Tests & Trials?
This past weekend, my son and I went on a scouts camping trip. The location wasn’t that far from home…a big park a few cities south of us in our same county, but further west. I had no reason to believe that this trip would be anything unlike the other trips I’ve been on, which were all good.
However, on the way heading west, a strange event occurred. I was on my way to my mother’s which was on the way west and from which I could easily get to the park. While driving and eating the chinese food we picked up, I began to experience a strange flush. It was like the kind of pins and needles sensation that you feel when your foot has fallen asleep and you try to walk on it. The difference was…the pins and needles were fiery hot like a million little hot pokers.
It started at the crown of my head and spread to my face, neck, shoulders, and just headed down through my entire body. All of a sudden, I felt like my insides were burning up, but my skin felt cool. Of course, the first thing I thought about was all the hospital based dramas, like House, and Grey’s anatomy. I remembered one such show…I think it was on House, where they said a patient’s blood was heating up. This is what I felt was happening to me because it was creeping through every limb in my body. Eventually, my face began to look a bit red to me…flushed; and that’s not easy to see considering my good, natural tan.
I called my mother who tried to calm me down, and told me to drink whatever water I had available. When I got to her house, she took my blood pressure, which turned out to be normal, and gave me some chewable aspirin, and I chilled for awhile until it began to go away.
Afterwards, we left and went to the park. Our setting up of the tent was an unusually calm event, as my son usually gets frustrated and ends up frustrating me with his failure to listen and follow instructions. But this time, it went very well. A preview of what was to come?
So Friday night, it was drizzling all night. The tent was all set up; we turned in relatively early, did our reading, and went to sleep. At about 1am, I wake up after being half asleep listening to the rain on the tent, and I check on my son, and he wakes up and says he feels wet. Come to find out…rain is coming through the back of the tent.
So we get up; I move the mattress; put down some towels and another comforter so my son is no longer feeling wet, and we attempt to return to peaceful slumber. But no sooner than we start getting comfortable, then we discover that the airmattress is deflating. I shake my head and chuckle, saying…”Ok…let’s go get in the car.” So my son and I go to the car, thinking that we can lay back in the seats and sleep. We were wide awake by that time, plus it was humid out, as it had stopped raining. So we take the Narnia book, and I turn on the car and the ac and the overhead light, and we start reading. Shortly thereafter, I turn off the ac and the car, and just leave the light on. We read one chapter…just one chapter, and the next thing I know, the overhead light dims. “Uhoh,” I say, “I’d better turn this off.” So I turn off the overhead light, and try to start the car. No go. Battery is dead. Great.
We sit there. I lay back in the seat, and lil man does too. The security guard comes along, and I let lil man go on the rounds with him, since he still can’t get back to sleep. I doze. They return, and lil man asks to go sit with his friend Zach in the campfire circle, as Zach and his brother are there because they can’t sleep either. I tell him only if he uses his library voice and doesn’t disturb anyone.
He returns at 4am saying he’s done, and is ready to sleep. Meanwhile, I find out later that one of the camp leaders had to get up and tell them to be quiet because they got too loud. So we doze off, and 6am rolls around. I had volunteered to help with breakfast at 6:30. My son says he sees someone there, but I say I will go in a bit and drift off again. I’m late of course. I woke at 7 and barely got myself over there.
After the breakfast festivities were done, I go to see if the car will start. After getting one of the pastors to jump it, I let it run and check all the fluids, fill the battery with water, and pump up the tires which were at half the inflation they should have been at.
After the car is going good, I drive around to where my tent is, and attempt to hook up the pump to blow up the mattress. Just as I had blown it up, and was putting away the pump; I turn to grab the mattress and keep it from blowing off the car, and find that it has deflated again. I repeat the process just to be sure, and realize that the mattress, which is brand new…is no good. Now I’ve got to take it back to Kmart, where my friend who gave it to me, bought it. I’m just shaking my head, and chuckling at all of this, like…”What’s up with this, God?”
So my son spends an hour running around trying to find a parent he knows that will agree to take him to the water park, where most of the campers are going. He gets his hookup, and I leave with a bag full of stuff to shower with, as I’m determined to get into the bath house in the adjacent camper section of the park, by hook or by crook. I’m not staying 2.5 days in the park without a shower.
I head to the store which is east of the park, and upon getting there, I’m told by the service desk clerk that because I don’t have the receipt, I have to find the exact same product, price and style or they will not exchange it. Of course, I had a full size, and they had a queen and two twin size mattresses. I speak to the manager about getting the two twins, which are on sale, and paying the difference…she says “no go.” Kmart now refuses to give store credit on their own defective products if you don’t have the receipt, so even if it is a gift, they will not take it back unless you find the exact same product to exchange. So I had to have the girl call the next store which was twice the distance away in the next town…and go there to get it.
On the way, I stop at a Dollar General to get something, and stop in a Jamaican restaurant next to it that I know. I order a red bean soup. While I’m standing there, I say to the owner (an older female), “There’s no pepper in this soup is there?” She says no. I tell her that I don’t want any dumplings in the soup. She says she wrote a note to the cook and told him.
So I pay for the soup and go to the other Kmart. After picking up the mattress, I’m headed back west towards the campground. I open the soup and hit a bump, spilling it on myself, but I don’t care because I’m still in my grubby clothes and haven’t showered yet.
I’m looking at the soup, and it’s sort of a greenish color, which is strange, considering I ordered RED bean soup. So I taste it. It’s full of pepper. I had told the woman I didn’t want it if it was peppery. I scoup down into the soup and pull up a spoon full of tripe. I’m like…”What’s this?” I scoop again….there’s dumplings! And…not a red bean to be found? So now I’m talking to God again. “Ok, Lord…this is a joke right? Cause if this is her red bean soup….I’ll never go to this restaurant again.” Turns out, after a bit of discussion about the contents above, that she gave me the wrong soup. I get my soup and head back to camp.
The rest of the night was uneventful, but the following morning when we broke camp, I stopped at my BF’s house, as she lives in that city. After talking to her sleepy self in her robe at the door, we determine that she’s too tired to do breakfast, and I turn to leave. My son was sitting in the car the entire time, playing the radio, and with the ac running. I get to the car and start fussing at him about the volume, and about the fact that he had the radio on, when I had already told him not to do this, considering that the battery had died two nights before. Sure enough…the car won’t start…and my BF’s already gone back to bed. I did not want to wake her whole household, so I told him that he’d better pray that there was enough juice in my recharger to jump that car or he was in serious trouble. It did. Praise God. So we got home with no other events, and rested. Hope your weekend was blessed. Peace.
Recent Comments