http://www.anotherloveroftheblade.blogspot.com/2012/07/camp-part-i-2008.html - Part I
http://www.anotherloveroftheblade.blogspot.com/2012/08/camp-part-ii-2009.html - Part II
http://www.anotherloveroftheblade.blogspot.com/2012/08/camp-part-iii-2010.html - Part III
In July 2010, I began doing some extra writing for a website, besides the stuff for the paper.
It was kinda like this: My dad was reading the news one morning, and he spotted an ad from the sports website, saying that they were interested in finding students to help with stories and pictures, video and stuff, as part of a new program they were trying out.
They had a statewide coverage area, and with that much territory to cover, they couldn't be everywhere at once. So, they were looking for volunteers to help them out. Students, specifically, both to get them involved in news production and also as sort of a training/evaluation program for the company, to hopefully grow future employees.
Anyway, I called the guy, asking for more info, and that's how I became part of the Student Mojo(Mobile Journalist) program of OKBlitz.com.
It was incredibly helpful, all the criticism I received from the staff, found lots of ways to improve my writing skills, and tell the story better, in a clearer way. I was the most consistent contributor of the two dozen or so in the program, sent them about two stories a week, on average. About forty or forty-five were published on the site, and I even had a few be linked up to the site's Facebook and Twitter pages, getting even more pageviews than it already was.
Of course, I was still the main sportswriter for the Free Lance, those went together nicely, I survived football season and then made it through basketball, too, without too many people getting mad at me.
In January, Dad's work, the local electric cooperative, was holding its annual essay contest for HS juniors, and he thought I should enter. One small problem: I'd never written an essay in my life, really; and I knew next to nothing about energy effieciency. Let me tell ya, that was a HARD task! Went through about five drafts in three days, actually. Then I forgot about it, that I even entered, until one day in March Dad said that I was picked as one of the six winners from East Central.
My prize? An all-expenses-paid trip to....WASHINGTON, D.C.!!!!! With about eighty total strangers. I kinda had mixed emotions about it. It was neat, and a huge honor, that among all the thousands of kids who entered the contest, I was in the group that won, one of the best writers in the state, but seriously, I would be, like, 2000 miles away from home. And in a (very big) city. It would be kinda neat to be able to see all that history and stuff up close, though....
In April, we packed up for a ride to Columbia, Missouri, for only the second family vacation I can remember us all going on. Dad had some training deal for work that he needed to complete, and so he figured we may as well just all come with him.
We saw a lot of incredibly pretty scenery(but then, we were in my favorite state in the country, so...), went to some neat parks, toured Fantastic Caverns, and explored a lot of downtown Columbia on foot, including the campus of the University of Missouri. And we took a LOT of pictures. It was an interesting time, but we realized why we don't do that sort of thing more often: It's stressful and tiring. And Dad got horribly sick with an infection on the way back home.
During that week, those of us going on the Youth Tour trip started talking on Facebook, the lady in charge(Jennifer, soon to be known to all as Spike Mama), started a group, and we began learning about each other, sharing what we were hoping to see. (I was looking forward to the Smithsonians, the Newseum, and the Lincoln Memorial, particularly. Best response ever to that question, from a girl out in the Panhandle: "I get to meet actual living breathing PEOPLE!!!" We also answered the important questions of: 1) Where you from(town and co-op)? 2) Where you think you might go for college? 3) What you gonna study? 4) Sooners or Cowboys?
I also began the Random Status of the Week Awards in April, because there were a handful of people who's posts were so outlandish, so crazy, or so interesting that I felt they just had to receive some type of recognition. So one Monday I just began giving out my own, starting with this status: "I hate shoes." With some over-the-top hype(I felt incredibly stupid marketing the honor so hard, but I knew if this was going to be successful, people had to want to earn it. And ya know what? It worked! About every two weeks or so somebody says "I want to win that award of yours some day!") About a year and a half of almost uninterrupted ceremonies, and I've collected about eighty or eighty-five classics. Hoping to compile them up into a coffee table or magazine rack type of book someday.
By March or so, thoughts were starting to turn to camp, and planning talent share ideas. As a youth group, we toyed with the idea of doing something all together, but that was scrapped pretty quickly. However, me and Sam started in on working on a song together. First step: Figure out which of the half-dozen we were considering to use. Second step: Learn to play it. Third step: Practice together to get the timing down right. Fourth step: Figure out how to split the lyrics.
Much to our entire state's thrilled shock and surprise, the Oklahoma City Thunder not only made it to the NBA playoffs, but then advanced all the way to the Western Conference finals before falling in six games. However, it was still a huge accomplishment, especially since it was such a quick turnaround from atrocious to awesome. And smoking the Lakers in the first round didn't hurt, either.
We got to D.C, slightly nervous and scared, but excited. Our parents? Well, they were just nervous. It was an amazing trip, and it will definitely earn a post of it's own. The Smithsonians were awesome, the Newseum spectacular, the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials amazing. Arlington Cemetery...never been anywhere like that. I stood on the grounds of Mount Vernon. I visited Ford's Theater. I met a ton of great people, like Agatha, Alicia, Aubrey, Bailey G, Bailey R, Brandi, Caleb B, Chance, Charlie R, Chrystal, Katie, Lorene, Maty, Morgan B, Ravi, Ryan, Tauri, Tre, Trent, and many, many others. And all the awesome counselors, too: among them, Andrea and Woogie, Ron, Jim and Amber, and Spike Mama and Ben.
That was an amazing time. Unfortunately, it had to end. A lot of us have still kept in contact, though; we attend the same colleges, and talk and visit each other often. two days after we got home, I found out the website was closing down. I went into panicky retriever mode, and managed to save copies of about forty of my stories that were published. It hurt, though.
And then two weeks later, just before we left, our dog Sport died. We'd had him since I was six years old, he was a member of the family, more so than any of the other animals we'd had. The backyard still seems so empty without him there...an Australian Shepherd-sized hole in everything.
So it was with a heavy(and worried) heart that I departed for Conway from the church Monday morning. I also had a phone interview with the editor of a magazine to get done(it didn't work out, which was probably better. More of this story can be found in the March post "Thoughts on Writing".http://www.anotherloveroftheblade.blogspot.com/2012/03/thoughts-on-writing.html And I discovered that mocha Rockstar is terrible for your nerves. I can handle caffeine well, and I was literally shaking. Of course, some of that was anxiety, some was excitement, some was sadness and grief, some was worry, but then I found out later than even without those things, it was still too much.
It seems like every year there's some crisis to one of our camp family members...in 2009, besides rebuilding after the fire and everything, Miss Kathy's husband died, and her entire family was extremely impacted by that. We were praying hard for the Butlers. In 2010, it was Tim and his tumor. We prayed hard for him and his family. In 2011, the owner of the campground passed away, so things were a little uncertain again. Would we have camp held this year? Would this be the final year? And the even worse crisis this year: Jed's health. It started out as chest pain after working out, but it just wouldn't go away. And it kept getting worse. So he went to doctor after doctor, had test after test, and basically, they weren't sure what was wrong. Just before camp, he was medically cleared to attend, as long as he stayed out of strenuous exertion. We all breathed a sigh of relief.
The guys coming were me, Caleb W, Dylan, and Josh, and Bennett, who would be a rookie. Son of Steven, our youth pastor, he was in seventh grade, and we tried hard to include him, knowing how hard it was to be an alien in the group, not even anywhere close to the fringe. The girls(much more talkative than we were on the way up, like always) were Corinne, Justine, Marie, Sam and Suzanna, and new kids Courtney(my little sister) and one of her best friends, (Dylan's little sister) Paige. The three rookies had heard every story in the book from all of us, starting with Josh and I's misadventure to start camp life off, and then to the traditions(The Gum Tree, candy stampedes, cabbage ball, etc) and quick autobiographical sketches of most everyone who was going to be there, and a handful of sketches of people who weren't able to make it. Courtney had a camp story to tell even before the trip started....
You see, the theme this year was Mythical Character, and that's just a leetle hard to think up anything to do. So Sam(our go-to authority when imagination and/or creativity are needed) thought up the idea that we should just all buy a bunch of plain gray T-shirts and then spray-paint them with "GBC Youth 2011" on the front. We had the spray-painting get-together the Friday before, and let them dry until Sunday morning, where we picked them up during church.
It was really fun. And there was music, which was good, and then a game of touch football. two-touch, about five-on-five or so, in the back yard between the main building and the youth building. I was the pass rusher(Odd, how I always end up in that position in these pickup games, since I'm 5'4' and barely a hundred pounds. But, anyway, somehow I can slip past linemen into the quarterback's face and force hurried throws.) So the ball is snapped on some ordinary play, I go charging like a rhino for Josh, who's looking for an open receiver. Sam tries to block me, I dodge off to the side, escaping her. Courtney, who's at tight end on this play, comes over to help Sam. My side-skip totally got both of them, and Courtney barrels full-speed into her own teammate. In the collision, I get knocked down, too, and Josh has made about a five-yard run on the other side of the field. But anyway, my necklace that I was wearing snapped. Which was kinda annoying, it was a good one. Plain and simple and masculine. I mean, it was made of nails. Anyway, we're kind of surprised by that. After teasing CJ for being such a little sister and breaking things, Sam takes a look at it and puts in in her pocket. (One of her hobbies is making/repairing jewelry. She fixed it over the weekend, and actually, I'm wearing that same necklace right this second. That's not important to this story, though)
But the lasting effect from that game, the moment everyone remembers, is that not only did Courtney completely flatten her friend and her brother and snap her brother's necklace, but she also earned her nickname of "Homicidal Psycho Jungle Cat", because she plays football just like Hobbes. Oh, and she also gave herself a shiner the size of a small continient, right on her left eye. No big deal, she's just about to head for the most exciting event of her life in three days.
Needless to say, she's never lived that one down yet. And that's why in all the pictures she has an enormous black eye. Of course she said I gave it to her, which maybe I did, but if she hadn't been so clumsy she wouldn't have tackled the wrong person, right? And everyone at camp thought it was a hilarious story.
Counselor-wise, things were mostly the same: Tim was back, Brother Larry was still here, Tom H. and Daniel N. were there, too. This guy from St Louis named Braxton was also a counselor, and Joe M. was the newest member of the camper-to-counselor group. And there was Terry, Janet, Robin and Mrs Minner, Miss Kathy was going to be there, but she couldn't come at the last minute with a new grandchild being born. Another familiar face in a new role, and another camper-turned-counselor, was Pippa, Joe's fiancee. Mostly the same faces, yeah, but there was a different tone coloring this week all throughout, Jojo said it was kind of like "a changing of the guard from the old generation to the new." I agreed with her, we were both part of the bridge between the generations of Daniel-Nathan-Cody-Jake-Ray-Olivia and Matt-Ash-Colton-Shari. It was an odd feeling.
The camp pastor was a guy named Ryan, he had been a camper a long time ago, and he is Miss Kathy's son. Also, his wife and two-year-old son were there, too, and so Mandy, his wife, asked her sister Jo to help babysit. Some of the neat family threads that run through the camp.
Anyway, his series of sermons that he taught on were about the fruits of the Spirit, and how we, as slaves/servants of Christ, should act, what our identities should be, in order to reflect the most glory possible back to Him. Very convicting, and very good. And, he recorded them for later use, and then uploaded them to a website called SermonAudio, relistened to several of those sermons again. This first sermon was on our identities in Christ. Got me to thinking, "What exactly is my identity found in?" Well, it wasn't exactly a comforting answer. It was found in my job as a sportswriter. Thankfully, though somewhat painfully, once I realized this, God moved that out of the way so I could focus on serving Him in a more clearer way. (Again, it's in "Thoughts on Writing".)
Brother Larry's group sessions all week were focused on how to live a practical life of godliness, what that looked like. Very useful and good messages.
I was elected captain of my Tourney Challenge team, White, Tuesday morning. For unfortunately honest reasons, we became known as the Cubs. Going in, I realized that most of my friends, and the people I'd looked up to as leaders, were gone now, and it was my turn to step up to the plate and set the example for the younger kids to follow. But being elected team captain, that really drove that point home for me. It's historically a slot given to the oldest guy, and hopefully there'll be another older guy or girl to help with the team-leading. In an awesome twist of of roster-building, I had Matt and Ash both as teammates. Two of my best camp friends, good athletes, great senses of humor, and also fellow strategy lovers. We needed every one of those qualities, they happily took roles of assistants, though they didn't like that title.
Besides the three of us, we had fellow Tulsans Bennett, Marie, Paige, Sam, and Suzanna; Ash's little siblings Austin and Alexa; Bethany(another repeat teammate), and Joe P. As far as chemistry went, ours was awesome. Somehow, I'm not quite sure how, given that I was the leader with the backup I had, not to mention Daniel F, Jed, Josh, Ashton, Madelyn and Shari on the other five teams and all their competetiveness, the Tourney Challenge as a whole was a much more laid-back affair. We all wanted to win and everything, and that was the goal of the week, but at the same time, we also had a good grasp of how unimportant it was in the big picture.
Anyway, like I said, our team chemistry was amazing. And that was good, because we needed something to go right. Because honestly, as a group, though we had some fantastic players, we weren't really that athletic, or even very good. Like, at all. Actually, to be perfectly honest, we were awful.
Again, Ultimate wasn't an official sport, but with Miss Kathy's grandchild being born, and the fact that she was always in charge of the bows and everything, archery was thrown out from the list. In its place, we overwhelmingly passed a motion to re-elect Ultimate as its' replacement, the second choice, with far, far fewer votes, was horseshoes, followed by basketball, soccer, and touch football. So, anyway, that's how we wound up playing UF. Black(called the Thunder this year) beat Blue(yet AGAIN competing as the Angels) in Frisbee, Red(the Devils) lost to Green(the Bulldogs) in volleyball, and White and Yellow(the 'Jackets) went to the grassy field to play cabbage ball.
Both sides got one hit in the first inning, but after that momentum went south. Yellow picked out four straight singles, and followed that up by a grand slam, to take the lead 5-0. We were able to string some hits together, and took a 6-5 edge going into the third inning. The 'Jackets stung us, in true softball fashion, with seven runs, and the best we could answer with was two, so Yellow got on the dining hall scoreboard first with the 12-8 win.
In BPG, Green beat Blue in golf, Yellow kept right up with them by winning Bible trivia over Black 8,600-7,900, and we had(insert evil gleeful laughter here) ping pong, against Red. Now, I'm not great or anything, but I can usually hold my own, and I play a lot. Matt is one of the best players at camp, and Ash is very good. And we found out something: Alexa not only learned her talent at sports from her big sister, but also her drive to win. It was still way closer than it should have been, but we pulled it out with eleven games to their ten, and getting ourselves a mark on the board.
In the Worst/First that night, Blue chose Green in cabbage ball and promptly lost 10-9, and Red wanted payback for us beating them, so they picked us in Ultimate.(Two of the three best sports back-to-back? We were pumped.) Yellow and Black went at it again, this time in volleyball, Yellow was victorious in that contest.
The drought last summer was awful; no rain for literally months, and something like thirty-eight consecutive days above 100 degrees. It hadn't been quite so bad in the Ozarks, but it was still VERY hot and very dry. What little grass there was still in the ground was trampled and slick as ice, it was hard to run on. And HOT. These were the conditions of the field, we were playing this year best of three games, each to five. Marie didn't want to play, she took over the photographer position for both teams, so we had one less player to work with. The Devils scored four straight touchdowns, I caught a pass in the end zone to get us on the scoreboard, but then Red struck back to win the first game 5-1. Each side sent out their second team for the next game, it went back and forth, but quick thinking resulting in a game full of screen passes(to make up for our lack of height) led to sibling success, Ash and Alexa led White in the 5-3 win, tying it at one game apiece. Game 3 began with two red scores, and then a medical time-out interrupted play after Sam passed out due to a combo of heart and asthma. She sat out for a while, but stubbornly re-entered and right off threw a touchdown to Matt. Red scored, Ash tossed a score to Sam, and then Bennett threw to Matt, but we still lost 5-3, two games to one, with a total scorecount of 12-9.
Of course the singing was great, like every year, this time besides the camp version of "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" and "In Christ Alone" there were a bunch of good theological, though impossible to sing, musty hymns no one had ever heard of.
The dance went well. For some reason we couldn't figure out, it was held in the tabernacle again, though it wasn't raining. Numbered up for partners in the Virginia Reel again, take a wild guess who happened to be standing across from me. Ash and I just rolled our eyes, grinned, and ran with it. Then came the Gay Gordon and another dance, I can't remember for sure, but I think I danced with Jojo and Marie. Then the box-and-square with Eva, looking around, it was interesting to see the couples. Dylan(who hates to dance and always wishes he could get out of it) was with Paige, keeping an eye on his little sister, Bennett and Courtney were trying to figure out how to step correctly, Sam was dancing with Jed and Jon, and Josh(who also hates the dancing) was with Suzanna(who does enjoy it).
Fun, lighthearted times.
For Wednesday's UVC section, there were several sibling battles, Brittany's Blue Angels topped Stan's Red Devils in cabbage ball 10-3, Black beat Yellow in volleyball(again), and for me and Courtney, it was just like at home, tossing the Frisbee around, except for the facts that we actually had teammates, and that the neighbor's pit bull won't chase us. Anyway, the tangle between the Bulldogs and Cubs began, and it was a fight. On the opening serve, Bennett crashed into a guy and fell hard, getting a massive headache and nearing blacking out, we almost thought he might have gotten a concussion. So, he was out. Marie was sitting out again, and Suzanna had decided that she'd be more helpful on the sidelines.(For those keeping track, that leaves us with about eight players.) I helped out with both our scores in the first game, catching a throw from Sam and then firing the disc to Ash, but we lost that game 5-2.
The second game started with the second teams, Courtney got a little overheated halfway through and was replaced(to her displeasure) by captain Jon M. Sam passed out again, worse this time, and Matt was feeling a little under the weather, too; so we seriously had some player issues, and were subbing in and out almost like hockey. It worked well enough for us to win that game, though, and it went into overtime. Green sent out a quintet of rested guys over 6'2', while we had a worn-out three-girl, two-guy lineup, tallest of us at maybe 5'8'. we tried hard, but we lost 2-1 gamecount, with a scorecount of 8-4.
In BPG, Black narrowly edged Red in golf 539-551, Yellow beat Blue in ping pong, and Green and White headed down the path for Bible trivia against each other. White had a large lead at one point, both sides risked it all in Final Jeopardy, on this question: Samson used these, in this amount, to destroy the fields and crops of the Phillistines. Both sides said foxes, but only Green said 300, so they stayed unbeaten, and had a real chance to be the first-ever undefeated team in Tourney Chalenge going into the final day.
After talent share and the general session that night, a long discussion on player safety was chewed over in the boys outer left cabin between me, Matt, Jed, and Jon, and it was worked out that whether Red or White had first pick in Worst/First, we'd play each other in volleyball, which meant shade.
The talent share was a pretty good one, a magic show by the Henrys was one of the best parts. Tim's juggling was entertaining, and all the forty or so girls sang together, that was really neat to hear. Jed recruited me, Jon, Sam and Eva to do "In Christ Alone" with him, we were the Jedites. That went well.
Mine and Sam's song...not so much. It was a great idea, and we both learned it and everything, we just needed more practice time together than we had. She was nervous playing before people and thought she might forget the words, and I was worried about her worrying so much. We had Josh film it for playback for future musical endeavors, if you wanted to watch you can find the video here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hSlJVR3_FiA&feature=g-upl
Also, Jed and his mom wrote up "The SGYC Camp Song", a hilarious ode to everything that can, does, and should happen during the week. That brought the house down.
One of the things about it that made the week feel so odd was the sudden appearance of new people. Of the 66 campers, 24 were there for the first time. And with extremely low numbers registered two weeks away, at the last minute the rules were tweaked: For this one time, ANYONE twelve years old was allowed, not just those twelve-year-olds who fell inside the cutoff date. Much of these rookies were little brothers and sisters. Courtney, Paige, Alexa, the Freelands' little brother Caleb, the Henrys' brother (or cousin) Christian. And non-related people, too, like this kid named Josh Owens that we never could remember his name. Or Drew Brashers, he wore these shiny aviator sunglasses and sang "Amazing Grace" in the talent share. (And played guitar, I tuned it by mistake while practicing.) And Bennett. he, ah...well, he kept the other guys in stitches, and mortified us who knew him. Yeah. Anyway, the cabin story became an official legend by then, Marshall was telling some of the new kids about it, Josh and I listen like we haven't heard it in forever, kinda smiling. "That was us." when he's finished. "Seriously? That was you guys???"
I'd been practicing ping pong, me and Courtney played each other most days on this oversized card table. I guess the smaller surface helped; I beat Matt, Jon, and then won back to back over Jed. That should have told me something wasn't right, but I ignored that miniscule thought. Just thought it was the virus beginning to spread.
Red won the coin flip for first pick in Thursday's Worst/First, so we headed down to the volleyball court. Blue and Green went to play cabbage ball, and an exception was made to the rules to allow Black and Yellow to play ping pong in the air conditioning.
Volleyball is traditionally thought of as a girls' sport, so it was hardly a surprise that we were led by Ash, Sam, Alexa and Bethany, for the most part. With the interesting rally cry of "Sharkbait!" before every serve, we Cubs held even and even led for a little while. Then reality caught up with us and things went downhill pretty fast. The Devils won in two sets 15-8, 15-8. Weird happenings in history: To go along with Ash's cannon shot serve that landed in the path in 2008, or our mutual target practice at each other, this year Austin broke the fence while chasing down a runaway ball, and Sam crushed a serve that stopped halfway along the tabernacle(about 100-200 feet away). The Angels triumphed over the Bulldogs 9-6, squashing a last-inning comeback bid and ruining the chances for an undefeated week. And the Thunder won a tight ping pong match twelve games to ten.
The volleyball match between Blue and White was irrelevant to the final standings. Black and Green were slated to play cabbage ball, each side had five points. Thus the title, prizes and bragging rights hinged on both cabbage ball and the Red-Yellow UF game. If Red won, then the winner of the cabbage ball game took the championship outright. If Yellow won, however, it would go into a tiebreaker system developed to avoid another emergency Bible trivia match like the one the year before.
Besides the sicknesses and everything, we were losing people for other reasons as well: Rhen had to go home to take care of his sister due to a family illness, and the Wrights left for vacation, so we lost two more campers and a counselor there. And then, during the guys singing, Eva gashed her eye open going down the waterslide, Mrs Minner and Lizzie rushed her to the nearest hospital to get that looked at and stitched up.
Still with the cry of "Sharkbait!" ringing, we astounded ourselves with how easily we won the first set, the score was 15-5. White's hopes dimmed quickly in the second set played out, Blue snuck up on us and took it 15-12. With the third game actually counting for something, our nerves got to us and we fell apart, dropping the third set 10-1. Yellow had won Ultimate 2-0 gamecount, scorecount 10-4, which meant they would be in a tiebreaker against Black, who won the cabbage ball game in jaw-dropping fashion, with a 21-1 score. Green players I interviewed couldn't figure out how they could play so well all week and then completely fall apart the next day. Anyway, the tiebreaker was mysteriously untangled, and Black emerged as this year's champs. But that didn't really mean anything, considering what happened right before that....
It was after volleyball, and before general session. We were killing time out on the volleyball court, just swatting it around. I go over to put my shoes back on, I finish tying one shoelace when I realized the noise level had lessened. Like, a lot. I looked around to figure out why, and they're standing around Jed, who's lying collapsed in the sand/kitty litter mix, motionless.
Naturally, the rest of us do two things: Pray, and panic. A couple people got him inside and stabilized, the rest of us tried to remember that this was just a more extreme example of the fact that God's in control and that it would work out however was most pleasing for Him. The next twenty minutes the tabernacle was full of hurried prayers, anxious thoughts and tightly reined emotions. We knew this could happen, that's why we kept tabs on how he was doing all week, but we just didn't think it would happen.
I know sports and games aren't important, and that "It's only a game", yeah. But I didn't fully understand that saying until that evening, with one of my best friends, for all we knew, might be having a heart attack or dying or something. It was terrifying.
I know from the halfhearted attempt at note-taking(I gave up after twenty minutes) that Ryan's sermon was about dealing rightly with anger, but I'm not sure anyone heard it. I know I didn't.
But, anyway, the general session finally ended, and we could see that Jed was recovering slowly, and we heard that Eva's accident wasn't anywhere near as bad as they thought, she was on the way back now, with only some stitches. Very joyfully, and with relieved exhaustion, the bittersweet time of book-signing had come. And with it, a last run on the snack bar, ping pong, and conversations with friends.
I was treasuring every moment. One of the perks that came with being an older person was that when Daniel rounded up the last people about eleven, he just sort of grinned and told us to come in whenever we were ready. So Jon, Dylan and Josh played ping pong for about two hours, and I talked with the Freelands, Hankinses and Mimi until midnight, when Mrs Boyer chased us all out of the dining hall. Amid perfunctory complaints, we obeyed, and so the last full day of the week ended, technically, about midnight, but us guys kept talking for about another hour before we were finally told to shut up for good.
Leaving, it was sadder than usual. Whatever that generation passing was, all those memories and stories and everything, was now ending for good, only to be kept alive through legends. The new kids, they'd write their own history of their years at the campground called Beth-Eden. And of those of us in the bridge, we weren't sure if we'd return next year or not, if we'd be able to, with the changing future and things like that, entering college, getting jobs.
Our trio of rookies LOVED the experience, as we knew they would, and rattled off camp stories to whoever would listen every chance they got for the next seven months. The virus that was being passed around took about two or three weeks to get over and leave, most people went immediately to sleep on the ride home.
The Gum Tree had its' own plaque now, the pool was renovated, there was a lot of other things that made us hopeful for the future of SGYC, and confident that Christ would still work through the camp in the years ahead, maybe even more than He already had. And nothing was psychically broken or destroyed.
Knowing....everything that happened this week, what it would lead to over the next year, would I change any of it? I don't really I think I would....there were some very high points, and quite a few very low places. A lot of stress, of the "pull-your-hair-out, I'm-at-the-end-of-my-rope-here, God; use-whatever this-mess-is-leading-into-to-grow-my-walk-closer-to-You, and shine-Your-glory-and-let-us-be-witnesses-for You" variety. Those things needed to happen to get us ready for life out there, tough as they were, I knew, we all did, that there was a good reason behind them, and good would come from it.
# # #
(TOURNAMENT CHALLENGE STANDINGS)
(Out of eight contests)
Black Thunder Six points
Yellow Jackets Six points
Green Bulldogs Five points
Red Devils Three points
Blue Angels Two points
White Cubs One point.
(CAMP BOOK SIGNINGS)
"Hey! I hope you had a great time and learn a lot as I did. Hope to see you next year. Anne
(Scratched out) Wesley, did you know that your name is spelled w- [That was one of the first things I noticed. There's always some typo or another...] Wes, loved talking to you a bit this week. You're an awesome guy! - Jo
Hey It was good to see you again! Colton
Wesley, It was fun to see you again, and you rocked the talent show. Hope to see you again next year. Joe Paxton P.S. Got a pen?
It was great to have you at camp! Suzanna
Wesley, you are amazing at singing plus playing the guitar. come back next year! Brittany
Wesley - Hope you had an amazing year! Hope you learned something from Brother Ryan and Brother Dean! In Christ, Daniel Freeland
Wesley, Since you didn't take any notes on the sermons...and I know you keep notes in your head - I guess I'll go ahead and impart some wisdom to you! If you see a buffalo and you really wanna go and pet it...Don't approach it - you'll regret it! Ooohhh....yeah, yeah.... Seriously, I truly enjoy spending time with you each year! You are a guy to be around and impress me more and more...hope this doesn't make you too proud! :O just kidding! You are one of the most humble people I've ever known! Love you, Wesley! By His Grace, Miss Terry :)
Wesley! You are so sweet! I loved that you sang in the talent share! You were awesome and it was a great song choice! :) Hope to see you next year! Shelby Henry
Hey Wes, good job on the guitar this yr. Keep up the hard work! Your brother in Christ, Josh F.
Wesley, you are so fun and considerate. I hope you have had a great week and that you have learned a lot and grown more in Christ. Grace and peace, Elizabeth Martin
WESLEY! My main man! Stay sweet! You Rock the guitar. See you next year Wes! Shari
Dear Wesley, I'm really glad you could come again this year! your talent was really awesome! loved the song you sang! I think you have an amazing voice! glad you were on my team this year. Bethany
See ya in OK. :) p.s. White Rules!! :) In Christ, Samara
Wesley, So glad you came to camp! thanks for singing every year! It's a blessing! I hope you were richly blessed by the teaching! - Ashton Brown
Wesley, It's practically a priviledge(sp?) to be associated with you - you have such a reputation for exellence at this camp...and everywhere else, for that matter! Keep seeking the LORD and serving Him. I pray that you were blessed this week by His Word! Justine Mueller
Wesley, I greatly enjoyed spending time with you this week. I sincerely pray that God has blessed you this week! Keep praying and seeking the Lord concerning His will for your life. Our God is so faithful! God richly bless you brother. Daniel N.
Great to see you again this week Wes! - Marshall
Wesley! Thanks you for being you! Continue to search the Scriptures and trust in the Lord! Braxton Hodgin
Wesley! It was great to seeing you again! And meeting your family(you have a great sister, treat her well :) ) Keep in touch!! :) Madelyn D.
Wesley, I really appreciate your friendship. it's been great talking w/you! Maybe we'll be on the same team next year! - Ashland
Had fun w/you this yr. We're the most holy team cuz we lost w/grace. - Bennett
Hey wes it was fun getting to know the pepole you've talked about so much it help alot thanks for being such a good brother courtney
(Dylan Steeley's signature)
Glad we were on the same team! Matt
Your awesome dude it was nice meeting you. you were a beast in Ultimate Frisby. - Caelin Weaver
Westley, Glad I could see you at camp again this year. No more Black Panthers, though! Hope to see ya next year. Keep in touch! :) Eva Sadowski
Hey. It was really fun being on your team! I had so much fun getting to know you! Alexa :)
Wesley, I'm so glad you came to camp again! have a wonderful year. In Christ, Lauren Wright
Hi person, boy person. Vania
Wesley, I'm so glad you were able to come this year It was good to see you. I hope you learned a lot this week. May God bless, In Christ, Maggie Jane
Wesley! I love you! I'm so glad you sang on talent night! I absolutely love your sweet spirit! - Jojo - P.S. See ya next year!
What's up man?! It was awesome hearin you and the other girl sing last night. Keep up the great work. I hope to see you next time Andrew Ashe
Wesley, it was awesome hanging out! AND I didn't break any strings!(Much farther down the page) yo this week was EPIC! c ya next year! Jon Lange
hope you had an awesome week. I'm going to beat you in ping-pong next time. :) caleb
See you next year maby Austin Hankins
hey man hope to see you next year. In Christ, Jed
(Marie Dugas' signature)
Keep singin' Wes, it's awesome! Joe"
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