So this may be a bit much to put in a blog but it needs to be done.  After school let out in May I was very burnt out.  I volunteered for the Transgender and LGBT causes for more than 1100 hours last school year.  Project DATE was approved by the University and will be hopefully up and running in the fall.  I am really proud for that but on the other hand I have been very sour this summer.  I realized that my life had become about the cause and too much involved in politics.  The real reason I had become involved in the first place was because of the people but in the chaos that became my life last semester, I lost sight of that.  I was very hurt by some organizations that didn’t seem to care about anything but money and neglected our community.  I became consumed by the anger I felt towards them.  On May 17th 2008 I left and went to Alaska for 6 weeks.  I was a Tour Director for Holland America Cruise Lines and did the On Land adventures through Alaska and the Yukon Canada.  I had an amazing time and met some of the most amazing people I have ever met in my life.  I met one man in particular whose name was Leslie.  He is 81 years old and was a prisoner in Auschwitz Concentration Camp during WWII.  His entire family was killed and he is the only survivor.  Later in life he married a German woman whose Father was put to death for war crimes he had committed during the Nuremberg Trials.  Leslie then informed me over our long talks during our 11 days together that he traveled the world to tell his story to high school kids and to teach them to not hate one another and that life is too short to hate.  I met Leslie because he couldn’t fill out his paperwork because he was illiterate and couldn’t read or write.  Leslie had never gone to school but he happens to be the most educated man I have ever met.  His wife died last year and in all the years he had been married to her he had never told her he loved her.  He told her for the first time on her death bed that he loved her and that he would travel the world and see all its beauty through her eyes.  He had received the trip to Alaska because he had cruised 100 days around the world with them in loving memory of his wife.  I cried as I heard this story and he told me “Chris, Let fools run.  Those who wrong you will only harm themselves in the end.  Don’t let anger and frustration with the people who wrong you control your life.”  I came back a different person after my 6 weeks in Alaska.  I still am trying to let go of the pain from last year but I believe that this time back is good to get prepared to get back on the horse because folks, it’s the people who matter….not so much the cause.  There will always be a cause but the people who matter in your life will never forget the time you spent caring.