Roadtrip to the Golden Brownies

Introduction
The camping trip was amazing. I basically “adopted” three sisters, which makes me happy. When I get to OBU I will have female friends with whom I can give & receive hugs, talk with, and spend time with without worry of romance. I love them all. I learned more from the three of them than I did at Super Summer and Falls Creek combined.

Saturday, Day 1
We made camp, ate leftovers, swam, and shared our testimonies. We were very comfortable with each other; there was no awkwardness amongst us. After swimming we went to Wal-Mart around midnight to get some necessities for Sunday and were back at the camp site and in bed sometime between one and two AM.

Sunday, Day 2
After breakfast and quiet time, we discussed prayer together before hitting the showers. That morning we attended Heritage Church in Shawnee. We all really liked it. Their worship music was relaxed and acoustic – it reminded me of Jon Foreman. The preaching was also good. They were going through the book of Acts and that morning was Acts 19:1-7. It was a good sermon. After church we met my roommate, “Beans,” at Taco Bell where we had lunch. Then we went to Wal-Mart and got our breakfast for the week and our dinner for the evening.

Monday, Day 3
This was the first day that we worked with the kids. We were working in a dirty gymnasium with no a/c and only two very loud fans to keep us cool. It was a difficult environment to work in because the noise made it difficult to have casual conversation with the kids and hear what they said. We didn't realize that this was an obstacle until later in the week. We met a girl named Morgan on this day. She was a pretty little girl; I think she said she was a fourth grader. Just the sight of her tugged at our hearts. It wasn't really anything about her physical appearance as much as it was the look in her eyes. She was lost and hurting. By the end of the day, she was smiling and talking to the girls, especially Megan and Chloe. The work we did for the ranch on Monday was pretty simple; Alice and I had to drill fifty holes into two big plastic barrels for a game on Tuesday – the kids were competing to fill the barrels up first – and the other three set up some obstacles – a spider-web like construction the kids were supposed to lift each other through, and a rope they were supposed to all step over while holding hands in a circle.

Tuesday, Day 4
Several of us said later in the week that Tuesday was the best day. I'm not sure there was any one thing that made it that way, I think it was just a really good day overall. The only scar on the day was an incident that happened while we were working with the kids. The whole time we were at the site that day the girl Morgan was getting piggy-back rides from Chloe and Megan. After lunch, Morgan was climbing on to Megan's back for a piggy-back ride when Megan stood up too soon and Morgan fell forward off Megan's back. Morgan split her lip on the gym floor and we walked her home. That afternoon our work consisted of simply putting away some tables and such after the kids left the ranch, and then trimming some trees that hung over the driveway.

Wednesday, Day 5
In contrast to Tuesday, Wednesday was probably the worst day of the trip. It began with Chloe having an upset stomach and staying at the campsite while we went on to work with the kids in Shawnee. After we were done working with the kids we got some limeades at Sonic. We were on our way home when we got a phone call from Chloe letting us know that her car had been hit pulling into the Wal-Mart parking lot. She was fine, and her car had only suffered aesthetic damage, but she was a little shook up. That afternoon we worked on cleaning up a horse-trail they created with a tractor. After we were done working we borrowed some bikes and went on a bike ride. Megan crashed on the gravel roads and scraped up her left side pretty badly, especially her left arm. The rest of the week we had to clean and dress one of her cuts several times a day to prevent infection.

Thursday, Day 6
This was the last full day we had with all of us there because Beans had to leave on Friday afternoon. It was a pretty good day. After working with the kids we went to OBU and did our laundry. It took us a while because we didn't get out of there until almost nine o'clock that evening. We had a good time though, the girls did each other's nails while Beans and I just hung out.

Friday, Day 7
Upon the Ranch owners recommendation, Megan went to the Urgent Care on Friday morning to get some antibiotics and Chloe went with her. Beans left the campsite around the same time we did, but we didn't see him again after that because he went back to Missouri after having lunch with a friend in Shawnee. Throughout the week a youth group from Mississippi had been helping with the mission, but they left before Friday lunch so the four of us were split between three sites instead of all going to the same one; Chloe and Megan went late to our regular site as soon as they were finished with the doctor. When we got to the ranch that afternoon, we were told we weren't working that afternoon because it was too hot. We went to the Shawnee Mall that afternoon instead. Friday evening we watched Saving Private Ryan because Chloe (and Alice?) had never seen it, and Chloe wanted to. Chloe and I were the only ones who stayed awake for the whole thing. That night the girls slept on the couches in the TV room and I slept on a bed in one of the guest bedrooms.

Saturday, Day 8
On Saturday, the girls decided they wanted to go to Oklahoma City. Their reason was simply that they hadn't been there yet. So we went to Oklahoma City. We ate Chinese for lunch and then went to a mall and shopped. I think all the girls bought something or other, and I briefly considered buying a hat. After the mall we went to Hobby Lobby so the girls could buy string for friendship bracelets. Saturday night we ate pizzas and watched Slumdog Millionaire at my friends' house – we didn't do it at the ranch because the owners were having a date night. We were tired, and I was the only one who didn't almost drift off at some point in the movie. After the movie my friend – an OBU alum who's lived in Shawnee ever since he graduated – told us that we were building strong bonds of friendship on this trip and that we would continue to build lifelong bonds when we got to OBU, he then regaled us with instances in his own life of friends he made at OBU that he is still in touch with and other friends whom he can talk to as if no time has passed, even though they haven't kept in touch regularly.

Sunday, Day 9
We went to Heritage again the second Sunday. Chloe and Alice both wanted to visit Immanuel but they gave in and we went to Heritage instead. We were late. The irony of this is that if I had skipped shaving we wouldn't have been late, and the girls didn't tell me until after I shaved that they thought I looked older/better when I was scruffy. After church we had popcorn chicken at KFC and then went back to the ranch and packed up our campsite. It took us four hours or so to pack up the campsite completely. After packing up the campsite I think we went to Starbucks before heading back to the ranch. We spent that night – from about eleven or midnight until four in the morning – talking. First I talked to the girls about healthy relationships, romantic or otherwise (of course, it was crammed full of tangents, because all of our conversations are). I did this not because I am wise but because some wisdom has been imparted to me by those wiser than me and I found that much of that wisdom had not been given to the girls, so I passed it on to them. After I was done lecturing, Chloe shared part of her life story and how she had come to live with her mom and step dad rather than her father – the story was long and took about two hours for her to tell entirely. After she was done we went to bed about four AM, as I said before.

Monday, Day 10
We got up around eight on Monday morning and got ready to leave. I believe we all left before nine thirty. Alice went back to Oklahoma City, Megan and Chloe drove back to Missouri, and I met up with the FBC Tulsa youth group to go to Falls Creek.

Conclusion
This log doesn't really tell the full story of the week, there was so much more to it. The heat index throughout the week was about 110 degrees. We usually spent our evenings in the pool until dark before going to IHOP and hanging out and talking there for an hour or more. We spent a lot of time talking and learning from each other, discussing life issues and wrestling with theological concepts, laughing and cracking jokes, opening our hearts and sharing our minds, and of course there were many other smaller events throughout the week that I failed to mention – either from forgetfulness or for the sake of prose – that helped to make the week what it was. God used us to teach each other that week, and we built bonds of friendship that I think will stay with us the rest of our lives.