After an arduous trek through the woods, our motly crew of skiers emerged into a clearing. The bumps of landscape provided ample room to sit and rest over our packed lunches. The sun was hidden behind the clouds and by the looks on every face you could tell that its warmth was longingly missed. Streaks of snot froze quickly under peoples noses. We had made it half way to our destination, and already most of our team was tired, worn out, and ready to pack it in. I hoped that the calories provided in our packed camp lunches would provide the extra umph needed to carry us to explore the night...explore....

...The little glen of trees in the distance looked cozy and comforting, a perfect place to spend the night. I was very particular when it came to picking a campsite for the night, but this one needed no second guessing. It had all the necessary features of a good campsite. Low lying flat ground for tents, tree coverage, some ridges to protect from the elements. It would be a good campsite. We skied the rest of the way into the glen and relaxed. Pulling our thermoses of tea out of my backpack I sighed. It had been a good quick escape. Had I tried a little harder I could have fooled myself into believing that this was a different time, but the time that it was in itself produced a smile on my face. We were not in Montana, we were far removed from Explore and though the sign of the 15th hole par 5 stood off to my right seemed out of place in a cross-country ski venture I soaked it all in and laughed to myself. To new things I told myself...

...I buried in deep into the bottom of the borrowed belongings. Though I was a senior intern, my memory at times still acted like a five year old, and thus I found myself at our campsite for the night, getting ready to sleep in Zach Vanderwalls down jacket and Ben's bivy sack. Out of all the things that you hate to forget on a winter campout, your sleeping bag probably ranks up near the top. For my defence it was a miscommunication between Zach and I, but in the end however you spelled it I was minus a bag and night approached...

...I awoke partway through the night a little cold. My feet were warm, and the warmth of my legs slowly trickled up to my head, but only wearing a small t-shirt I shivered to produce some extra warmth. Stubbornly I burried myself deeper into the recesses of my bag. I did not want to go through the hassle of finding the extra clothes. Eventually though, after 15 minutes of laying awake I dove into the bottom of my bag and dragged up a thin fleece blanket. Clutching it dearly to my heart I began to warm up. My REI tent felt like a second home. After so many nights in it over the years I felt more at ease in it then our new apartment at times. Our landlords thought we were crazy spending the night outside in the deep snowfall that had dropped itself into our world. I merely smiled to them and said, "but I love it." So off I went at 9:30pm into the dark to set up for the night. Sarah, with a slight apprehension of freezing slept with our blanket that we have since dubbed, "the brown bear." Our landlords awoke early in the morning to get ready for their day of work. They looked out on their backyards in slight disbelief. Not only was our tent set up, surrounded by snow, but the neighboring deer that wander in and out of their lawn had nestled themselves up next to our tent.

...We skied into a divide. The trail split into two directions and the choice of where to go lay in my hands. "There's a road up here, it circles around the place," my mother said. In the echoes of her words all I could hear was a voice of another time,

"I found the road, I found the road! Hey guys, I found the road!"

Merry Christmas everyone,

Merry Christmas

What profit is it to a man, if he should gain the whole world but forfeit his soul in the process? Or what is of more value then a soul?

Sarah and I made the first of many steps of settling ourselves here in the Comox Valley. We spent all afternoon moving into our new one-bedroom apartment. When we first looked at it we are both a little suspicious if the place would serve our needs. Will one bedroom really be enough? How can you have a partial kitchen? Now that we have moved a bit more stuff in we are realizing that it may not serve us, but we can serve it. Rather then forming our own demands on the place, I think we are beginning to see that we can live more simply and allow the smaller space to form itself on us.

This is the refreshing thing that comes when you move. You are reminded that you are a people on journey; that things will never fully bring completion. This reminder forces me too really look at life, I mean like really look. Though I would like to settle down for good, the forced change is a reminder of mercy and grace; it tells me that we have new chances, new opportunities, and that we actually hold in ourselves the ability to choose our own life. When life gets dreary, we become dissatisfied and the walls around us feel like they are cloistering us it is often because we are setting our minds on the wrong things, the wrong means, and the wrong ends and basically are missing the whole point.

I was walking tonight and I was reminded of this simple yet profound truth. Where your treasure is there your heart will be also. If you desire to be beautiful, you force your energies there. If you desire to have good stuff, you will be preoccupied in the pursuit of materialism. We choose our level of contentment. If life was really about the attainment of stuff then people really would not survive through the afflictions that come in life. Countless stories have been told about soldiers detained in prison camps for years with little space, little food, little belongings, little freedoms, and yet they come out better men for it. I want to spend this year focusing myself with the same diligence, with the same eyes, the same mind that these people have.

I want to go for a walk and see the sun as bright as it really is, to see the mountains as majestic as they are, to see the smiles on little kids walking by bring the real joy that it should. I want to actually hear the thump of a soccer ball being kicked, to smell the salt in the air at the ocean, and to be amazed by the littlest things that life offers. There is an infinite contentment to be found in reality, yet how often do we forfeit it because of false promises.

What is of more value then a soul?

Before I launch into this blog, I have to send out a quick note to one special reader. As you have probably noticed I have taken quite an absence from Xanga. I blame this on summer vacations and the novelty found in a new love called Facebook. When I returned this morning to Xanga I remembered its quality, the deepness I feel in writing actual sentances with actual words and meanings. If Facebook is a summer fling Xanga is definately a childhood friend. It even comes with those same old habits that friends have that they never change because they know they just irk you off. In the whole process of writing this paragraph I have had to restart the application three times because this keyboard goes bezerk. Thanks *cough* roomie.

There is a song that is all up-beat and it goes something like this "I'm walking on sunshine, woah-oh! And it makes me feel good!!" It would be cool if that was everyones summer song. I can't say it is mine. I realize as this summer surges on that I have much to be thankful for in life. I have many great friends who despite time and distance somehow make it back into my life. I have a quirky family who at times I feel like I am just coming to know, or perhaps they are just coming to know me. Sarah continues to surprise me and remind me of the fruitfulness and joy of relationship. Heck, I even just graduated from college. And all these things well up inside of me and do make me thankful. But as I turn out towards quarterlife I seem to be keenly aware of the divergent streams that life unknowingly takes us on. The people behind me, my younger friends and college students are still in the thralls of biblical education and some of them are into that stage in high school where they just become vastly different people. You just look at them and get sad and think "what the heck are you doing?" The people ahead of me, the ones who I look towards for hope and guidance are in such stages of flux that it makes my own steps feel so precarious. I feel that from here on in the roads are not paved with the solidity of gold but are thin, delicate layers of glass.

How do you walk forward when you feel deserted on a battlefield? The rallying cry of the officers ahead of you have faded into an echo as they have turned onto new paths of their own and you are left to discover your own path.

Yes, it is good to be back with Xanga. It always leaves me at this conflict and I realize that I can't really solve the world by typing or sharing, all I can do is return to my life, and walk humbly, prayerfully, and thankfully. I hope you all are well, I think of most of you often.