Learning to be the Light

According to my Mom, I haven't been putting enough detail into my posts (even though I've only had one thus far).  So, this is for you mom.  Sorry to everyone else that you have to read the boring parts along with the, well more exciting parts.  You could probably just skip to the last paragraph and still get enough to know how I'm doing!

Time is already starting to blend together here so I will do my best to bring ya'll up to speed.  My main job for the first few weeks consisted of setting tables, serving food, cleaning up, more cleaning, setting tables, serving food...you get the picture.  Oh, and sometimes it gets exciting and we got to do extra cleaning!  So my title is server, and while summer staff was here I was learning the duties of crew chief while being a server.  Our free time is in the afternoons and after we are done with dinner clean up/re-setting for breakfast.  At night, we have a Rec center that most people go to and hang out.  There are bowling lanes, a rock wall, a gym, racquetball, work out equipment and lots of fun!  It is also one of two places on camp that you can get internet, so most of the staff go there to use that also.

One day, a while ago (I couldn't tell you when), I was driving a few people to one of the full time staff's house for a cookout.  Needless to say, we got lost.  Not only did we get lost, but in the process of being lost, I got a flat tire.  Fortunately we were just stopping to ask a couple out for a stroll which way we should be headed.  The nice man told us that we were not just lost but also had a flat tire.  So, the awesome guy who was in our car helped jack the car up and then 2 more guys came to help.  This nice man we ran into also happened to have taught automotive classes for 20+ years and had an air compressor and tire plugs in his garage.  So one of my guy friends who came to the rescue and I were able to bring the tire to his garage and get it fixed.  Talk about God's perfect timing and placement of those friendly Colorado neighbors!

The next day, I was able to go to one of our maintenance guy's house in Westcliffe, or as we call it "in town" to get help changing my oil.  It was really fun to get to know him and his wife over ice cream and also to officially learn how to change oil in my newly acquired Pontiac Aztek (Thanks Aunt Linda and Uncle Brian!!)

I recently drove to Denver and was able to stay with some friends before flying back to Sioux Falls for a wedding.  It was a great weekend back home but went way too fast.  On my way home, the fixed flat tire, was going flat again.  So, I ended up driving through the heart of Denver to find a tire place to patch my leak.  I found one and it was a really cheap fix, except that it took over an hour!  But, besides that it was a smooth ride back to camp.

Then, I was invited to drive back up north of Denver to go hike a 14er.  In hiking terms that means a mountain that is higher than 14,000 feet elevation.  I knew it would be tough but I decided to give it a try.  So after just getting back from Denver and working on Tuesday, we took off for Loveland, CO about 5pm and got there around 9:30pm Tuesday night.  We packed lunches, slept/napped for a couple hours and headed to Long's Peak at 1am.  We started our hike at 2:30am with headlamps and flashlights in check.  About 5:30am we made it to the boulder field where we had to walk over a bunch of boulders.  Then we started climbing towards what's called the Keyhole.  At this point, I was ready to quit.  I thought we were close, but then we weren't close at all.  It took a little bit of convincing, okay a lot of convincing from the other girls to keep me going.  But I made it through the Keyhole to the back side of the peak.  We had to "scramble" along the backside for quite a ways before reaching the "Narrows" and then finally the home stretch.  I decided that the home stretch was quite the view and I wasn't up to climbing straight up the side of a mountain at that point.  I was exhausted and the altitude wasn't settling very nice with me either.  So I just enjoyed the view from there until the rest of the group peaked and came back down.  We made it to the Home stretch at about 9am and most of the group peaked at 10am.  I was surprised at how many people checked on me as they passed by on their way to the peak.  It was cool to see how considerate everyone was and fun to encourage them that they were almost there.  We began out trek back down the mountain and finally made it back about 3pm.  Wow was that a long day!  My knees, hips and feet were screaming by the end of all that.  But the next day we went shopping and that took care of everything--just kidding!  But we did go shopping and it was good to walk off the pain haha.  I can't decide if the hike was fun or not, but it was worth it.  I prayed many times along the way and was just really reminded of how HUGE, majestic and sovereign the Lord is.  He is everywhere, created everything and all things work together for His good. You can't stand on top of (or almost on top of) a mountain and not wonder how it got there.

Today was my first day as crew chief.  It is not much different from serving, except that I'm supposed to know what's going on and what needs to be done, when to do it, etc.  So it's more responsibility than a server, but essentially the same tasks.  I thought my rookie night went a-okay!  It was fun working with a smaller group and knowing that we had to work extra hard to get everything done in time.  I also had a quick lesson on driving stick pickups because I am now in charge of trash duty at night.  I can't say I did the best at it, but I will learn!  So for now, I have assistants who are better at driving stick than me helping me out.  This weekend we have a military group in and then we have another group coming on Sunday night.  Therefore, it's going to be a crazy week and a half-ish cleaning from the weekend camp and prepping for the week long camp.  Even though it will be crazy for a while I am really excited to see what the Lord has in store for our staff and the groups that come through camp this year.

If I could describe my first 3 weeks here at Horn Creek in one word, it would be learning.  I have learned so much about the camp, myself, Jesus, others and life in general.  I know that I need to put in the effort to learn and grow how i want to, and no matter what I think is going to happen, I also know that God has His own plans and they will prevail.  So whatever that may bring, I am excited I have the next year to find out who I am and how I can use that to follow Jesus with all that I am.  I guess you could say I'm just learning to be the Light.