Stickers, Stickers, and More Stickers - SOL20 Day 30

The other day, a friend posted a picture on Instagram of her laptop. It was completely covered in stickers. Her caption was...
"I've always been fascinated by what you can learn about a person by simply looking at their laptop. If the front is blank, you won't learn much, but if they have a minor sticker obsession like I do, quite a bit of their story is displayed right in front of you."
I immediately texted her these pictures of my laptop:

What I love about my collection is that each sticker tells a story. Each sticker represents a memory, a theme, a philosophy, a love, a passion, or a dream. I won't go into the story behind each one, but I wanted to take some time on this eve of the last day of Slice of Life to share just a little bit more about who I am.

The sticker in the very center (which will soon be replaced by the moon from "A Journey to the Moon" by George Melies), reminded me of the photo above. I took this picture when on a road trip in Ireland. I spent the summer of 2017 living in a hostel in Scotland, then with a host family in Ireland. A friend and I were doing missions work, and we worked for a couple of different churches. We found ourselves with one week "off", so we took a road trip to the Cliffs of Moher, Galway, and Kylemore Abbey.

The sticker in the bottom left corner is from the comic above. It's a reminder to myself that growth is a continuous process. It reminds me of one of my favorite poems, "The Station" by Robert Hastings.

"However, sooner or later me must realize there is no one station, no one place to arrive at once and for all. The true joy of like is the trip. The station is only a dream. It constantly outdistances us."

The sticker that is on the inside of my laptop, near my keyboard, was the scripture that I put on my graduation cap. My graduation was not what I expected it to be. I've alluded to this in earlier Slices, but the last semester of my senior year was not a smooth one. In April, I ended up dropping from my program and switching majors. It was not a decision that I wanted to make, but I was backed into a corner. Though I walked in the May ceremony, I did not officially graduate until August. It was a really hard time for me, but my faith was what kept me going. The sticker on my laptop is a reminder that I did not, nor will I, fall.