Lakeside Antics

I am currently at annual conference in Lakeside, Ohio. This is a yearly, regional meeting of methodist pastors and lay people, for the purpose of...well, I don't know what the purpose is, really. For me, the purpose is talking with as many people as I can (guess you'd call that "networking"; I call it being an extrovert in a whole auditorium filled with people). I think there are around 2,500 of us here is this little lakeside community (appropriately called "Lakeside", right on the shores of Lake Erie). I am not sure about that statistic, because I overheard some random person saying it today...who knows if he was making it up or not, but it sounded like a reasonable guess to me. This pretty much means that every where you go, there are people--lots of them, crammed into a small space. I am staying at the "youth house", meaning every where I go there are lots of young people, being loud and crazy and trying to impress each other. For all the struggles of life, I count my blessings that I am no longer a teenager. What a time of insecurity and searching for identity and meaning. At least I know who I am now. I may not always like what I find, but I do feel more secure in my own skin than I did back then.

It is truly beautiful here at Lakeside. I went for a walk tonight, along the dock and around the water. It is amazing how a lake can look so like an ocean at times. And when the sun is setting and seems to sizzle into the water as it goes down, well that is a view straight from the prettiest part of Heaven.

I came up to Lakeside early this year. The conference technically started tonight (Sunday). I got here yesterday afternoon. I promised my friend Tammy Jo that I would help her set up the pray room here at conference. Tammy Jo was delayed in getting here yesterday and finally made it around midnight. We pretty much stayed up all night getting the prayer room together. It was worth the effort, though, because it looks amazing and is a very peaceful and worshipful space. Still, I cannot remember the last time I went to bed as the sun was coming up (literally).

The other eventful moment of Lakeside so far has to do with my cell phone. I dropped it in my dog's water dish. I was carrying a pile of stuff (as I was packing to leave), with my phone on top, and the phone fell off, just as I was walking past the water dish and "plop". If I had tried to throw the thing into the water dish, I would have missed. But when it fell, at just the right time, at just the right angle, it landed perfectly. I pulled it out right away, dried it off, and it seemed to work alright still. Slowly but surely, it began its ascent toward death. People would call and I could not hear them. Strange colors started appearing. Error messages. Then finally, nothing. So, I had to find a Verizon nearby and buy a new phone. Since it is my only phone (no land line), it is kind of a necessity.

The thing I have learned in the past few days is that you never really know what is coming next in life. You have to be flexible. You have to take the good with the bad. Sometimes you stay up all night doing something good for others. Sometimes you have to spend money that you didn't plan to spend because you did something stupid. That is just the way life goes. Maybe that is what life is all about, anyway: the unexpected things, the things that catch us by surprise. Maybe that is where character is formed, in how we respond and learn from the bends in the road. I keep telling myself that...like when I forgot to bring bedding and towels with me to Lakeside yesterday and had to run to the store and buy something cheap to sleep on and bathe with. There is always something happening...but that is what makes life interesting. And who would want it to be boring?