Whoa. Rough morning. I would say that today officially marks the coming and going of my first month as an intern, seeing as typically 30 days constitutes a month. Maybe that had something to do with the fact that I didn't wake up until 7:30am today? Probably not.
After a month of waking up at 7am, doing devotions, and spending time in prayer before going off to my volunteer site or starting the day with LJ, I have faltered. For the first time, not only did I wake up after 7am during a weekday, but I also did not have time for devos or anything of the sort this morning. Craziness.
I don't know if I made the right move skipping devos to get to work on time, instead of going in late, because I had to do devos, but I had to make a decision. We'll see what I decide after I think about it for a while longer.
I prayed almost the entire way into work. I prayed that I would be ready for what was coming my way today, especially since I didn't feel like I had properly prepared myself this morning. Turns out it was a pretty good day! God was definitely answering my prayers and taking care of me today.
When I got to work, there were only a few of us in on time. Percy went straight out to his site to continue to work on his shed, and the rest of us cruised for a majority of the morning. After running a couple errands, if you can call them that, we made it down to the Rosebud Dam to finally finish the job.
It was pretty crazy going down there, because we found the platform had taken a little beating. There were two pre-cut boards and about 12 joist hangers that my crew had put up before they left last time they were down there. When we got there, one of the boards was completely lost, one was floating along the far bank, and two or three joist hangers had been ripped off the platform. Great.
Recovering from the minor damage and finishing the job consumed the rest of our morning and all of our afternoon. We even worked through lunch. From what I had seen from the other time I had worked all day on this project, finishing the job went pretty typically, We worked hard with the tools we had, and at the end of the day, we finished the job.
There was one interesting thing that happened while we were out in the dam, though. We had just finished with the joist hangers and cross joints, and Ferg and I were starting to tack down the floor boards for this things, when all of a sudden the boys in the boat told us they would be right back. I didn't pay much attention to them because I was working on spacing the floor boards.
As I was finished tacking some of the boards, I realized the truck was pulling away. I guess they really did mean they would be right back. Then it dawned on me. Ferg and I are out in the middle of this dam, we are almost done with the floor boards we have and there isn't a boat near us to get back to shore when we finish with the few boards we had left. You've gotta be kidding me.
So basically, not only did the boys ditch us at the dam, but they took the boat back to shore and, thereby, stranded us in the middle of the dam, under the scorching sun, with no water. I felt like I was living out the movie Cast Away, but that was just me being dramatic. Still. Weird. The nice thing about this was that Ferg was stranded with me too. Not that I would ever wish that on somebody, but I figured, if we were stranded together, we may as well talk about some stuff.
We talked about what Ferg and the boys thought about me when I first walked in. He thought a little differently than Marky, but he still didn't seem to be very positive. I changed his opinion of me pretty quickly though! We also talked about drugs and how prevalent they are on the Rez. Some very interesting revelations there. Finally, we had another pretty in depth conversation about Sun Dances and the power of the witch doctor in the Indian Tradition. I found out that the current witch doctor is only a little older than I am. Crazy.
The boys made it back in the own time, and we finished the job. We all ended up leaving around 4pm, because there wasn't really a whole lot left for us to do with the dam being done and Percy's project in good hands.
I made it back home for a couple minutes, before Jonny called and asked if I wanted to go over to Greg's for some grilling. He was already there helping Greg clean up some stuff. I grabbed some buns and headed out the door. I was pretty excited! It's not often that we have the pleasure of grilled food around here.
When I got to Greg's, I had the pleasure of meeting Kelly's parents which was cool. We talked a little bit about what I did out here on the Rez for the summer, we ate, then we shot some guns. The .22 was where it was tonight. Greg's .22 rifle is a beauty, and Greg's father in law brought out a .22 pistol with a eye relief scope. Pretty sick.
We had a ton of fun with that, but after an hour or so, it was time to go to SF. We had promised some kids that we were going to be back in town to light off some fireworks with them, so we picked up Stephen and were on our way!
After about an hour and a half of blowing things up in SF, with some crazy experiences along the way, I decided to call it a night. Stephen agreed, but Jonny was more reluctant. Understandable, but it was pitch black out, and we had a sort of curfew to follow.
When we got home, I sat down and did my devos that I missed for the day, listened to some music, grabbed a snack, and now here we are!
I can't believe how quickly the time has gone by. I should probably call it a night soon. Thanks for reading!
God bless,
Brenden
Things I learned today:
1. The witch doctor in the area is the same age as me, and he has some scary forces working with him.
2. Aim low.
3. Acts 6.
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