Retreats and Woods and Things...

This past weekend I went on a youth retreat with my friend's church, which I enjoyed immensely. Except for the part of almost killing myself in the woods....Okay I'm exaggerating a bit. It wasn't quite that bad (haha), but I'll explain in a minute....

First of all it was an in-town retreat, which I was very glad of. I don't understand why all these youth groups think they have to go hours away to have fun. Seriously is that long car ride really worth it?? Plus if I forgot to pack something or if I was having some kind of dire emergency home was just a few minutes away. I could get away from home and yet have it close if I really needed it. Best of both worlds. Okay end of that tangent...;)

Anyways, the whole weekend was themed around self-control, which was really good. I really needed to hear some of those things and now it's just a matter of actually applying them. Plus we got to stay in one of the girl's really nice house. It had an amazing basement (which I am so jealous of) with this awesome ping-pong and kitchenette and everything. Plus I actually got to sleep in a bed rather than on the floor in some sleeping bag which would probably result in me tearing up my back or catching my death of cold....NICE. haha. Anyways so that was all good. Then came the woods....

If you don't know this about me already, I hate (I repeat HATE) walking through the woods. I am find when it comes to sitting on a porch and staring at them from a distance, seeing them on TV, or reading about them. However, just don't expect me to go walking through them if I can help it. Not only did we have to walk through woods, we had to do this little obstacle course some of the leaders had set up. Another thing about me. I suck at obstacle courses. I'm scared of heights, climbing, woods, and getting scratched and having a horrible infection set in. So yeah this little woods "adventure" was simply not for me. But I had to do it of course. I mean I sure wasn't going to stand at the edge of the woods by myself for the entire time. I'm not that much of a wimp....haha. So anyways the course started out with all of us being hooked to this rope and going down into this little ditch like thing. Then you (and the person in front of you helped of course) had to hoist yourself up this little hill. I say "little", but it sure didn't seem little to me. I put my foot up there and immediately slipped and fell back down (yes I'm probably the klutz of the year). "I'm too short," I complained, hoping they'd let me get out of doing it....They didn't. So the guy behind me had to basically lift me up onto the embankment thing and then I grabbed my friend's (who was already on the top of the hill) hand with one hand and held onto a tree with the other for dear life and slowly got myself up. Yes I survived. But boy was it dang embarrassing. Everyone probably thought I was some hopeless wimp or something...But it wasn't over yet of course....

Later on in the course, (and by this time my back was covered with dirt from crawling under logs and such) we came upon something that almost made me cry. A tree. Yes of all things I had to climb a tree. At first I seriously considered demanding to be unhooked from the rope, but I decided I could at least give it a try. To make a long story short, I made it (though with a lot of help from the people behind and in front of me and not before getting my foot untangled from the rope and almost falling on my face.) So yes I did survive. But no nothing or nobody is going to get me to go in another obstacle course in the woods. No WAY. But the rest of the trip was pretty dang awesome and I'm very very glad that I went. Basically it was worth having to climb that tree...;)

Later