Steve and I decided to sleep outside that night. We were tired of the
usual rigamarole of sleeping in staff quarters at camp with other
smelly dudes and needed some time to connect. We headed down
from the main dining hall and found an abandoned cabin still with
mattresses in it. Chris's wedding had ended the day before and Steve
and I finally had a chance to de-brief our lives for the past few
months. Before heading back to Guelph, I had decided to volunteer
at camp that weekend for a couple days as my new girlfriend was
also there and it would be the first time we saw each other since
the summer.
We both chucked our sleeping gear on to the bunk closest to the
door and made remarks about how nice of a night it was. The cool
smokiness of the fall air lent something to it and under the
starry umbrella of lanark county, we were sensing it in full force.
We decided to forego teeth-brushing and got right into our
sleeping cocoons and began to chat in the dark of the cabin with
the moonlight seeping in. I poured out my guts to Steve and he
listened. I told him that being with this girl was hard but that
we were giving it an honest go (even though she lived in Ottawa
and was still in high school and I was 5 hours away in 2nd year
of uni). Steve was silent about his romantic endeavours. So I
asked him and he responded that he was also scared and unsure
but that things were going alright. They lived in different parts
of Ottawa and Steve (being a slacker 18 year old) still didn't
have his license.
After talking for a bit, I realized that Steve was a good friend.
Steve didn't always appear to be the brightest light on the block
but that was just his big and somewhat oafy demeanour - he
really only thought deeply 95% of the time and didn't like
talking about things that didn't matter.
That same fall, a few weeks before the wedding and sleeping
in the cabin with Steve, I had a bit of an experience in my guelph
basement. I was tired of living a life that focused on things that
didn't matter. As cheesy and as over-Americanized it sounds -
God spoke to me.
