Day 31 of laundry, driving, and delays.

Today was a strange day, we started the morning with once again pulling up our roots and leaving the place we have called home for the last week. We loaded up our tiny trailer and hitched up chad-moe. (our semi-faithful van) From here we went to the laundromat and got a little caught up on laundry, during this time we also tried to be somewhat preventative about mechanical issues and were as proactive as we could be about adding the fluids necessary to poor ol' chad-moe. A few of the staff also did a brief shopping trip while things were in the dryers.

Once all of the above were completed we once again loaded up and rolled out to a house someplace in casper (I still don't have a good mental picture of where we were any more than that) where two supporters of camp had prepared lunch for the whole staff. It was a delicious lunch and it was very good to see both of them again.

After lunch, we started the trek out of town and higher up the mountains to saratoga wyoming. It was somewhat eventful as our poor van has issues with oveorheating when he's asked to pull us and a trailer full of things up large hills without a little bit of downhill to cool off. Turns out that's a fair bit of the route through here. So every hour and a bit (or so it seemed) we took a few minutes to let the van cool off and happily accepted the opportunity to stretch our legs. Eventually we reached our destination and set up camp in our new home. (an empty trailer home, now packed to the gills with us and our stuff).

As we were driving out here I was reminded of a road trip I took several years ago, from spearfish SD to Pasadena CA. Being crazy and not really minding where I ended up I just plugged pasadena into google maps, printed a thing off and started driving. Well part of that route is the same highways that we drove today. The even cooler part is that back when I was driving this route before, God had really been reminding me that He is faithful, He is powerful, and even though I often feel like i'm not worth much... He cares about me and is willing and able to take care of me.

One of the ways in which I was reminded of the power of God was a section of road where you can see the mountains rising around you on either side of the road but you're in a valley, the last time I was here The mountains were getting rained on and a thunderstorm was raging on top. But as I was driving I was in sunlight and dry. It was slightly less visually impressive (still fairly impressive though) but no less spiritually meaningful when this time the valley was shrouded in shadow but the peaks of the mountains were still in the sunlight. Even without the quick visual it would have been pretty cool to re-walk an old pilgrimage in my mind; combined with the new visual it was incredibly encouraging.

Prayer requests:

-That my cold (or whatever it is) continues to subside and that I'm back to 100% by monday

-That the few missing staff members would have safe travels and be re-united with us soon

-That we all can rest fully and in every way this weekend. That we'd be renewed and ready to minister to campers this coming week.

-That as we hit the halfway mark this weekend and patience begins to wear thin, that we'd be gracious and flexible to smooth what we have to do. (and that it would begin with me)

This week is high school camp, we've got a few days of non-typical schedule until then... but then we go to table in the wilderness, and after that week it's on to denver for a week. And after that we head back to rimrock for the tail end of the summer.

Nick

p.s. Internet availability might be a bit scarce this week but rest assured that I will continue to write posts even if they aren't uploaded in a timely manner.

Day 30. The end of lil kid camp,

As mentioned above, today was the end of primary camp. After 4 fairly busy days of having a horde of little kiddos, we were all a bit glad to see them go home and not have to worry about being up at 6:30 to do it all over again. On the flip side we were also fairly sad to see the little guys go home... even after a few days you do get a bit of an attachment and they are just so darn cute sometimes.

Today we did our regular routines of a minimal chapel service, some large group games, and whatnot we ate lunch (hot dogs!) and headed up to casper mountain for a short hike up to the waterfall. After the hike we headed further up the mountain and spent the remainder of the day frolicking at a picnic area and tie-dyed pillowcases with each of the campers. (brilliant idea as kids will outgrow a t-shirt waaay too fast).

The end of a camp is always exhausting and today was no exception, after about 5:30 we all seemed to hit a wall and started dragging fairly hard. Despite this it was a great day and because of the early end we got to spend a few hours chatting, telling stories, and generally getting to know the other staff members a bit better.

I know this is a bit of a token post... but such is life eh?

-Nick

Day 29. Lake day!

Today was little kid lake day. We went to a nearby state park (at least I think that's what it was) and enjoyed a day filled with swimming, splashing, and tiny fish catching. It was really fun to see the similarities to a 'normal' lake day while at the same time being blown away by how different it really can be when you're a wee child and the lake is still the coolest thing ever.

I can tell you one thing, the post-lake day fatigue feels very similar to the other weeks of camp. I had less of worrying about getting boats into the water and making sure they're running, and more of "I'm a large tugboat, why don't you grab on and get pulled along for a while". This game was fun, but was even more fun was when a group of campers (and one staff member) decided that they were going to chant "fish are friends, not food", to which we replied "fish are food, and they taste great!" The war raged on and ended in an impasse. (although the staffer told me afterwards that yeahhhh... fish are basically delicious)

Also as I'm sure you are aware, today is wednesday and the calendar week is over half done. Normally this also means we're just hitting our stride for the week of camp but with this group we've got one more day. We did 3 full days and after they head home tomorrow we're done, As is also typical this means we're exhausted and spiritual warfare and fallen human nature are flaring up left and right. We've had several situations that have been dealt with but that are directly related to the fact that a fallen world by its very nature will rebel against the presence of kingdom things happening. Factor in human fatigue and random entropy and the middle of the week can get a bit rough... So we'd appreciate your prayers for energy, grace, and a renewed awareness of the real situation and the priorities we MUST have in light of that.

Nick
p.s. apparently if I do this for a few more days it might have become a habit.
p.p.s. I'm starting to get a cold so I'd appreciate your prayers on that front too

Day 28. Of waterfights and shoulder rides.

Primary camp rolls ever onward. Most of the ravening horde returned again for another day filled with crazy energy and wonderment. Kids are incredible entertaining because they have yet to develop a filter, so when they're mad they will occasionally lecture their counselors (especially if that counselor 'won' the waterfight but dumping a bucket of water on said camper) complete with one fist on their hip and one finger wagging in the air. Or they're not able to hide the crushed feelings of being told "one minute and I'll give you another shoulder ride, I'm a bit sore at the moment". On the flip side, kids are a blast when you get a pack of em together and with water balloons in hand hunt down a group leader that is suspiciously dry. Or the joy that lights up their face when they're told "ok, I'm ready now... hop on!". I love kids, and despite the fact that they wear me out they're a blast to be around.

Hmm... lessee I'll hit the timeline afore I go off on the rant I've already chosen for today annd... because it's new I'll do a tick-tock sorta format and see how it goes. all times are approximate and all facts are colored by my perception, they could be fairly innaccurate at times...but hopefully it'll be fun and exciting anyway.

6:15- alarm went off.
6:15.00001- snooze button was hit.
6:30-breakfast began
6:32-finally turned alarm off and rolled out of bed.
6:55-ate breakfast
7:00-breakfast stopped being served
7:15-scheduled bus departure time
7:25ish-actual departure time
8:00-arrive at the link. told I'm helping with food today, made mental shift to 'cook' instead of gopher.
8:10-began prep for lunch
8:25-finished lunch prep
8:30-first campers arrive
9:00-scheduled camper arrival time
9:30-depart the link with campers and begin walk to the parade route (casper had a parade today)
10:00-began singing campfire songs to keep kids occupied while waiting for parade to start.
10:15-parade begins.
11:00-lunch types walk back to the link to make sure we're ready to go at 11:30
11:15-arrive at link. discover door is locked and we were not given a key...
11:25-arrive back at parade route and get key for the link
11:35-arrive back at the link and begin lunch prep. (to be ready to go at 11:30)
11:45-campers arrive and lunch is served
12:30-depart the link for the park
1:00-arrive at park
1:02-depart park with adam to go fill water balloons.
1:04-arrive at location to fill water balloons
1:04.002-get phone call summoning adam back to the park
1:07-return adam to park, fetch morgan
1:09-return to water balloons, begin assembly line.
1:21-adam walks up and joins assembly line
1:45-balloons loaded and we return to the park.
1:46-overcome by temptation, water balloons tested on select members of staff.
2:30-group stations (playground, parachute, sponge relay, etc)
3:00-strategic water balloon ammo dumps placed around park.
3:01-unprovoked staff attack on campers
3:01.000000000001-campers find ammo stashes and delightful chaos results.
3:15-all water balloons expended, all water dumped on people, and remaining drinking water was declared de-weaponized.
3:20-reward was offered to camper with the most trash picked up
3:21-park was cleaner than when we arrived.
3:30-bus arrived and campers were loaded
4:00-arrive back at the link
4:15-campfire songs in the gym
4:45-free time and games, parents begin to arrive.
5:30-last camper departs, final cleanup begins, unbaked pizza arrives at the link
5:31-cleanup is finished and staff is ready to depart and eat pizza
6:00-return to home base at highland park church unbaked pizza in hand.
5:59-pizza put in oven
6:30-pizza consumed quickly, efficiently and somewhat brutally
7:30-meetings and such
8:30-more meetings
9:00 released for quiet time, this post began
9:36 current time.

So there you have it. A non-comprehensive idea of the day.

and now onto the serious ish things. One of the other advantages that we have as a team this week is that we've been blessed by a group of younger men and women to be counselors in training. These 7 folks are given a great deal of responsibility and are paired up with an older mentor (yeah I know I might have mentioned that part before but this is my blog so shush you). They've been doing a good job at times, and a poor job at times but if I had to graph it I'd say it's an upward sloping graph for sure.

Now, the thing that I've been thinking about and that has been on my mind lately is this... I've said many times that God gives us the team that we need every summer. There is never any 'dead weight' present and there is always something to learn from each and every person that we get to work alongside. This has also been proven true this summer and this week. That having been said it also amazes me how ungracious and downright cranky I can be with people sometimes. I have a hard time keeping my mouth shut when I'm at camp (a problem that is often reversed elsewhere) and allowing God to grow people at His pace and not my own and I'll try to quickly and artificially force solutions where a slow strength is being developed by God instead. I need to remind myself of where I was at that age and when I compare that to where I see these young men and women... I'm impressed by them. They're in good shape and I'm glad that they're here.

annnd... now i'm being summoned to eat cake... so gubye!

-Nick

Day 27. In which there be a great horde of wee tykes! And several driving tours of casper.

Today began far too early... although in some days it began when my fellow staffers snoring awakened me. However if you don't count that the day still began frightfully early. I rolled/fell out of bed at approximately 6:29. You might wonder why I awoke at such a weird time and I'd love to set that sort of issue to rest. I awoke at that time because breakfast was being served at 6:30. After breakfast we rolled on out to the site where camp is based out of (it's an old boys and girls club, the facility is pretty cool). And that's about the end of what I saw of a camp morning.

As we were driving over to the link (that's the name of the site), we got a call from our weekly director who had gotten a flat tire on the way to the same place. So my to-do list involved getting the spare tire on her car (easier said than done when the car in question has funky custom lug-nuts) fetching prescriptions for the sick staffer mentioned in yesterdays post, grabbing the few missing groceries for lunch and so on and so forth. It was a good morning but I didn't even meet the kids until after lunch. Luckily most of them still had their name tags on and I was easily able to identify em.

The afternoon consisted of a trip out to a farm where the kids got to see horses, pet cows, a peacock, a few cats and dogs and whatnot. They were pretty excited about that part and the staff was pretty excited that we played a fun game of red rover without anyone getting hurt.

After a few exhausting and wonderfully chaotic hours we adjourned back to the link and had our version of campfire. (more of a song circle really) After that we cleaned up and the parents started arriving to take the little types home.

All in all it was a pretty fun day... I got a few opportunities to hang out with some incredible kids, to make a few friends with the kids who seemed inclined to stay near the fringe of a group (an inclination I remember quite well back when I was young) and I am wonderfully exhausted.

hmm... I suppose this is where I put my rant for the day. Lessee ... oh yeah! when I started writing this it was using the rest of a section of time set aside for a quiet time, I did get into the word for a brief moment but I've never really been able to do the whole "10 minutes every day" thing. I get into the word most days and spend some time in prayer but that might be 2 minutes, and it has been as long as a few hours before, but whenever I try to dictate how long I will work on anything of that nature it is a struggle to get anything beneficial out of it. I heard a good sermon about it once that basically said that we shouldn't focus on the quantity of that sort of thing, but instead focus on having quality time with God. Mandating that we spend precise intervals can easily result in legalism but allowing God to work often causes a great deal of freedom and joy for the Lord to work.

And that's all I've got to say for now...

-Nick

Day 26. Of mega churches and training days, of friends and frisbee

Today was a good day, we woke up and broke camp before church and then attended the same church which we'll call home for the next few week or so. It is always an interesting experience attending this church because it is very different than what I'm used to and I don't particularly resonate with the format that they use for their worship. Don't get me wrong they are very passionate about their ministry, but I've really fallen in love with my tiny church and I don't really like the feeling that if I wasn't there no one would notice.

That having been said I also was blown away by the sermon this morning. I appreciated it immensely the openness with which it was delivered and the pastor was incredibly vulnerable with the struggles that he has come through personally and professionally.

After church we went to the mall for food court fun times, and to get a wee dose o' starbucks before training began. I had taco johns... it made me miss tuesdays at home.

We came back 'home' and set up camp (although to be fair I have been blowing up my air mattress in between paragraphs) and did our typical meetings and learning the ins and outs of this week of camp. It was quite enjoyable (or as much as those things can be).

The solid highlight of the day was the semi-impromptu games of frisbee that we played all the way until our frisbee was broken in a moment of frustration (not by me but it easily could have been). It was good times and even though I'm still wiped out it is a great tired and I'm quite happy that we were able to have that time to frolic.


Since I havn't asked for specific prayer requests in a while here are a few.

-One of our guys was recently diagnosed with strep. Pray for his health and that it ends with him, instead of him just being patient zero.
-Pray for our team of directors this week, they're doing a great job but it's a special sort of stressful to run a camp like this for a week.
-Pray for me, It has been a great season so far but especially at the midpoint like this I need to remind myself to keep my head in the game, pray that I can do that without distractions or efforts that might be counter-productive to the call we've been given.
-Pray for a spirit of peace and restfulness. We're getting as much sleep as we can, and working as smartly as we can... but we're running on borrowed steam at this point. Pray that we can keep our engines roaring to keep up with the wee kiddos this week.

Day 25. Of horse corrals and swimming pools.

Day 25 began in the same way most do... however this time we were awake and there to witness it. This was a fun exercise and also a bit of a reminder that most ranchers work a great deal harder than I do (at least on average). We woke up and grabbed some breakfast, and by 5am ish half of us were headed up the mountain to start working.

We arrived up top about 30-45 minutes later and got rolling on a row of fenceposts. These were not ordinary fenceposts though, when Ben builds a corral he does it right, so the posts we were sinking were old railroad ties. Incredibly heavy buggers that are also soaked in a fair bit of creosote tar so they don't rot. Over the course of the day we managed to get 3 sides of a big pen done, and what stopped us was the auger on the skid-steer broke. It was near the time we were out of energy anyway but 5 of us finished the last side by hand while most of the crew headed back down the hill.

Eventually the truck made its way back up to pick us up and get some of the tools, and by this time we'd long since discovered that the soda cooler had been left behind and reduced it to merely an ice cooler. We also were all tired enough that somewhat insane hilarity ensued. The restorative power of laughter is great stuff.

hmm... after returning to the base of the mountain we discovered camp had been packed up and we were ready to roll across town to our next temporary home.

We made our magical journey and arrived, set up camp, and fairly promptly began to swim. yaay swimming! It was quite refreshing but did quickly devolve into a tiny rendition of lake day where your sucess hinged on how often you got dunked.

We ate dunner and then sleep happened. I felt somewhat inclined to write these posts last night but was tired enough that it may have been dangerous (albeit possibly entertaining).

Today we attend church at the same facility we'll be living all week and we get the rest of the team for primary camp!

hmm... rant.... Despite the busy days we had and despite the incredible fatigue that comes from a full day of work I think I've rested and recovered in the last few days more than I have poured out. The laughter and conversations I've had with old friends and new, the wonderful support that comes from a team that just gets the job done and has fun doing it... and the blessings that God has bestowed upon us greatly outpace the aches and pains, the sleep that I wish I had more of and the pain of the scrapes on my arm. (don't worry mum and martha they're taking good care of me). I am so excited that we're only halfway done. There is so much to look forward to!

-Nick
p.s. I think zach wants to take down my tent so I'll finish here.

Day 24. The one on which I didn't have internet or energy.

Day 24. (the one where I didn't keep good notes, so i'll just try to remember as best I can)

Today was a day of travel, after the arrival of all of the remaining summer staff last night we slept at a handful of houses in torington and when morning rolled around we ate breakfast, and packed the trailer. While most were left to help pack or make sure their stuff got packed, I was dispatched to camp to feed horses for the last time for a few weeks. It is not a very well kept secret that although I do enjoy horses a great deal I don't always appreciate the fact that it is near impossible to toss hay to horses without getting little pieces of it ALL over you. Feeding went well and myself, jenni (the highest ranking member of our expedition) and hunter quickly completed our to-do lists and headed back to town.

Once we got back in town it was a simple process to throw our stuff into the trailer and then everyone piled into the van and we hit the road. Our van's name right now is chadmoe. At some point in the past he had been named moe and that's a good name for him... however when he's a bad van and tries very hard to overheat we prefer to call him chad because that's an easier name to be angry with. (there was some debate as to why but it was generally agreed upon without any great discussion otherwise) While rolling down the road a few of us had a discussion about books that we like and our favorite authors, when we were doneish the remainder of the van had fallen asleep. I think we might have been boring them or some such... meh.

Anyway, last few highlights and then I'll move on to some sort of rant.

-We had low air in a tire, normally this means stopping at a service station and filling it up. Instead it required stopping at a service station, zach fixing the service station air compressor, and thennn filling up the tire.

-We had lunch at a little picnic shelter called "the castle" it's an old CCC project and if I should ever come into a LARGE sum of money I think I want one attached to the back of my house.

-near the end of our drive we had a little exercise where you say something nice about whomever's turn it is. I was surprised at how much people had to say about each other and think the general response was "yep, it was all true. but they lied when they were talking about me". nevertheless it was an entertaining time and we'll have to return the favor to our directors (who conveniently excused themselves with the excuse of "we're heeeere")

We arrived in casper and set up site at the eagle ridge ranch where we would spend a large portion of the next day (and arguably the night in between) working on putting in a ton of fenceposts for a corral. It was nice to see the entire scott family again (I was a ranch-hand there for 3 weeks last summer) and I was reminded of many good memories I had packed into such a short time last year.

At this point we went to sleep. Or rather I did... or tried to. 4am was coming far too swiftly for my taste.

-Nick
p.s. I'll do my 'rant' in the day 25 post probably.