Return from hiking - Part 2

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Garden of the Gods

Cataract Falls

I'll post some of my favorite photos later.

Return from hiking - Part 1

I went hiking this weekend. It was originally going to be a beginner's backpacking trip, but we ended up day hiking. The place we went to wasn't set up well for backpacking and it was hot, and it was hard to find info. The place we went to is called Garden of the Gods, it is a part of Shawnee National Forest in southern Illinois. On the way back we also stopped by Cataract Falls in western Indiana.

I went to Cataract Falls back in the beginning of January, when there was a huge amount of rain. So it was neat to compare the waterfalls to now (when it's so dry).

This is the upper Cataract Falls today:


This is the upper Cataract Falls back in January:


This is the lower Cataract Falls today:


This is the lower Cataract Falls back in January:


I'll be uploading my Garden of the Gods photos overnight and will post a couple in the morning.

Gazing - Adventure Slideshow

First run on the East Race

Video from my first time down the East Race. Sharon is in the lead, I'm behind her.

Visiting or dwelling?

Written while sitting on a rock next to a creek at my first campsite on the Fontana backpacking trip.

We have become a people of visitors instead of dwellers. We go to a place, see what there is to see, then move on to the next place. We treat our experiences in life like a TV show. We watch the church show, the friend show, the Bible show, the prayer show. When the half hour show or the hour and a half show is over, we move on. But something different happens when we dwell. We explore the finer details. we enjoy what is there. We listen, without an immediate expectation. We become a part of that place and allow it to become a part of us.

Walking in darkness

So hiking in a cave brings a whole new meaning to the word "darkness" They took away all the lights to let us experience total darkness, you can't see a thing. Total absence of light. As we hike through a cave for 3 hours, we are totally dependent on a hand full of lanterns to be able to find our way. We had a ranger in front leading us, and a ranger in back following us. We were completely in their care. Had something happened to them, we'd be hosed. Even with the lights, it would be a challenge for us to find our way out of a 350 mile long cave system. If we had lost the lights, our only option would be to sit and wait for help to come.

I think most of us, especially myself, lives in ignorance of the darkness we exist in. Our world is full of countless variables that we must navigate. We have some semblence of control over some things. I can choose to eat lunch or not. There are things that we have no control over, such as someone running a red light and crashing into us.

We do have a bit of light. I have some level of trust that at 5 am tomorrow my alarm will go off, I will get up, go to work, and in another week I will get a paycheck that I will use to pay my bills and buy food. Those are things that I have a reasonable level of confidence in. It's worked that way for the past 7 years, so there's a good chance it will work like that for at least the next week. But maybe it won't, maybe an accident will put me in the hospital. Maybe I'll lose my job. Maybe someone in my company will take off with all the money and there will be no pay check. There's no way that I can know or control those things. What I know about tomorrow is not 100% certain.

Even with some light, that doesn't mean that we know where we are going. I could spend the rest of my life working my current job and doing what I've done for the last 7 years, but maybe I might miss the opportunity of a lifetime. Maybe at one point the right thing to do is to change jobs, and my life will be much better. Maybe by taking a different path to work I'll avoid an accident that would leave me paralyzed for life. Maybe my next paycheck will have a bonus and that will enable me to do something life changing. Those are things that my light can't show me. I have to trust a guide as to where to go. I have to follow where he leads, because, even though I have my own light, I may choose the wrong path. I have to trust someone who knows the right path.

As I walked through the cave I considered all the different possibilities that could happen. An earthquake, the lamps going out, losing the group, falling into a pit. In the end, the only thing that I could do is follow the guide and use the light I had, and trust that those would lead to a place of safety.

Losing the battle to win the war

I'm a nerd, I'll admit it. I like history and yesterday I discovered a PBS show about Indiana in the Civil War. On one part of the show they talked about a general from Indiana who played a key role in the Civil War. The Northern troops were spread out and Washington DC was left lightly guarded. A confederate force started moving towards Washington DC and the only force available was this Hoosier general and his poorly trained troops. This general took his troops and got in the way of the confederates and took a stand. They were beaten, but they bought enough time for other troops to reinforce Washington DC. It was said that this general and his men accomplished more in their defeat than most did in victory.

So a couple of weeks ago I went kayaking. I'll admit, I had some pride issues. I was convinced that I was going to be the first HCC member to never swim. I was scared when I put on the water, but I think many times that my fear isn't so much about death or getting hurt as it is about failing. I really didn't want to blow it and I was afraid that I would. It took me all of 15 minutes on the river, directly across from the put in, to swim. My worst fear came true. As I saw on the bank of the river catching my breath, I struggled with myself. I was trying to figure out if I had the courage to ferry across the river back to my car to drive home. Somewhere I found the courage to get back in my boat. Then, somewhere I found the courage to roll my kayak twice, just to remind myself that I can do it. I didn't realize it until later, but I think I accomplished more there than if I had never swam. My fears came true and I kept going.

I think many times in my life I've never tried because I was afraid I would fail. That can be true in many parts of our life, whether it's with relationships with the opposite sex, jobs, adventures, and even our relationship with God. We don't try to push the limits because we're afraid that we'll get hurt or it won't work out. So we sit still and just try not to rock the boat. But when we do that, we fail to live and to experience all that could be. One of God's greater Graces to us is not just that He forgives us if we fail, He gives us permission to fail. No, God doesn't want us to fail. But He understands that if we don't fall down then we never learn to walk. It's simply part of the process and if we don't engage in that process, we'll never mature.

It's ok to struggle, struggling is good. Struggling means that we're meeting resistance, things are getting hard, but we're still going. We fall down and get back up. We end up swimming, but we get back in the boat. We get our pride handed to us shattered in a million little pieces, but we refuse to just sit there with the broken pieces of our heart. We persevere because we refuse to settle for mediocrity, we want to experience the fullness of what God offers us.

I struggle and many times I fall. There's been many battles that I've walked away from without trying to fight back. But there are also battles that I continue to fight. It's hard and it's scary, but I'm struggling.

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in that grey twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat." - Theodore Roosevelt