Into the wilderness

I had it all planned out.

Leave by 2:30, hit the 89A junction by 4:00 and watch God lead us with bright sunbeams to the exact camping spot He had saved for us.

Are you surprised to hear that we left at 7? 7pm. It's practically dark by then! And I had already started to feel like we shouldn't even go. For starters, I looked nothing like a camping girl with my rebellious hair and stupid clothes. My one friend goes camping and always looks much better in the pictures than I did standing before my mirror. Plus, the house was getting dirtier by the second and we didn't even know if we would find a camping spot.

Frustration rose as I convinced myself that it was a ridiculous idea. Find God in the wilderness? Whatever. How could I even know for sure that God had inspired this little camping extravaganza anyway?

My husband was this close to giving up himself. But he smiled--a real, genuine smile proving his ability to fight the good fight--and said he really wanted us to go and offered to help me. He did the dishes while I changed my clothes--seven times. And then by the time the sun went down, we were ready.

We made great time and everything but by the time we hit a little town about 30 minutes from our destination, we somehow got confused and drove the wrong way through the town--twice. My husband was smart enough to ask for directions (which was helpful because I hadn't even noticed that it was the second time we had seen the same art gallery) and found that we weren't far from our path. In fact, we had just misread one sign. We thought it said "ONE WAY," but didn't realize that it didn't apply to us. All we had to do was go back and turn right.

And that's kind of why we were on this road trip to begin with. We had started our life together headed in the right direction. Sure it wasn't exactly like we had planned (my clothes weren't quite right back then, either), but we went anyway. We trusted and we went. When it came to make some big decisions, we misread a sign and went around what felt much like the circle that winded through that little town.

We weren't so quick to stop and ask for directions back then, though. We got a decent ways off from our path. And true to the camping analogy, I hadn't even noticed til it was almost too late.

This trip was all about re-aligning ourselves. And wasn't perfect. And it was messy.

We searched and scoured for an open campsite that felt secluded and almost settled until we made a last-ditch attempt to find the perfect spot. And although there was no sunbeam or voice from heaven, we found campsite #1 and were shocked at our fortune. We set up camp in the dark (I am still laughing as I think about us boiling water for about an hour over the campfire) and then hit the sleeping bag before we could even get romantic. Morning was beautiful until the bees swarmed the honey we had left out and I had to hide in the car because of my allergy.

There were so many opportunities to throw in the towel. To cry and quit and just give up. But we had each other and trusted that God had us. And in the end, that's exactly what we needed to find in the wilderness. And looking back, that's exactly what we found.