Elementary Retreat At GLBC

This last weekend, I helped out with an elementary retreat at Green Lake Bible Camp. I was really excited, because I've been yearning for camp since September. However, I had no idea what the retreat actually was. Early last week, Danielle, one of my friends who is on the summer staff for camp, told me I should help out, because they needed help and I'd be good at it. I agreed. Throughout the week, I found out a little bit more about the retreat, such as when I have to be there, that they needed a guitar player and more people to help, and that's actually all I found out. It dawned on me that I might have to be the guitar player. That was a little unnerving because my confidence level regarding my guitar proficiency is at or near zero. To ensure that I could not be the guitar player, I "forgot" to bring my guitar. However, when we were going over the schedule and creating the song list for the weekend, Linnae, the program director, asked who could play guitar. "You can, can't you?" I asked her. She said she could fake it. I'm not entirely sure what that means in regards to playing guitar. Anyway, she agreed to be the guitar player, I guess, but when she looked at the chords for one of the songs, she became flustered. "An E-slide? What's that?"

"E-slide? That's easy. You just play an E higher up on the neck," I answered. As soon as those words left my mouth, I immediately regretted it. Everyone turned their heads towards me, and I realized that I had just been named the guitar player. Since I didn't bring mine, we had to find a guitar. We found one (it was pretty nice, actually - nicer than mine, anyway) but we couldn't find a pick or a capo. A couple of the songs that we chose needed a capo, and didn't sound very good without one, so we sang those a cappella. It turns out that those songs sound horrible a cappella - lesson learned. Since we couldn't find a pick, I had to strum with my fingers. I'm horrible at strumming with my fingers. After the last song session, my fingers were bleeding.

As the kids were showing up, we would take them outside so they could play. They had some kickballs to play with, which is really all you need to entertain young children. "The only rule is that you do not kick or throw the balls towards the lake," I announced. Two minutes later, I was up to my thighs in lake water, retrieving a rogue ball. I wouldn't have had much of a problem with this, except that I could only roll my pants up to my knees.

That night, I couldn't sleep. My kids could sleep. That's actually why I couldn't sleep. One of my kids was snoring extremely loudly. That kept me up. Like any teenager, I started to text people, telling them I couldn't slip. Then I remembered I'm not actually a teenager, but I was too tired to feel shame. Eventually, the kid stopped snoring, and I drifted off into a peaceful sleep. That is, until about half an hour later, when I woke to the sound of a crying child. I went over to where it was coming from and found one of my kids on the floor. "What happened?" I asked.

"I fell out of my bed," he sniffled. This boy had been on the top bunk.

"What?! Are you okay?!" He didn't answer - he just cried. "Can you come out to the hallway with me?" I asked.

He tried to stand up, but couldn't. "No," he replied. Oh. He can't get up. That's not good at all. At this point I was thinking that he broke something. It was 1:00 in the morning, so the nurse wasn't there. I was on the verge of panicking. Then I thought he'd have been crying louder had he actually broken something. Remembering that one has to risk it to get the biscuit, I said, "I need you to come out into the hallway with me. I'll carry you if you can't walk." He stood right up and followed me into the hallway. "How long were you laying there?" I asked.

"A long time." Well, that wasn't true, because I had only fallen asleep a half hour ago.

"Okay, you're holding your side - does anywhere else hurt?"

"No, just my side."

"Alright, do you want a drink of water?" I led him over to the water fountain and he took a drink. "Do you want to sit for a little bit, until you feel better?" I asked.

"Yeah." Not even a minute later, he stopped crying and said he felt better. I asked if he was sure and he said he was. I led him back to our room and moved his stuff to a bottom bunk. He got into bed, and I got back into mine, and he started to cry again. I waited about five minutes before I went over to his bed. "Are you sure you're feeling better?"

"Yeah."

"Oh, well, alright then. Goodnight." He kept crying for fifteen more minutes, and then fell asleep. So, at about 1:30, I finally fell asleep for the night. By 6:45, all of my kids were awake and talking to each other. Then, Isaac's cabin (Isaac was another counselor) burst into my room wielding pillows. It was a sneak attack, and my cabin had no chance. After they left, I gathered my kids and devised a counterattack. We stormed into Isaac's room, but they weren't there. "Okay, guys, hide. We'll wait for them to come back, and then ambush them!" A few minutes later, Isaac came back, but not his cabin. He told us that their room was too hot, and they moved into a different room. I was disappointed, because I was pretty proud of my ambush-counterattack strategy, but we stormed into the other room to satisfy my kids' longing for revenge. Isaac's cabin was quick to react, though, fending off our forces. I called for a retreat, and we fled back to our room, waking up the other cabin on our floor. I've decided that military strategist is not a career I should pursue.

Also, there were a few fantastic quotes by kids from the weekend. These two are the best. The first is taken way out of context, so don't judge me or my fellow counselors.

"Somebody please kill me!"

"Nobody step on my sweatshirt! My glasses are in there and they are doing some funky things."