves finally got up to 10 feet and we were just trying to coast through without flipping the boat. Everyone was piled onto everyone else, holding on for dear life. It was one of the craziest and scariest moments yet. Sometimes the boat would even get so low that it would almost submerge for a moment, and then pop back up. We took a video, but it's basically just us screaming at the top of our lungs and the rain pelting us. I've never been that we before from the rain- we could have been swimming. Then, the second we got out of the huge 10 foot swells and back to calmer water, the boat ran out of gas! We had a reserve packed, but thank goodness that we didn't run out in the middle of the ocean, or we'd all be dead. That's how crazy the waves were!
After that long adventure we finally made it back to SDA. I got to hang out with my dad a little more before he had to leave to get ready to go to the airport. Even though I was really sad to see him leave, I was super happy that I could share that day with him because it was so incredible! Plus, now I have someone to confirm what sounds like a made up story- it's not!
Lately, I've been praying a lot for the future. Mainly because I don't know what kind of things are in store. Whether it's the near future, going to Yap, Japan, or Manila for Christmas break, or the further future, what to do with the rest of my life and how to accomplish all the things I want to. I just feel like life is SO SHORT. It's funny because people who were SM's here in the past said that the time goes so slow until Christmas, and then it goes fast. For me, it's already flying by and I can't imagine it going any faster then it is. I don't want it to! I want it to take as long as possible for it to get to tomorrow. Even though I miss Walla Walla so much, nothing in the world can compare to today, last weekend, and all the amazing memories that are waiting for me to make.