Not until we sing Kumbaya.

My spring break is coming to an end. I am sitting on the couch soaking up the last minutes of vacation before heading to bed, and I have to offer up a big thank you to God for such a wonderful, restful week. I have mentioned many times before that I feel incredibly blessed to be a part of the school community where I work. Even on spring break, on our week of rest and renewal, we teachers wanted to spend time together! And we did just that, on a three day "camping" adventure. I feel like the quotes are necessary--it wasn't actual camping, since we stayed in cabins. However, in our defense, the cabins were billed as "rustic," and my friends know that I basically grew up as a member of Troop Beverly Hills, so "rustic" is not a word typically found in my vocabulary. Don't get me wrong; I love nature. God created it, so what's not to love? I just also love things like sleeping on a soft surface, and being clean. And being away from spiders. I'm a suburban-raised girl, what do you expect?

Anyway, my friends and I spent three wonderful days up in the hills/mountains of Van Buren, Missouri. We stayed in charming cabins that were built in the 1930s by the Civilian Conservation Corps; we cooked and ate all of our meals outside; we basically did whatever we wanted and it was incredibly restful. I loved waking up and not having any set plans for the day. At home, I feel so rushed all of the time. I feel like I'm constantly anticipating the next activity, thinking about my next steps, to the point that I don't take the time to really be in the moment. I am so thankful for those three days in the Ozarks, and I'm thankful that I was able to intentionally be in every moment there. Because there were some pretty great moments!

One thing I experienced there that is sort of a metaphor for my need to slow down is the joy of being in nature with children. I love and envy the wonder with which they live their lives! On Thursday afternoon, I took a walk by the river with my friend's two-and-a-half year old son E. I worried the whole time about where the path was leading us, whether we needed to turn around and wait for E's mom at the picnic table where she left us, etc. I should have taken a page out of E's book; he was happily experiencing nature at his own pace. When was the last time that we were perfectly content just throwing rocks into a river? Or listening to the rhythm of a woodpecker, or the drops of water falling on rocks? Or poking the green, carpety moss that lined the rocky path? Such things, such little pleasures, just seem too unimportant to be included in my busy day.

Later that day, I ended up on another walk of sorts with a group of kids. We had discovered a beautiful natural spring while goofing off at a nearby playground, and it was just so fun to watch the kids explore this space. They excitedly crawled to the back of a damp cave in the rocks. They ran fearlessly along the mossy trail. They eagerly climbed every stone staircase that led down to the water, and they didn't care when their shoes got a little wet. When one staircase led the kids to a small, grassy riverbank, they were overjoyed to discover a new place to play!

Friday morning, my friend J and I decided to adopt that child-like fearlessness. On our way to the playground with our group, we noticed a stone staircase cut into the side of a hill, and we didn't think twice about finding out where it led. That burst of curiosity led to an hour of purely uphill climbing that I'm not sure I would have agreed to had I known what I was getting myself into! J and I kept saying to each other, "let's just go around that corner over there and then decide if we should turn around," and "surely the hill will peak any minute!" Well, basically I've decided that I'm going to tell people we climbed a mountain when I recount this tale later on. It got to the point where we just had to laugh at ourselves. What had our boldness gotten us into? I'm pretty sure my ears were popping by the time we reached the peak. My calves were so happy when we began our descent.

I think J and I were both happy to spend an hour out in nature, just the two of us and our Creator. The ground was covered in a blanket of brown leaves, and the trees were still bare from winter, but there was something so beautiful about the bareness of the forest and the solitude we found at the top of that mountain. We hiked at a pretty steady clip, but we were child-like in our tendency to stop and examine sparkly rocks.

That evening, it started to rain, and we found ourselves with nothing to do except stay in our seats around the campfire and work together to toast the perfect marshmallow. There we were, commiserating together about the off-and-on showers and the cold snap that had set in around lunchtime, and experiencing yet another lesson in slowing down as we struggled to toast our marshmallows instead of lighting them on fire (particularly hard for me, as I love a charred s'more!) What a truly perfect night.

As I return to work and to my hectic schedule, I hope that I can find the time every day to slow down and to experience each moment with the child-like wonder I experienced in the woods. I think it is especially meaningful that I had these slowing-down experiences during Lent, when I am trying to be more intentional about my slowing-down, being-still time with God. I pray that He will open my eyes to times in each day when I can let go of my distractions and just be in His presence.