my life as a nomad

one for the ages

last weekend was....

i don't know. it's hard to describe. you'd have had to be there to understand why it was what it was. anyways, a brief recap:

Friday: picked mark up from the manchester airport sometime around 11. drove back, showed him around southern maine a little bit (old orchard beach, portland head light, etc) then trekked back home. ate supper, then went up to ll bean, where i finally got my sleeping bag that my folks had given me some christmas money for. so i was pretty pumped about that. mark picked up a nice fleece blanket that was bright yellow (of course). and it was morning and evening, the first day.

Saturday: woke up a little after 7. most of the morning was spent cleaning up the house, getting things organized and generally ready for the massive influx of people. went over to the church sometime after noon to get stuff set up over there, and then everybody showed up at the house sometime right around 2. i forget exactly when, because the whole weekend sort of got blurred together. anyhow, some people dropped their stuff at the house, while others were slated to stay at a nearby motel. their was a slight snafu at the motel when they (a) said they only had reservations for one room, (b) were trying to charge much more than the rooms had been reserved for, and (c) were generally unhelpful in resolving the situation. so since it was past lunch time, we got everybody over to the church for the grand feast that my mom had prepared for everyone, and then ben and i went back over to the motel to try and get things straightened out (which eventually did happen, but not without further drama).

meanwhile, back at the church, there was probably 20+ people hanging out and eating. 14 total drove out from ohio/pennsylvania/new york/connecticutt/michigan + plus a few friends from the portland area + me and my family = big time fun. food was awesome, but it was even greater to see everybody. i was making a timeline of who i hadn't seen in the longest... and it ranged from mark and ben (year and a half at least, maybe more) to matt and liz (just about a year exactly) to dave, luke, anna, kim, and kristin (1-2 months). anyways it'd been way too long for everyone, and it was superb to have the whole gang back together, with some other additions (mostly friends of ben's from various places).

after supper most people crashed for a nap... the majority of the gang had left ohio at around midnight on friday, so they'd been on the go for awhile. i wasn't really tired so i stayed up, hung out and played some games with whoever happened to be awake throughout the evening, shuttled people back and forth between the motel and the house, and got stuff ready to go for the hike.

new year's was actually pretty bland. we sat around in the living room and counted down to the new year, but most everyone was so tired that it sounded hilariously pathetic. you had to be there

Sunday: it was snowing. which probably should have tipped us off that the weather wouldn't be favorable for a sunrise, but ben is not the kind of guy to be deterred by something as simple (and possibly wrong) as a weather report. so we packed up and rocked out by around 1 AM. luke and matt stayed back at the motel... they were both still pretty beat from the drive out, and didn't relish the idea of going through the long drive and hike in the cold just to not see a sunrise, when they could not see a sunrise while sleeping. can't say as i blame them all that much.

we made it out to bar harbor without any trouble, and got started on the hike a little before 5 AM. it was still pretty overcast, but at that point we weren't going to back away from the challenge. so we hiked. and it was cold, and everyone was tired, and it was a long hike for that early in the morning (five miles one way), but everyone made it (alive, even). and we had hot chocolate and blankets to stave off the cold, which helped but not enough. especially since we were pretty much in a cloud... visibility was probably less than five hundred feet.

so, technically, we didn't see the sun rise. but, the sun did rise, and we were at the first spot in the U.S. that would be able to see it, so that counts for something. plus it was a pretty crazy-fun adventure. and everyone (13 hikers total... a lucky number) made it up and back safely. which was a blessing, for sure.

got back to the house for lunch... mom had tons of stuff for sandwiches, as well as some chili and leftovers from the day before. so it was a pretty superb spread. i was pretty much eating off and on the entire afternoon and evening, since i hadn't really eaten since around 4 on saturday. most everyone crashed for some hard-core naps after lunch, except for luke and matt who were fairly well rested. so they hung out at the house and we conducted our second annual cedarville university alumni poker championship (the CUAPC). luke was trying to defend his title and retain the t-shirt he had won the previous year, but he was unable to overcome my generally solid play, as both he and then matt eventually bowed out, leaving me as the 2006 champion. i think the home-court factor may have helped a bit, but who knows. at any rate, it was wicked good to just be sitting around, playing games, and having a grand time in general. felt just like the old days back at college


sunday evening everyone left, right around 10 PM. well, everyone except for mark, who didn't fly out until the next day. then on monday i dropped him back off at manchester, and it was back to square one. i finally got some sleep sunday night... after pulling a 40-hour marathon without any (7am saturday - 11pm sunday). but surprisingly, i never felt very tired at all... which i felt was a real blessing, as it let me take advantage of what little time i had to see everyone

i was more than a little sad on the drive back from the airport monday afternoon... i mean, it was such an amazing weekend, but it was so short. and it's always hard to say goodbye to the people you care the most about, because you never know how long or when you'll be able to see them again. and i have the absolute best friends in the world, who are also insane enough to drive all the way out to maine for less than a 36-hour stay in the state.

miss you guys.

but i was thinking about the weekend while driving back home, and i guess it sort of dawned on me that it was a sort of bittersweet taste of heaven. bitter because it was short, and everyone eventually had to leave and go their seperate ways without knowing when we'd see each other again. sweet because it was just so great to see everyone, and to just start up again like nothing had changed since our days back at cedarville. and i guess that's one of the things about heaven that i can identify with to some extent with while here on earth: the chance to see old friends, make new ones, relive our past memories and make new ones, and to feel the blessing of God on us the entire time. it was just a taste of what's to come, but a very poignant one. so it was short, and it was sad to see everyone go...


but we made the most of the time we had.
and in the end, you can't ask for anything better than that.
and it was the best.new years.ever.


*sigh*



-noonan-

posted by Patrick @ 8:36 PM