2005 - 2008

So we ended summer of 05...
Ok, let me set up your surroundings first.
It's early september, I've just gotten back from 2 months of working as a counselor at a small christina camp just west of North Bay. The present camp director, Linda, was a close family friend so that was how I ended up there in the first place 4 years back. She invited a good friend of mine and I on a canoe trip with the a few people from the camp. That was when I fell in love with that place. Ever since then I've been going back for the better part of the summer working as maintenance, than counselor, lol now 7 years later in 2009 a head of staff. That place has become an extremely important part of my life.
Anyway, so this is just after a long summer of great times and lots of camp drama. Drama sort of comes with the job, but this year it sort of followed me home. I had met this great girl; smart, funny, beautiful and she was easy to talk to. So on impulse, like anything else in my life, we started going out. I couldn't really tell you how long we dated, it was so on and off it would get you dizzy. Neither of us really knew what we wanted. And out of my stubbornness to hold onto what I had, I developed a sense of responsibility for her. Which ultimately turned the whole thing into a one way relationship; she would talk, I would listen. I've come to learn that never works, no matter how humble you may be trying to be.
Anyway, in the middle of all this, God gave me the first bit of direction I needed. But I dismissed it, I had told her about how God wanted me to go down to the states for a Leaders program. That didn't go over too well, so I stuck around. God continued to dig and dig at me. A year passed by, and my stubborn attitude and heroic ego amplified the stress going on in both our lives. God knew it had to change.
The summer of 07 was God's second piece of direction in my life, I can see that now :) That summer was crazy it was so strething emotionally. Until finally God said, "Enough! Open your eyes, this isn't where I want you to be! That is..." At the end of the summer at Teen camp I ran into someone I hadn't seen for a while because of different commitments she had over the past few summers because of previous commitments; she was a real jock lol. Soccer, Basketball, Volleyball... Anyway, we ended up at the same teen week . It was great to see her, soothing actually lol. Sadly only a few weeks earlier she had lost her father to cancer, so I tried my best to be there for her. Over that week Her, Janes; another good buddy of mine and I really bonded. We're still pretty tightly knit to this day lol, even more so. Anyway that summer God kept pointing me towards her, he continued to allow her to be the first person I'd run into when I needed someone to talk to, and it seemed vice versa for her. But at the end of the summer, I still returned to the mess I had made. But Katie and I kept in touch that whole year... yup, that was Katie :) In my fear of becoming like my father I suppose; abandoning someone who needed to be heard, I continued to try to be there for the girl I had been on and off with for the last 2 years. But over the next year, God continued to let Katie's name mull over in my mind. Whenever I needed someone to talk to, she was always the first one to come to mind. In the winter Janes and I went up north to visit Katie. lol I look back on the last 2 years and can see now how stubborn I was.
Then finally christmas of 07 I decided to begin to let go. I decided to go for that Leaders program in NY. I had put it off for far too long, and why? Insecurities, responsibilities, pride... ? It was about time I started to listen. So I was lined up for the fall of 08, was I ready? depends how you define it... I had no idea if I was ready for the program, but God seemed to think so. Was I ready to finally let go? ...yes I was. I just didn't know how. But once again God had it all figured out, lol. That June my previous girlfriend came to my house one evening and wanted to talk, but this time I wasn't worried or scared. I was impatient to hear the words come out of her mouth. "We need to stop this. My life is not your life." The fact that she was breaking up with me didn't bother me for one second, I needed that push for years. Those words had been spoken several times but finally God engraved them into my mind. That relationship was a step in my life, now it was for the next. God was taking over the wheel, and it felt so liberating, so humbling, so peaceful.
So I entered the summer of 08 with a whole different attitude, a different life. I was free of all the burdens I had piled up on myself. And on the first day of training week, Linda's husband Doug and I were taking a pile of garbage to the local dump when who should walk out in front of us, but Katie. I couldn't stop smiling while I quickly opened my window, "We're just taking a load to the dump, but I'll be right back." she began to smile, "Ok." And so, Summer of 2008 began.

Later
Godbless