What a crazy past two weeks! I have been out in Loveland, Colorado staying in Lucile Erwin Middle School where I was basically back in school again for job training. We spent all day in a classroom setting learning our different positions, going through driving school, and so on. Now we are finally starting up camp and I am back on the East Coast!!! We spent the last three days driving almost 2,000 miles to come to Lexington, North Carolina where we are helping another crew set up and run their first camp until next week when we will continue our journey down to Greenwood, South Carolina to begin our first camp. In those three days of traveling we have been through 8 different states: Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, and North Carolina. Let me tell you, our country is truly beautiful! If you ever get the chance to go and travel across the states, do it!! (But more on that later)
So Alaska (sorry folks I promise I'm getting all my stories up more now that I don't have to be in the classroom all day long). Sunday May 17th was our first full day and man did we really experience Alaska! We began the day with Holy Hour and Mass, which if you have the access and ability to do so, I highly recommend it, always begin your day by giving it to God. We also went down to the harbor to do a blessing of the fleet, which was amazing! Yakutat is very much a fishing village, where that is the main income for most people, so for Father Steve to go down and bless the boats was so cool. Then our group went on a hike through a part of the Tongass rainforest, with plenty of views of the mountains and the water. After the hike we went down to one of the many beaches in Yakutat called Graveyard beach. This beach is beautiful, and looks straight out to the mountains, espeically Mount St. Elias, the second largest mountain in the world, since it starts directly at sea level. Not only was the day beautiful with all the nature, but we had some great time to talk with each other as well. One of the things that Devon, our leader, told us was to "be fluid" on this trip, meaning that plans could change at any moment, things will come up, and we have to be able to be flexible and go with whatever changes. I'm not going to lie, I really do struggle with this because I am a very organized person who likes to have lists and schedules. Don't get me wrong, I do "go with the flow" from time to time, but I do like to have somewhat of a plan. It's the control that I like, something huge that keeps me from giving everything to God.
So we hung out at the beach for a while, then it was time go back to dinner at the church. We loaded up our two rental vans, and began to drive out down the sandy road to get back. As we were driving, our first van ended up getting really stuck in the sand. We got out to try and push, pull, anything to get out, but nothing was working, we were only going deeper and deeper into the sand, making it harder and harder to get out. With no cell service, well no technology at all since we were on a technology fast for the entire mission, and dinner waiting for us back at the church, you can probably tell that this was very much not planned at all. As a few of us were looking around the area to find big pieces of drift wood to use to get the van out of the sand, I thought back to what Devon had said eariler in the day to be fluid. Obviously we hadn't planned to get stuck, and we had planned to be back at a certain time, but instead of getting frustrated and start blamming people for things we could have done better, I took this as a time to not only enjoy outside, but also to get to know and talk to my group more. We had laughs, jokes, and worked as a team, till we finally got the van out of the sand and back on the road. I had only known these people for about 24 hours, and yet coming together to overcome that challenge, I felt like I had known them for a lifetime. If we hadn't gotten stuck, I may not have had those moments of bonding with my group. Praise God for vans stuck in the sand!
As I go into my job, planning, setting up, and running 3 different camps with almost 400 campers each, I have many different lists and things that need to get done, but I have to remember that I need to be fluid. Things are not going to go 100% right all the time, and instead of getting hung up on what went wrong, I need to remember why I am here, and I am here to serve my God who graciously gave me this opportunity to serve Him by serving others.
Be Fluid
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