Whew. It's just been so full of bustle! I don't want to bombard you with the details of everything, but I do want to uncover some stories and thoughts about my last couple of weeks. My next several posts may be to that end.
Just one story tonight and then a preview of the next few to come...
Bowling with frozen poultry. It was a sight to behold! The winter retreat at Riverside was in full swing. I had two "talks" under my belt. I was half-way through the four I had prepared. It was going well. I was surprised that the urgency of what I was sharing came out between the shakes and nerves. Being a first time speaker, I thought that I would come out dry and unfeeling. Anyway, the bowling. It was magnificent. There is nothing quite like holding a smallish frozen turkey and looking across the ice rink at 10 2-liter bottles set up like pins. The strategies you come up with to knock down the most pins (on the knees, granny-style, side arm) are just hilarious to watch fail or succeed in their turn. As I heaved the turkey forward in the first frame for my team, I had visions of getting a strike on my first time and impressing everyone. Nothing could be further from the truth. I missed completely. Not. A. Pin. Down.
Thankfully, everyone else was having similar luck. Half-filled with water and frozen, those bottles were difficult to totter over. Getting two or more down brought huge hoots and hollers from your team. Toward the end of the game, Jake gets a brilliant idea. He begins running from outside of the rink, on the snow, to gain momentum. He plans to launch himself on the ice and propel the turkey forward from the line. Anyone else would have biffed it and broken a bone (as someone did that day). But Jake's middle names are "gracefully athletic" so, of course, he nails the landing and the release. He knocked down 6 pins. This guy is my hero.
And then somehow, potentially by a mathematical error, our team (TEAM STRIKE!) went from last to first in the second half of the game. We don't ask questions at that point. We just go crazy bananas on the ice, screaming and slapping backs. This is what I love about camp. It's a place where you can tell a person about Jesus and then be utterly silly with that person in the very next moment. What a lovely mix!
Stay tuned for...
A bit of pregnancy in the library at Northwestern (A social experiment)
Fluent in Flatulence (A look inside a fish-house full of Sherfs)
The New Job (on the effects of growing up with only brothers and then working with only women.)
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