November 22

With this last breathe of intellectual energy, I think it would be worthwhile to record the simple events of a simply, profoundly, wonderful Saturday.
As has been the habit of the last few weeks, I sleepily look at my clock after the second round of bells attempt to wake me up (post-snooze button.) I argue myself out of my soft, warm bed and into some loose, warm clothing.

I know I will regret it if I don't go.

This is the always the wining thought.
Today I decide it is cold enough to opt for driving the half mile or so to the Kauffman residence.
I arrive just in time for the blessing, as me and the other early-arriver's bow our heads and Isaiah leads us in prayer. Seating myself next to the thrice "retired" Rev. Al Lutz, I am immediately greeted with by Mary Kauffman with a plate piled high with steaming blueberry pancakes and bacon. Orange juice and hot tea garnish the feast, and I am soon joined across the table by Sam, and next to me by Brian. The conversations are always more filling than the pancakes (a hard battle) and today is no exception.
Somewhere in the midst of said conversation I am happily recruited to an after-breakfast leaf-raking party at the Lutz/Schmidt residence.
Warm and full, me and my fellow students gratefully clear the tables and chairs. We blow out the candles and load the dishes, piling the tablecloths in the laundrey room and folding up the extra tables; we know the routine.
Sam, Jared and I climb into the car, picking up Heidi at the corner as well. A quick swap of Heidi for Josh at the apartments, and a changing for me into more a more raking-friendly sweatshirt and wool socks, and we are off to the house.
I have never raked such deep leaves before. In the middle of the woods on top of the mountain, we are soon thigh deep in pools of reds and yellows. With more people than rakes, we scoop the piles onto blue tarps, drag them to the cliff behind the house, and toss the leaves over the ten foot bluff into the woods below.
I have never raked so many leaves before; I have also never finished a raking job so quickly before! The 15 or so of us manage countless tarp-fulls in no time, with Al running the leaf blower and wife Julie demonstrating how to unshell hickory nuts. In keeping with the years, Will and a few others jump off the cliff and into the ocean of leafs below. They dig around unsuccessfully for Sam's hat, apparently lost during the same stunt the previous year.
Somehow I manage to become some kind of mediator between siblings Brian and Kelly as they begin a rake-fight.
Soon we are gathered outside around the bratwursts, cookies, and chips prepared by Aunt Collyn Schmidt, heads bowed once again in grateful awe of our Creator.
Alicia sweetly prepares a London Fog for me, and I help her pass out the rest of the hot drinks around the fire inside the house, as the conversation turns to deep-sea life and Pterodactyls in the Congo.
As everyone slowly trickles out, to pursue other Saturday demands, Alicia invites me to study in the house that afternoon, although she will need to be on campus. I heartily accept the invitation, and escape for an hour or so back to the apartment and campus to change and gather supplies.
The afternoon is spent fruitfully at the feet of the aforementioned fire, with Aunt Collyn napping in her room, or reading her bible in the corner, while I am finally able to relax and focus on my work.
By God's grace I finally feel as though I am exactly where I am supposed to be, doing precisly what I am supposed to be doing, and am undaunted for a time by the worries of life as we know it.

Just an Ordinary Day

On the gravel path that leads down from the main campus to my apartment, a blue mechanical pencil quietly found me walking back. Waiting for me on the edge of the path, it stopped me with a soft-spoken whisper of God's constant and and perfectly-timed provision for me.
"Remember the last time you found a pencil on the ground? You had just run out of all of your other pencils, and were on your way to class. It, too, was unbroken and full of lead.
"Perhaps you hadn't given it much thought, but that pencil is almost out of lead."

--- --- ---

Having hit the wall that night as far as homework was concerned, I headed out of the library. The car was parked in the quasi-secret place under the chapel Max had shown me just a few nights before. I veered toward the side door of the chapel, just on a whim, thinking that I would steal a few minutes alone with God in the sanctuary. Upon approaching the door, I was met with the low, guttural sounds of a kind of melodious nature. Curiosity led me in to find three of my friends practicing on the stage.
James is on the drums, pounding out the beats wearing nothing but shorts and athletic socks. Brian;s tall frame leans over the electric bass, his shaggy blond hair curtaining his face dramatically. But Jonathan steals the show rolling back and fourth on the stage, screaming the words to the song and playing his electric guitar.
Post my initial laughter, and their song dedication to me, I settle myself into a seat in the balcony and accomplish some reading to the soundtrack of their talent.