I just can’t help it. You get me around mass quantities of blue cordorouy, strike up some toe-tapping piano ditties, throw in a gavel, a tunnel, some slideshows and a couple stage lights and I get down right emotional! A knot builds in my stomach, I tear up at the slightest hint of patriotism or goodwill, and I just want to hug or shake hands with everyone around me. Call me crazy, but I just keep coming back for more! For the seventh time in my life, I’m happily spending he week at the Kentucky FFA State Convention!
High school FFA gave me plenty of great memories, but there are NONE better than those made during the 2nd week of June each summer! I’ll never forget my first convention – it was my first “unchaperoned” (my male advisors were obviously in separate rooms!) trip away from home, where I got to compete in a speaking contest, make tons of new friends from other Kentucky chapters, accept recognition for doing well in my competitions, drive my advisors bonkers trying to keep us all reigned in and flat out have a great time! Besides being loads of fun, that first convention was pretty special in that it introduced me to these people known as “State Officers.” They’re typically college kids, elected to serve one-year terms spent travelling Kentucky, advocating for agriculture and leadership development, and serving as positive images for the State FFA Association. I’d never seen such professionalism in all my life! I remember watching “Vespers,” (a spiritual, reflective program given by each year’s State Officer team) and being absolutely awed by these young men and women, not much older than myself, who could speak with such poise and conviction about their obvious LOVE for Kentucky FFA and it’s members. I was hooked; I wanted whatever they had! To top it off, God had a pretty enormous seed to plant in my life during the final session that year.
(See “Here Am I… Send Me” – God Thing #1). “1.) An FFA speech I heard in high school, which assured me that the outcome of my life – my successes, failures, impacts – were defined by my willingness to “get up and go!”” If you want details, ask me sometime. Bottom line, I’ve never forgotten that speech. I’ve never forgotten that convention. I’ve never forgotten that feeling!
A few year’s later, I got to live one my life’s dreams thru serving at Kentucky FFA State Reporter. And while that year was indeed filled with unrelenting professionalism, countless hours on the road, constantly practicing and delivering speeches, developing workshops and doing all that I could to positively “give back” to Kentucky FFA, I was far more blessed by the year than I could have ever made up for.
This is my State Officer team (LtoR: Buddy, TJ, Megan, Quint, Ashlee, Shelby, Keitha (holding Anna Grace – our State Officer "Baby Sister," Leslie, Sarah, Derek and Ethan.) For a year, we traveled together, worked together, laughed, cried, fought, grieved, comforted, celebrated and practically lived together. God used each and everyone of them to teach me lessons about myself and to show me so much about who and how I want to be in life. From Quint, the leader, Sarah, the brain, Megan, the “Mom,” Derek, the softhearted “grandpa,” T.J., the comedian, Shelby, the realist, Keitha, the inadvertently funny, Buddy, the politician, Leslie, the socialite, and Ethan, the free-spirit, I’ve gained a sense of belonging and family that just can’t be matched until you know someone so well and care about someone so much! (I’ll let them fill in the description concerning my role on our team.) To this day, I consider them my siblings and I would count on any one of them if I were ever in need. This time of year, I always miss them, but this year my trip down memory lane did more than make me smile (and tear up.) It made me think…
Who’s my next team? What will our dynamics be? Who will I stay up late chatting with? Who will I learn to be quiet around each morning? When will our sense of “family” just “click?” I’m so excited to know and love this new group that God has already perfectly crafted. Wherever we go, whatever we do… they’ll be my people.
No real inspiration this time, just a reminder to recognize "the people" in your life.
Be Blessed,
Ashlee
