With the girls coming over to spend the night, the plan was to send them home with family the next day after the baptism. Great plan, but there was a flaw: Nate. I love my son too much to abandon him to a day long estrogen festival. At this age, he needs some man-time. So I talked it over with him and we formulated our own plan. Friday night we watched Pirates of the Caribbean. Good movie, even if it is a little old for him.
Then on Saturday, while the girls giggled and played dress up and had tea parties and all other sorts of fluffy fun, we went to Prairie State Park and hiked the Drover's Trail. It was a blast. Eighty-five degree heat, no trees, no water but what you carry in, and bison. Yes, bison. Huge, hairy, manly bison. And let me just add that there is no such thing as a girly bison. The bulls are over a thousand pounds, and even the cows are intensely manly, if for no other reason than that they can kill you if you play with them.Anyway, our adventure started out with a close encounter with the bison. The herd was hanging out on the trail, so we approached with caution hoping that when they sensed our presence they would move. I was surprised at close we could get without startling them... And for the most part, the plan worked perfectly. The only exception is that when they did finally move, they moved in our direction! Not good.
"Nate, move faster!"
They weren't charging us, they were just curious about who we were. But when you're only seventy-five feet away, its still a bit scary to see about a million pounds of muscle and horns coming right at you. So as they meandered directly toward our position, we beat a hasty retreat back to the visitor's center which was the longest quarter mile I've ever had to travel. Since the Drover's trail is a loop, we decided to travel in the opposite direction and hope the bison had moved on when we got back to that point.
Did I mention that there is ZERO shade on the Drover's Trail? There are however, prairie chickens. I've never seen a prairie chicken, but we found three on our hike, which was really cool since they wait until you're almost on top of them before they break cover. The second one was so close when it took off that Nate and I were both startled enough to take a step back. Then an amazing thing happened; Nate found a chick. A prairie chick. That's just unheard of. We could go back on that trail a thousand times and not see it. I walked right over it. I think any adult would, but Nate's still pretty close to the ground, so he spotted the movement right away. I caught it and we took a picture with it... beautiful. The staff at the visitor's center was astounded. They asked for a copy of the picture.By the time we got back to the place where the bison had blocked the trail, they'd moved on, so we had a clear shot to the visitor's center. The prairie was beautiful.
The prairie was also hot and muggy. We'd been on that trail for about two hours in the heat of the day and we here scorched, so our next stop was the creek that runs through the park. We soaked our feet, drank some water (I filtered it first!) and just relaxed for a bit before getting back in the car and heading for home. On the way out we stopped to help a box turtle cross the road. I love turtles. So does Nate. And, honestly, none of our adventure would have been worth it if he hadn't been there to share it with. I hope we can have many more outdoor adventures like it in the future.
The rest of the afternoon was pretty uneventful, but church was great. Pastor John brought a great message, Lloyd and the band were ON, and, of course, the whole family (Mandi's side) was there to watch the baptism. Anna and Nate did fantastic. The only hitch was that we got confused as to where the person taking pictures should stand, so all we got was their backs. Oh well. Being able to baptize your own children is one of life's greatest blessings. It's hard to describe, but it feels like you've done something right. And I don't mean that you didn't drown them, I mean that for the duration of their little lives it feels like, as a parent, you're not a complete failure. I think you have to have kids of your own to understand what I mean by that. Anyhow, I can't wait to see who they become as Christ molds their lives. Thank you, Jesus, for a fantastic day.
