CAMP: Part I, 2008

   It all started with a dare, basically.

   One of the biggest tools God's used to shape me so far into who I am now, so much so that it's hard to imagine what life would be like without it, I didn't really want to try at first.

   Okay, let me back up. It's late 2007, early 2008, I'm in eighth grade, and of the few people I'm friends with at our church, Marie and Josh are the closest. We were the young kids, just into the youth group, and scared to death to breathe, pretty much, in there, afraid we'd get made fun of or ridiculed. So we banded together for protection. Well, it comes time for our annual trek to church camp in Missouri, and she's trying to convince us to come along. Like, week-after-week-after-week sales pitches. We finally halfheartedly agree to the plan, a "I-will-if-you-will" sort of thing. (She's very persistent that way.) Turns out she can't come because of a family vacation, so that leaves Josh and I without any backup when it comes to figuring this camp stuff out.
   So we, along with three other guys(who all left the church in the next year, we didn't really know any of them) named Bryce, Noah and Jeremy, hit the road in one van with our pastor, Dennis, driving, while the girls(Adriana, Josh's sister Kerra, and her friend Sprite; all of whom had been before) rode with Ana Marie in her van.
   I knew that if I could just get myself to leave, in a few hours I'd be fine and I'd have the time of my life(how much this was based off Marie's sales pitches, Mom's tales of her times at camp, or just intuition, I'm not sure, but all three of those were factors). Just the only thing was; could I force myself to go? I'd never been that far from home for that long, would I be able to make it without my family nearby? My stomach is really sensitive, highly attuned to my stress level, it was upset. This line from the FFH song "I'll Join the Rocks" kept running through my head: "My ship is sailing now/Into an ocean, I can't tell/What's on the other side/But I know if I don't leave/My heart will never forgive me, and I'll be left behind."
   I finally decide to go through with it, since we're already in Tulsa, and already paid the fee and everything. But still...it was scary. There was five young guys that didn't have a clue what to expect out of this thing, it made for a tense five hours. At least Josh had a little help, in stories of people Kerra knew that she'd met there. Dennis was busy trying to A) Remember how to get to the camp, and B) Trying to resolve a dispute in the church over the raising of hands during worship. (And we were also remodeling the church building, too, but that's kind of a different post. But, like all construction projects, what was supposed to end in March lasted til late October, and til then, we met at first an empty warehouse, and then at the library.)

   We go through Joplin and  past Springfield about 45 minutes, until we get to this cute little town called Conway, and some of the prettiest country I've ever seen. Everywhere you look you want to take pictures, it's just so perfect, kinda like Thomas Kinkade's paintings ran into Norman Rockwell's. There's this ridiculous stretch of hills that we freak out on, being nervous already, unexpected dips and rises aren't very pleasant. When your nerves are shot, you really don't want to have to ride a roller coaster on the way to an adventure you can't predict.

   We found the camp, lying on a dirt road six minutes off the highway, get our name tags, and a guy with a mustache named Kevin points me and Josh "All the way to the right" to drop our stuff off. We take a look around. There's a huge barn that has been converted into a cabin and a chapel, the bathroom, a shed used for storing tools and mowers, and this long building that looks a little like a motel, which is probably a bunkhouse.
   We take another look around. "Farthest over on the right, he said?" "Yep, think so..." "That one over there?" "Looks like it..."
   The two of us make our way over the farthest room in the long building over on the right, and look around. Four sets of bunk beds, everything looks very white and clean. "Looks kinda empty." "Yeah...I bet the other people will be here in a minute." We set our stuff out, then hurry over to the dining hall for lunch. It was an interesting experience. About the length of a football field, concrete floor, with four rows of wooden tables and benches, a stainless-steel serving table acting as a divider, and then four ping pong tables on faded blue-and-white checkered linoleum, there's an air-hockey table, too, and then the snack bar. We ate barbeque sandwiches, baked beans and chips, then listened to the orientation speech by the director, a guy named Tim. (The key points: 1; Guys, don't go in the girls' cabins. Ladies, vice versa. 2; Follow the rules, or get sent home. 3; Do not go near the buffaloes in the pasture over there. 4; At cheer camp, you cheer. At golf camp, you golf. At band camp, you play music. At church camp, you study the Bible. That comes first, remember that. One of the most fun things is making new friends and hanging out with people you know, but that's not why we're here.)

   After that, we then had group sessions(grouped by age of campers), and sing/swim time. The girls swam first, so us guys walked down a river-gravel path to a building called the "tabernacle", which was mentioned in some of Mom's stories. (She'd been to the same campground when she was a teenager, though it wasn't run by the same people. One of the stories was about how the tabernacle didn't have any air conditioning, so it got really hot in there. But it's July in the Ozarks, it's always hot. Anyway, it didn't have A/C, so everyone was sweating like crazy(we still do). This one preacher, he always wore a dress shirt with a tie, and you could always tell how much longer his sermon would last by watching his tie; when he was nearly finished, the entire thing would be soaked through and dripping sweat onto the floor.)
   Well, now, it had air-conditioning. A good-sized building, empty save a bunch of chairs and a few tables, has some of the best acoustics I've ever heard. The singing there...it's indescribable. I love the people I've met there)some of my best friends), and the whole experience in general(ask my pals), but I think if I had to pick one favorite activity, it would be the singing. It was led by Tim, with a guy named Jed on the keyboard.

   (Interruption here to note the schedule: Everything from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m. is arranged, and you're supposed to move from one place to the next when it's time. Some people hate it at first. Me? I love it. I like knowing what's what, and when and where the next few things are going to be. I like organization.)

   Next was the girls' turn to sing, which means we could swim(or, if we didn't want to swim, throw a ball around, or whatever. Only hour of free time laid out during the day), so it was time to check out the pool. About ordinary size, I suppose, nothing extraordinary about it. Not being much on water, I went in for about twenty minutes, and have never stepped foot inside it again. So I was wandering around, watching people. Some guys were kicking a soccer ball around, a few others were playing catch. There was this one kid, he was just standing there, tossing a Frisbee and then walking over to pick it back up, then throwing it again.
   "Can I play?"
   He looks up at me, not knowing there was anybody there. "Yeah," he shrugs. So the disc comes sailing in towards me, I try to grab it, and miss. I then throw it back, it hooks in a crazy spin and lands thirty feet away from my intended target of the other guy. Repeat five or six times. "You might want to try throwing it like this..." He demonstrates, snapping his wrist like it was holding a skipping rock. "Okay...I'll try that." "And to catch it, you kinda use both hands to slap it, like this." "Uh-huh....thanks." "Sure." "My name's Wesley." "I'm Matt."
   Soon enough it was dinnertime, of spaghetti, garlic bread, and chocolate cake. At mealtimes, in order to feed about sixty to ninety people at once, they go in shifts. The way these shifts are selected is by a series of basic questions, e.g. "If you're wearing a blue shirt, go ahead." "If this is your first time to be here, come on up. " "If you are from...Mississippi, it's your turn!"
 
   Next, it was time for the Tournament Challenge. Now, that's the "Fun and Games" part of it, consisting of archery, Bible trivia,  cabbage ball(which will be explained later), mini golf, ping pong, Ultimate Frisbee, and volleyball, each team(there's six) plays each sport once, and two Worst-to-First wild card sports. Your team is awarded one point for each victory, and the team with the most points at the end of the week wins the prize, which isn't anything much, just a Mad Libs book or two, or a free run through the snack bar, but the winners also get bragging rights, which are must longer-lasting and fun to tease others with. The Worst/First challenges work like this: The team in last place gets to challenge any team they want, in any of the UVC sports they want, and then the next-to-last team gets to pick one of the other teams in one of the other two choices, and then the two remaining teams play each other in whatever sport hasn't been selected yet.
    Up first for the Red team was Ultimate Frisbee against Yellow. Ultimate is pretty much hockey, basketball, soccer, and football thrown together in a blender, it's insane to play, but once you play once, you become addicted. You play with from five to eight players per team, and the object is to score more points than the opponents. There's two end zones, and no end lines, so anything past the goal line is fair play and a touchdown, as long as it's within the sidelines, too. TDs are worth one point each. The Frisbee can only be moved by throwing, you can't move with the disc, but you are allowed one step, or a pivot, or, if receiving, however many reasonable steps needed to slow your momentum. You have to get rid of the Frisbee within ten seconds of receiving it, play switches hands after a touchdown, throw out-of-bounds, interception, or imcompletion.
    Using the newly-gained insights from Matt, I found myself enjoying this game, and the fact that we had two guys(Cody and Daniel) over 6'2" helped a lot, we could just fling it as hard as we could about eight feet off the ground towards the end zone, and one or the other of them'd leap up and snatch it. Easy scores. Maggie kept up a steady stream of encouragement, both on and off the field for her teammates, it helped. And also the fact that Patrick the counselor, an ex-Marine, current cop and all-around good guy, hadn't ever been overseeing a UF game before and wasn't for sure on some of the rules, that didn't hurt either. We got to be the guinea pigs. And we sure did the right amount of squealing and scurrying, the final score ended up being Red 20, Yellow 18, earning us one mark on the dining-hall scoreboard, and setting up the interesting task of forming a mix of friends and strangers into a better understanding of siblings in Christ. That was the highest-ever scoring game of Ultimate played in the last five years that's been recorded, and since I'm kind of a walking encyclopedia of camp facts(those same pals both love and hate me for it), noting every miniscule detail from each separate day, including menu of meals, average miles walked, and most of the Tourney Challenge scores, I'm happy to have taken part in it, and doubt anyone else will ever care. Or they'll just laugh and roll their eyes at my retention of memories. Blue won volleyball 14-7, 2-15, 15-10 over Yellow, Green beat Black 16-15 in cabbage ball, a girl named Haley had her toe broken when someone stepped on her foot.
   Josh and I talked for about an hour that night after heading into the cabin for the night, about  just about everything, it seemed like, and listening to the crickets chirping very loudly.

   Tuesday morning started with devotions at seven, then breakfast at eight, general session of preaching at nine, and then Tourney Challenge. Black beat Blue in cabbage ball 9-7, Red won over Green in volleyball 15-5, 8-4, it was interesting to learn how to play. Yellow beat White in cabbage ball. Then in the BPG section, Blue topped Green in both golf and ping pong, Yellow won Bible trivia 10,000-8,500 over Black, and Red was facing White in archery. It started raining slightly, and since only half of each team could shoot at once, the rest of us watched and talked to each other. I got to chatting with Daniel and Ray, two of my first friends from camp. Never having shot a bow before, it didn't go that well, launching three arrows into the dirt, from two feet, four feet, and seventeen feet away from where I was standing. White won 214-183, I noticed this girl on the other team, she had brown hair and a tan, she reminded me of someone. (Okay, well, actually, nearly everyone I meet reminds me of someone else I know, because as Miss Marple says, "Human nature is much the same everywhere.") She looked kind of like a girl I liked named Maddie, who had just moved two months before. During reading and rest time, right after lunch, I looked her up in my camp book, and found out a few interesting things: This girl was from Mississippi, she had a twin brother also at the camp, her and Maddie's birthdays were a day apart, and they even shared the same name, though it was spelled differently. Her name was Madelyn, it said.

   About three o'clock, I was putting my stuff away in my cabin and walking out, when I heard a voice say sternly, "What are you doing in there?" "Um...I'm putting my stuff away?.." "Well, I could see that. Why are you putting your things in there?" "Because that's where I'm staying, me and a friend-my friend Josh and I, we were told to go there." I stammer, quaking in fear and confusion at apparently breaking some rule that I didn't know of. "By who?" "Uhh....I don't know his name...a big guy, with black hair and a mustache. He said for us to go all the way to the right, so we did." The man nods, thinking. "That must have been Kevin. Let's go over here, we'll get this straightened out." I follow the man, who I find out later everyone calls Brother Larry. Apparently some signals had gotten mixed up, and we were placed in the wrong cabins by mistake. But what was really amazing was that nobody had noticed until then! Of course, we had never been there before, so no one knew us, but still...our new, right, cabin was on the outer left wing, Jed the pianist was in there, so were guys named Nathan and Taylor, and Cody and Taylor's brother Andrew, who were two of my teammates. "We were wondering who those two guys were..." Cody remarked, seeing my stuff being moved into one of the few empty beds.
   After that, I scooted into the dining hall, where I first began to understand one of the passions that wrapped itself around the fabric of these people: Ping Pong. It had always seemed like a game that cool teenagers played, and my aunt loved the game, but I'd never really played it all that much. These guys were amazing! They treated it as an art form, almost; customizing paddles with neat drawings, and then to watch them go at it - Your jaw dropped at their skill. They were moving that ball so fast, hitting it so hard, and spinning it just along the corners of the tables, with as much effort being put in as if they were playing basketball or something. Tim was spectacular, Jason, Jed, Nathan, Rich, Matt, Daniel F. and Jake were terrific. Once every meal was complete, there'd be a stampede for the tables, and then more battles would commence. Jed's mom Terry was even better than he was, also a girl named Lauren was great. I studied them, and made it a goal to beat at least one of them next year, or if I couldn't, to at least stay within about ten points.
   The first of the Worst/Firsts was that night, Green beat Yellow in Ultimate 12-6, White beat Black in volleyball, and Red won over Blue in cabbage ball, 13-9 in five innings. A cabbage ball is technically known as a 16-inch softball, it's slowpitch rules, without gloves. My first thought when we played? "This is so camp..." And it is. What that means, I'm not sure, but it was interesting, even though I was terrible at it. Around 10:05 or so that night, Cody and a few other guys were playing catch with a football, somebody threw it just a touch too high, it skimmed the ceiling, and then destroyed a light bulb. I've never seen anything shatter like that before. From an ordinary light bulb, it went to a hole in the ceiling, with the wires gone and everything. Shards sprayed everywhere, it took a while for them to get that cleaned up.

   Same routine Wednesday morning, there had been some talk about "Who you gonna ask to the dance?" here and there. Matt was like "Go ahead and ask her! Worst she can do is say no thanks, you know? Now, get going!" So after general session Thursday I wander over to where Madelyn is sitting. "Um....Madelyn...could I ask you something?" "Yeah, I guess so." "I was wondering....umm....ahh....well.....if you would.....uhh....." "Yes?"  "If you would - ah, if you would go with me tomorrow night. To the dance. Over there." (I point to the grassy area near the ampitheatre unnecessarily.) Somehow, she's managed to keep a straight face and not laugh me into a hole in the ground. "That sounds great, I'd love to."  I go flying to the cabbage ball field,where Blue beat us 9-7 in three innings the day before, Yellow wins over Black 25 points to 22, and Green wins over White 8-3 in Ultimate Frisbee. Red and Black split golf and ping pong, Yellow tops Blue in archery, 260-160, and Green wins 16,000-15,700 in Bible trivia.
   That day, Tim says "If you want to do something in the talent share, come see me about signing up." I figure, "Well, I'm here, this is already an adventure, I may as well do something else wild and crazy, go sing in front of strangers, to see if I can do it." I sang "Amazing Grace" that night, somewhere between Todd Agnew's version and Billy Ray Cyrus. I wouldn't know whether it was any good or not, but people seemed to enjoy it. A girl named Olivia told me the next morning that all the girls loved it, which was odd to hear, but kind of neat.

The second Worst/First was first thing Thursday morning in Tournament Challenge, Yellow won over Black in Ultimate 8-2, White overcame Black on the volleyball court 15-4, 15-6, and playing cabbage ball for the third time in three days, Red was hammered by Green, losing 12-2.  In golf and ping pong, Yellow swept White, Black squeaked out a one-point win over Green 201-200, and Red won in Bible trivia over Blue 18,500-16,600.
   It's played like Jeopardy, with the questions in the form of answers, and answers in the form of questions. All these obscure facts from the Old Testament and memory verse-related questions, somehow I knew most of the answers when I had a chance to answer. It was fun, and it felt good to actually be able to help my team in something.
   There was this voting for Most Valuable Person on each team, I missed our vote by hurrying out of the dining hall too fast, not wanting to get in trouble for being in the wrong place again. My teammates picked me, for some reason that I still don't understand. That was neat, though, and I was able to get something from the snack bar for free that night.

   The square dance was right between dinner and the general session, it was interesting. I'd never tried square dancing in my life, but Madelyn knew the Virginia Reel, and she was able to help me learn it without too much trouble. Once that was over, it was time for a new dance called the Gay Gordon, where everyone got in a circle and partners were exchanged all throughout. We had to pick somebody new to dance with, so I watched everybody else, to see how they were doing this. Matt asked Madelyn, so I asked the girl he had been dancing with, a glasses-wearing blonde named Ash. She'd seemed like a friendly kind of person, from what I'd seen over the week, kind of quiet. It took awhile for everyone to get in their right places, and even longer to get the steps down right, so there was a lot of time to talk. She was also the oldest child, she had three siblings to my four, and we both enjoyed sports and reading, and wore glasses. I had an idea that she'd show up later in my life, somehow, probably at camp, but I couldn't have guessed what a friend she'd become, one of the five or six camp people I'm closest to. Despite some guy stepping on my foot and causing me to trip, the dance went smoothly, I sat out the next one, it was hot and humid, I was tired, and it looked complicated.
    Then there was the book signing, which was a crazy experience that was really fun. I'd always enjoyed reading through my mom's old scrapbooks, full of memories and pictures of her and her friends in high school, and her yearbooks were neat to pore over, too. I'd always wondered what it'd be like to have something like that, to sign and have your own book signed, to be able to look back and relive the memories. I kind of found out.

   For breakfast Friday morning we had the most gigantic, best-tasting cinnamon roll I've ever had, then the last general session, and then after we packed up we could do whatever we wanted. So I went back to the volleyball court, since that was really fun and I wanted to get better at it. What happened was I ended up drilling Ash about four times trying to serve the ball over the net, she returned the favor a few times, also unintentionally.

 My goal was to try to survive the week. I did that, but more than that, I had the time of my life. I knew even before I left that I wanted to come back next year. And I learned a ton of great new songs.

                                                    # # #
                                          (CAMP BOOK NOTES)

(Notes on counselors)
Elisabeth C - Patrick's wife.
Michele M - Camp nurse, real nice lady
Kevin B - Jed's dad, stuck me and Josh in wrong cabin by mistake
Patrick C - Neat guy, ex-Marine
Larry D - Kept score during cabbage ball
Tom E - Camp photographer
Tim N - Funny, amazing ping pong player, can juggle

(Notes on campers)

Sprite A - That's her real name! One of Kerra's friends, nice
Ashton B - Great pitcher (She was a Red teammate)
Madelyn D - Looks like Maddie's twin, she's Marshall's. Really good singer, nice archer, great dancer, awesome personality (Yeah, I totally went overboard. But that's what I wrote in the margins back then)
Haley D - Broke her toe playing cabbage ball, good dancer
Brittany G - Good athlete, model pretty (Red teammate)
Ash H - Real good dancer, good personality
Maggie H - Very positive, good at encouraging us Red team
Ray P - Ray's going to fashion school soon (She never did, I don't think, just was hoping to)
Kathy S - Nonstop talker, pretty neat, though
Andrew A - Neat guy (Red teammate)
Taylor A - Neat guy
Cody B - Sort of crazy, good with girls and sports (Red teammate)
Jed B - Unbelievable pianist!
Jake B - Can't miss his sideburns.
Kurt C - Fell out of bed and didn't wake up
Marshall D - Madelyn's twin, showed how to kill somebody with tae-kwon-do moves(in talent share)
Matt F - Really cool guy, showed me how to throw a Frisbee better, sister Hannah's writing almost identical to his
Tommy H -Something wrong with him, can't figure out what
Tanner J - Pretty neat guy
Rich L - Really good ping pong player
Daniel N - 6'6" of niceness
Joe P - Annoying
Caleb R - Dressed up as part of the "Hawaiian Mafia", oh brother! (The theme night was Hawaiian stuff. Trench coats are not Hawaiian.)
Matt W - Likes Adriana a LOT (That was freaky, I tried to stay away from them both when I could.)

(CAMP BOOK SIGNINGS)

Wesley - You are a super nice guy! No matter what anyone says, you're great and so was your singing! Hope to see you next year! - Kathy

Wesley, I had a great time with you on my team!  - Hannah Freeland

Wesley, Hey man...you did really GREAT in the talent show. HopeToSeeYouNextYear! Macy

Hey MVP! Glad seein' you this year. It was great roomin' w/you. I'll see you next year. Taylor

Wesley, I'm so glad you came! You are truly an exemplary guy and I think very highly of you. I also got to know you better here, too. - Pastor Dennis

Wesley - You're so great - and loved by all you're around. Thanks for coming! I hope you had a refreshing and wonderful week. In Christ, Kerra F.

WESLEY, You DOMINATED  the talent show! Hope to see you next year! :) leah

Hi Wesley! - Jeremy

Hey dude thanx for making this an awesome year! Mr. MVP, Cody Bieber

Hey MVP, See you nxt year Tommy Henry

Hey Wesley have a rocking summer - Andrew

(Indechipherable scribble that Josh swears is his signature)

Hey, it was really cool getting to know you! Good luck! Ray

Wesley -It was great getting to meet you this year! Hope you come back next time! God bless - Rose

Wesley, so sorry about the cabin thing. Come back anyway. Kevin

Wesley, I hope God has blessed you this week. It was great getting to know you. God bless you in the days to come. Daniel

Wesley - It was so nice having you on our team! Go red!! I hope to see you next year. In Christ, Maggie

Hi! I'm gonna see you this Sunday! - Noah Collins

Read your entire Bible! - Mr Tim  Thanks for camping with us.

Hey Wesley! You are so talented and can sing so well! It has been great getting to know you! Be very blessed! - Sprite Always :) James 4:8

Wesley, it was great that you were on the awesome Red team. You did good. Ashton Brown

You were a great outfielder in cabbage ball. Matthew Freeland

Hey! I had fun at camp with you! Hope to see you next year! Always, Melanie Rucker

This was an interesting first year - bryce

C ya next year Connor Gillo

You dance realy well! See ya! Ash

hey you are amazing at bible trivia - Brittany

Hey Wes! Hope you had a great year! Nice playing ping-pong w/u! Rich Lange

You did great in the talant share Jorgi Henry

hey! I had so much fun at camp with you! hope to see you next year!!! Shelby Henry

Marshall Davis wuz here -> (Squiggly mark)

You were a great dancer! See you next year! Madelyn D. :)

Hey wats up nice meeting can't wait to come back Tanner Juch

Hope you had an awesome week! Nathan Brown

Hey, hope you had a great year. Daniel Freeland

Wesley! It was great to meet you and I love how you did amazing grace! Keep on glorifying God! - Olivia Wilbanks

Westley, It was so nice to meet you! You did wonderful when you sang Amazing Grace!  - Lizzie

(Joe Paxton's signature)

Wesley, you are an incredible guy! Hope to see you next year. Mrs Minner

Hey Wesley! I really enjoyed your singing! Keep up the good work, and remember to give God the glory that He is due! Kelsie C

Spider-Man

     "Who am I? You sure you want to know? My story is not for the faint of heart..."

     That's how the greatest trilogy in cinematic history(arguably, right up there with both sets of Star Wars movies, Back to the Future, and Toy Story, some people would most likely include Indiana Jones and Rocky to that list) opens.

     This story, whose narrator warns us by those intriguing words, begins about forty years before, with a guy named Stan. He was one of those group of people who are born storytellers, and who work at it, too, so that they can improve their stories and engage and please their audience. The audience he worked to wanted tales about heroes(but who doesn't?). In particular, heroes that were teenagers. Stan was a writer in the comic-book industry, and the people buying Marvel comics had spoken. So he got together with a guy he worked with named Steve, and they bounced idea off one another until somebody thought of creating a superhero with the powers of a fly - To crawl up walls, mainly, and be able to move really fast. "A fly? That's...um..." "Kinda dumb?" "Yeeahh." "I guess you've sort of got a point...isn't really that sexy. But I like the idea." "Yeah, just NOT a fly. What about...." (Long list of insects and other creepy crawly things) "...a spider!" "Yeah!!! But what about the alter ego?" "Hmm..."
     The character Stan Lee and Steve Ditka came up with that day was revolutionary to the world of superheroes, and the entertainment world at large: The tale of Peter Parker, a bright but nerdy high school student, skilled at science and physics, who was bitten by a radioactive spider, which injected some of its' DNA into his bloodstream, giving the teen arachnid-like abilities. That wasn't really the incredible part, though. What was, was the fact of who Peter was: A perfectly ordinary person, complete with anxieties and doubts, troubles with zits, girls, his aunt, and paying next month's rent.

     He started out in entertainment, wrestling and TV stunts and such, until his Uncle Ben was killed by a car thief, which began his trajectory into the world's most well-loved superhero. Motivated by vengeance at first, to track down his uncle's killer, but gradually he came to understand something that he'd been told just before the accident, that "With great power, comes great responsibility. I want you to remember that, Pete."

     Over time, throughout the comics(which I have never read), he went to college, got a work-study job in the science department at Empire State University and as a freelancing photographer for the The Daily Bugle newspaper, dealing with his cranky boss J. Jonah Jameson, always ranting against Spidey's protection; dating, first Gwen Stacy and then Mary Jane Watson, dealing with the aftermath of Gwen's death and his best friend Harry Osborn's drug addiction. And then the arsenal of supervillians that have come along over the years: the Green Goblin, the Lizard, Doc Ock, Sandman, Venom, the Rhino, Carnage, the Hobgoblin, many, many others...

     Over nearly fifty years, with who knows how many people writing the stories, a lot of details don't really match up, or sometimes outright contradict each other, so it's hard to tell exactly how the story goes. But for most of us teens and twentysomethings now, we were lured into Spidey's web by the 2002 movie directed by Sam Raimi and starring Tobey Maguire and Kirsten Dunst. I was twelve or thirteen when I saw it for the first time, and I loved it. Such a well-told story, Pete is so relateable(is that a word?), you know exactly what he's going through. That scene where Pete's taking the trash out, and he has that talk with MJ, we know exactly what that being afraid, yet hopeful for the future, is like. I mean, I ever put some of that scene into my graduation speech, that's how good it is. The nerdiness, it's perfect, like when he's trying to figure out how to use his webs, that quick little montage of fourteen different ways that don't shoot, with the sound effects and grunts and everything. One of the things that really made an impact om me was the scene in front of the library, when Uncle Ben delivers the "With great power comes great responsibility" line, before that, he says: "These are the years a man changes into what he's going to become for the rest of his life. Be careful who you change into." As a young teen, that really stuck, I've tried to heed that advice. The last scene, in the cemetery, was not written well, at all, way too over-dramatic and sappy. But we understand what's going on in his mind, the pain he's facing: "No matter what I do, no matter how hard I try, the ones I love will always be the ones who pay." That's why he tells MJ that "I will always be there for you, I will always keep you safe. I will always...be your friend." "Only a friend?" "...That's all I have to give." It tears us apart inside, to hear that she loves him, to know that he's loved her since he was six, but yet he can't say it, can't act on it. But, really...isn't that part of really being a hero, really loving someone? To keep them safe and happy, out of danger and trouble as much as possible, even if it rips us apart to do that? Because it's better for them? And, in an odd way, even Norman Osborn knows that, telling Peter not to tell Harry about his past as the Green Goblin.

     And then it continues two years later, both in the story's timeline and literally, with the second movie of the trilogy. Pete's just been fired from his pizza delivery job, JJJ is bashing Spidey every chance he gets, Aunt May is being evicted from her house, Harry won't hardly talk to him, and MJ just started tentatively making something out on Broadway and as a model...which means her face plastered up on billboards everywhere throughout the city. College isn't going all that well, not having that much time to study, things aren't looking very good. And Mary Jane has just gotten engaged to this hotshot astronaut, who just happens to be Jameson's son. That night Peter has dinner with Otto Octavious and his wife Rosie, they talk about poetry, how they met, about science, and the nuclear fission device the doctor is working on. Rosie asks if Pete has a girlfriend, he says "Um...I don't really know..." Doc kinda laughs at him, but isn't that how a lot of us guys feel sometimes? Then, of course, the reactor explodes, tearing everything apart, shredding Rosie by flying glass shards, and melting the inhibitor chip, which lets the tentacles take over and drives Doc Ock insane. Pete has a lot on his plate, he loses sight of what he's supposed to do, he even loses his powers there for a while. Aunt May reminds him, while packing for her move, that there's a little bit of a hero inside all of us, that sometimes we just need an extra-special hero to give us that spark of courage to go about our everyday lives. In the climatic fight at the end of the film, the reactor is proving too powerful, it has to be destroyed. Peter reminds Doctor Octavious that intelligence is a privilege, and should be treated as such, to use for good, and not for evil. "And...sometimes...we have to be steady, let our dreams go, in order to do what's right, even if it means giving up what we want most." Don't we need to be reminded of that? He realizes what the tentacles have done to him, blinded him into thinking he was serving the greater good, when really it was too powerful a creation, too destructive, too harmful. So he drowns the reactor, and in so doing also drowns himself. Kind of a parallel to what Christ did on the cross, not a perfect one, but the similarities can easily be drawn.

     Two years after that in the storyline, and three years in reality, Peter and MJ are finally together, Harry's figured out that Pete is Spider-Man, and everyone loves him while MJ's career is falling apart. Vanity can get to you, and for him, it does. He becomes a jerk, basically, angering Mary Jane by never taking the time to actually listen to what her problems are, always leaping ahead to Spider-Man this, Spidey that. And the fact that Harry discovered his father's stash of Oscorp goodies at the end of the second movie just sets up perfectly. So now not only does Harry have the malice behind him to crush that little bug, he now has the tools, too. During a long, bewildering fight as Pete's on his way to ask Mary Jane to marry him, Harry is tripped and knocked unconscious, getting amnesia, and the last thing he remember's the three of them are all still starting college, and none of these webs and criss-crosses that happened, they're all still friends. That throws a new wrinkle in things, proves to be a pretty big storyline. And this escaped convict, Flint Marko, he gets loose, to see his daughter Penny, stricken with cancer. He didn't have the money or anything to pay for treatment, so he tried to raise some cash the fastest way he could find: By holding up some people. That didn't go as planned, and he inadvertly shot Uncle Ben. He was later arrested, and in his escape from the police, crossed into a particle reactor test, becoming...well, sand. With rage at that, at his inablilty to help his daughter, his anger at Spider-Man, and generally the world, he goes on a rampage. Also, there's this otherworldly symbiote that attaches itself to Peter, bringing up his levels of aggression and confidence, he realizes eventually it's turned him into something he's not, in a fierce struggle on a Catholic church roof, he separates himself from the symbiote, which then bonds with a recently fired Daily Bugle photographer named Eddie Brock, who hates Parker for exposing the fact that he cheated, he becomes Venom. (Wow...these plots are crazy to explain. Of course, I've never been good at summarizing books or movies, I study them too in-depth, but still...Trust me: they make sense when you watch them!! Wonderful movies.) Anyway, before proposing to MJ, he talks with Aunt May about it. She gives him some good advice about how to treat your wife, how that a man has to put the woman he wants before himself, and his wants and desires. That you should take your time, plan carefully, not rush into something as big as that.
     Well, over time, Harry regains his memory, remembers his vow to kill Spider-Man, there's a mini-fight there. Peter pleads with his best friend, that Mary Jane's in trouble. They need to put aside their differences and work together to save her. During that ultimate fight, Venom and Sandman have teamed up to eradicate Spider-Man, Harry(as the New Goblin) comes to his aid just when he needs it most. During the course of the battle, Eddie is separated from the symbiote, Pete's telling him that "I know what it does to you, what it feels like. It isn't safe, it's dangerous." One of Harry's pumpkin bombs blows it up, but not before Eddie leaps desperately back towards the symbiote, not willing to give up his newfound power, and thus dying in the process. Harry was mortally wounded, but working together they manage to save Mary Jane and thwart Venom, Eddie dies in the explosion, daylight comes, and Harry lies there dying, with MJ and Pete beside him, with nothing they can do.
     Flint Marko states quietly, gesturing at the destruction and debris, "I didn't want this, but I had no choice." "We always have a choice. You had a choice when you killed my uncle." "My daughter was dying, I needed money. I was scared...I told your uncle all I wanted was the car, he said to me..'Why don't you just put the gun down, and go home?' I know now he was just tryin' to help me. Then I saw my partner running over with the cash...and the gun was in my hand. Did a terrible thing to you, I spent a lot of nights wishin' I could take it back. Not asking you to forgive me, I just want you to understand." Peter swallows. "I've done terrible things, too." "I didn't choose to be this...the only thing left to me now, is my daughter." Peter stares at him, dealing with some long-held emotion. "I forgive you." Marko nods, then floats away, leaving Peter to go back to Harry.
     "I'm sorry I hurt you, said those things..." "None of that matters, Peter. I'm your friend." He nods, "Best friend." he whispers. And then...he's gone, leaving a gaping hole in both his best friend's lives. As the credits start to come in, this is Peter's final monolgue: "Whatever comes out way, whatever battle we have raging inside us, we'll always have a choice. My friend Harry taught me that. He chose to be the best in himself...it's our choices that make us who we are, and we can always choose to do what's right."

     I've made the movies sound like they're just one big love story, which in a way, they are...but they're so much more than that. All the action(they are action movies, after all), can't really be described all that well. And they definitely have elements of comedy, too; all the pathos of how perfectly awful things in Peter's life are going, the witticisms and barbs thrown back and forth during battles, Mr Dinkovich the landlord and his daughter Ursula. They're all well-edited, the way it cuts quickly, leaves you spinning for a second with an unexpected cut, implying action so well. And they way all three movies tie together so well, the little things you don't notice until you've come to know the characters, what they're going through, what each inside joke or uncomfortable pause means.
     And they're so...inspiring, somehow. They make you think, they make you laugh, they make you cry, they're good pictures, to paraphrase Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Edsel Adams. You want to strive to be more heroic, to fulfill your little mundane everyday tasks well, even the ones that people don't really notice if they're done or not. That's what Spidey's whole job is, most of the time; and compared to him, what do we have to complain about? Sure, our problems are numerous and ever-expanding, it seems like, but we don't have supervillians on our tail, besides all that. We might be having trouble talking with a friend or something, but he's not scheming to kill us. Our personal problems and relationships might be chaotic, but not anywhere near as messy as what Pete, MJ and Harry are going through. When life gets tough and God throws a new disaster into our lives to grow us, well, hang on and fight through it, we'll get whatever help we need at exactly the right time(By the way, witty comebacks towards the direction of the problem don't hurt, either).  The advice given and wisdom shared that we get to understand, is invaluable. These are just some of the reasons why I love these movies, and why the web-slinger is my favorite superhero.

     (Postscript, occurring five years after the conclusion of the trilogy.)
     They had planed on making a third sequel, a fourth movie, to come out in 2010, but somewhere along in production, that plan fell through. With Sony having to use the character within a certain amount of time to avoid having the rights return to Marvel penalty-free, they had to whip something up in a hurry. Meanwhile, all of us fans were curious to see when the wall-crawler would return, and what story would be spun around him this time. We weren't exactly expecting the one we got. It was completely recast, with a new director and everything, a total reboot of the franchise, which took two years more than anticipated to hit the big screen.
     Anyway, with heading off to college soon and everything, I needed a change to get myself ready for whatever is thrown my way here in a couple weeks. I was kind of stuck in a rut, doing the same type of things day after day, etc. So I think about what might be labeled an adventure, what was totally out of the ordinary, but still realistically feasible. What I came up with was going to a movie, specifically, The Amazing Spider-Man. Adventure picked. Now who to go with...so I asked around, Sam loved the idea, and it's been forever since we hung out, Josh wanted to come, too. From there it was more like a construction project to plan, once we got when to see it down, then there was the "I wanna come! No, wait, I can't...No, I'll be there!"s to deal with, and then the where-are-we-going-to-see-this problem, which was quite interesting to solve. And, of course, the transportation tangle of getting from the church to the theater and back home. But, anyway, Sam and I got all those details figured out, and we set out after church last Sunday to go see the movie. There was me, Sam, and Marie(the Seniors); Josh and Suzanna; my sister Courtney; writing buddy Cassie; Bennett, the oh-so-fun-to-tease; Katie and Lilya. Lunch had its...interesting moments, which won't be revealed on here, but caused frowns, groans, and hysterical laughter(but then, it's most of our youth group, that 's kinda to be expected, haha). We made a wrong turn coming out of the mall, ended up walking around the whole entire place like it's Jericho or something, til we finally get on the right track, and then it's a race against time to get to the theater before the show starts.
     We make it - barely - endure the waiting-for-those-ordering-popcorn, find our seats as the previews are starting. They went for twenty solid minutes!!! Once the movie got rolling...you could feel the difference right from the title opening. It had a slow, meandering pace, interspersed with authentic-looking violence, and the camera didn't cut away, it just showed everything. The actors playing Peter Parker and Gwen Stacy(some British dude named Andrew Garfield and Emma Stone) seemed way too old for their roles, there was a lot of mumbling. It took some getting used to, Aunt May and Uncle Ben were much younger, he was killed in a different way, and the spider bite was much different.  We knew that coming in, but it's hard to tie together with all the memories of the trilogy, to reconcile those contradictions and stuff that I mentioned earlier. Peter rides a skateboard? And his hair was too cool-looking to be a nerd, that was distracting. The writing felt like it was patched together in a hurry(it no doubt was), but then do you have to over-act it, too? The only character I believed was Curt Connors, everyone else seemed too forced.
     The plot: Peter's parents disappear when he's four years old, leaving him with Uncle Ben and Aunt May, who raise him. He grow into kind of a jerk, really; when the basement floods, he finds a briefcase that had belonged to his dad while saving stuff from water damage, and looks into it. He finds...well, not much. A few scraps of things his father used in his work, a lead in the form of an old newspaper clipping. So begins Peter's quest to find out what exactly happened to his parents. He accidentally gets bitten by a radioactive spider and unintentionally turns Dr Connors into the Lizard, and only reluctantly goes into the superoing business, after numerous vigilante attacks on muggers who might have killed his uncle. It's a more subtle film, I guess you could say, than the others, supposedly more in line with the way he got started in the comics. Jonah's always railing against this masked menace called Spider-Man, well, maybe he has a point. There was still some entertaining moments, Stan Lee's cameo was the best yet, the way he yanks the keys off his laptop while researching spider bites, that sort of thing, which was interesting. And a few good one-liners, like when he comes to Gwen's apartment for dinner one night, knocking on her window. "How'd you get up here?" "Fire escape. You have a very intimidating doorman." The little things like bringing Aunt May a carton of eggs after a long night out, or wolfing down her meatloaf. "Something's wrong, Ben..." "I'll say....nobody likes your meatloaf." "....They don't? Why didn't you tell me that thirty-seven years ago? Do you know how many times I've made that?" The scene where Peter asks Gwen out was good, seemed like it could happen easily. (There were about twenty people in the theater, counting our ten. I probably heard fifteen laugh out loud there.) It was interesting. Didn't have much of a plot, and what there was was tangled up in a cobweb, but since this is the beginning of a new trilogy, holds some promise. Compared to the trilogy, it was far inferior, compared to the story of the first movie, it's lacking, but I think as a movie, it might be about equal. I'll definitely need to see it again. It's another side of Spidey, one that's darker, but that needs to be examined, in order to better understand who he is.

Fourth of July and Andy Griffith

   It's July already? How'd it get here so fast, and where's the year gotten to, with its' being half gone and all? Well, since I haven't posted anything in about three or four weeks, here's what happened: Oklahoma City lost in Game 5 of the 2012 NBA Finals to Miami, I never got around to writing a post for that. My dad had surgery a few weeks ago, so been taking care of him, the Internet was out, and nothing much worth blogging about presented itself.

   The Fourth of July was Wednesday, in case anybody didn't notice. It was a typical holiday for us - in other words, just another day, with no special things planned or anything. My little brothers set off fireworks, the annual army man battle where there's loads of multcolored smoke balls, melted plastic, and firecracker shells scattered all over the sidewalk and driveway. I poked my head out long enough to see how strong the smoke smelled; it was fireworks, all right. I then ducked back into my safe hideyhole and tried to ignore all sights and smells of flames existing for no useful purpose.
   So it was a good time to think about how this country got started, what it took for us to have this country we live in today. The Founding Fathers, they were pretty well-off, the famous ones everyone remembers. Yet they believed in the cause of liberty so strongly that they were willing to risk not only their monetary fortunes, but also the friendly ties/perks they might have had with the English overlords, and whatever comforts and safeties those provided. They went so far as to risk their lives for what they thought was right. And many of them had families to support, and this decision would have impacted them, as well.
   Would we have the same courage, the unshakable strength and endurance to do the same? I don't think we would, much as we might say so, or wish so. As society has moved farther and farther away from the Christian roots and values we started with, something of that courage was lost, somehow. Not that large a percentage of people want to grow up to be soldiers(though I can think of a handful of people I know who chose that path off the top of my head), because it's dangerous. We might die or be seriously injured. No matter how tame the service time is, you will be forever changed. And is this country really worth defending, anyway? Rarely do you see people who believe it is, and who'll do what they can to try to keep us on the right track.
   Paul Revere went galloping through, warning us of the British attack on the way. George Washington led the army, through unimaginable stress and difficulties. Lafayette was aiding a country he didn't even belong to; how much firmer a belief can you get than that? Ben Franklin used his pen, mouth, wit and brains to lay the framework for the Revolution, and a ton of opinionated men fought and quarreled and haggled their way into setting aside most of their personal issues with each other to agree to take an enormous plunge into the unknown; Breaking off from England and declaring independence as a new sovereign nation. Once they finally agreed to that, somebody had to write out the announcement, and had to choose just the right phrasing and make certain points and truths stand out. And he had to turn this document in for editing in two days. No pressure or anything. The man chosen for this endeavor was a man by the name of Thomas Jefferson. So he began writing. And thinking, and wrestling with his thoughts, trying to make the words untangle themselves into straight lines of clear thought. There was a war on, of course, so imports of British products were scarce and expensive. Jefferson used what he had to write with; and set to work using the backside of a spare sheet of wallpaper he had laying around the house. (Funny thing about Jefferson, he was a man of many talents; one of which was home construction. Always working on something or other.) He kept at it well into the middle of the night, and what my grandpa(sixteen generations  removed, on my mom's side) wrote became one of the most famous documents in the history of mankind: The Declaration of Independence.

   Fast forward about a hundred and fifty years, to a small town called Mount Airy, right in the heart of North Carolina, where a little boy named Andrew was born to the Griffiths. Andy, he fell in love with music(girls weren't for him, he never knew how to act around 'em), and once he got done with his schooling became a high school music teacher. Well, he was one of those fellas that ya call a quick wit, and people thought he was pretty good at makin' jokes and such, and by golly, he should go up and try to see what happened by using those! So off he goes to New York as a comedian, and he's doing pretty well at it. He has a monologue called "What It Was, Was Football" that gets featured on the Ed Sullivan Show, and that kickstarts his career in the entertainment industry.
   So after five or six years of being a pretty successful comedian, who can sing, too, one of these Broadway plays asks him to try out for a part. Well, he does, he auditions for the part, and what do you know, but he gets it. That play does pretty well, and he gets a part in another, and another, including one called No Time For Seargeants  That was turned into a movie by those people out in Hollywood, and they see if he can be in the movie, too, since the play went so well. He goes to California, stars in the picture, and it does pretty well, leading to another film, A Face in the Crowd. That does pretty well, too, and so by and by it comes that CBS is trying to pitch a new show, a comedy, and they want Andy Griffith to star in it. They shoot the pilot, which was in reality an episode of another show they had, starring a guy named Danny Thomas, and it goes okay, some people liked it. This other comedian, named Don Knotts, he calls up Andy and says "Don't you need a deputy on that new show you're gonna be in?" Andy and the producer, Sheldon Leonard, look at each other a minute. "Well, yeah...I guess we could use one." "Great! Can I be him?" Well, they figure it up that Andy is a single father, as well as the town sheriff and justice of the peace, his wife died years ago, and he has a little boy, around six years old. They cast a little redhead named Ronny Howard as Andy's son Opie, and well, someone needs to look after these characters, they cain't just be tromping along all by themselves! People'd start to talk, y'see, and they'd get to wonderin' why this, and why that, and who's looking after these folks? Ain't there no women in this town? They find a lady named Francis Bavier, a classically trained actress, huge on Broadway thirty years ago, and slightly cantankerous and hard to deal with, but she fit the role well, and so became Andy's aunt and housekeeper. The show that followed, of course, was The Andy Griffith Show; for most of the nine-season run viewers across America grew to love  Andy's taking care of the scrapes that Barney or Opie get into, listen in on the party line with Aunt Bee and Clara gossiping, and groan in anticipation of the mayhem from the mountain folk on their infrequent visits to town. And Mayberry itself was just so likable!
   After "TAGS" went off the air, and several moderately successful at best TV movies and advertising spots later, Andy became the star of a new CBS series, as a friendly and shrewd lawyer named Matlock. That show also did well, and he retired from acting due to burnout and old age catching up to him, leaving him time to (finally) focus on music. He did several albums, and Brad Paisley asked him to help with a song he'd written, called "Waitin' On A Woman." While another fantastic song from Brad, the video made for it was even better.
   Andy Griffith was a great actor, a hilarious storyteller, and a good man. He passed away in his Mount Airy home Tuesday morning at the age of eighty-six, he will be greatly missed. While sad, we know that we all have to go sometime, and this includes famous people we've come to love like family, and his work will continue to be cherished and loved by untold counts of people. A fine example of a life well spent, much like the Founding Fathers hoped their descendants would live.