When the end of June arrived, the four of us guys migrated to the Staff House, now known as Wesley Lodge. Goodbye disgusting shower and the flea infested chemical toilet! We got indoor plumbing! The rest of the staff arrived and moved in. The ratio went from 4:0 to 6:25, men to women. Life was improving.

The prior seven weeks were devoted to getting the property in shape for summer camp. Most evenings, after a long workday and sailing / water skiing, we, few set about the task of building the long anticipated Fourth of July campfire.

Each year boats from around Owasco Lake would gather offshore to gather around our campfire, strategically located where the creek poured into the lake. It appeared to be safely positioned far enough away to keep embers from catching Galilee on fire, our signature Lodge, yet, close enough to the water that we could easily shove it into the lake if things got out of hand.

Dave, lifelong friend and best man at my wedding, was the chain saw guy. I was on the International tractor, using the front loader as an elevated platform and the hitch to drag logs. Clint, another dear friend, drove the dump truck, and climbed to the top of the stack to help Dave place the logs. We might have had one or two helpers, but mostly, it was the three of us.

We seldom found logs suitable for our efforts laying on the ground, so we went about the extensive woods searching for trees to fell and add to our stack. Dave would drop the tree and cut to length the largest logs to fit into the Dodge Power wagon dump bed. Clint would chain me up, first, to skid the logs, then, to attach them to my front loader so I could place them in the truck. The woods we worked could be anywhere between flat level to near vertical. Chains, cables, and winches, Oh my!

We’d take a load to the campfire site down by the lake, dump the load, and begin to lift each log onto the pile. We built a four-sided fire log cabin style, wide at the bottom, tapered to the top. We’d fill the interior with old firewood that had turned punky and couldn’t be used in any of the fireplaces. Our first year, the fire was built to 17 and a half feet tall. My final year, the campfire was built to 35 feet. Galilee was beginning to appear uncomfortably close.

It was not unusual for the coals to be a couple of feet deep and the fire to burn for four or more days afterward. Yes. It was a big campfire. And it got bigger every summer.

Dave, Clint, and I were a team. We worked well together, enjoyed each other’s company, and shared a humorous trait for pulling practical jokes. We pilfered another male staff member’s underwear, put them in zip lock bags, soaked them in beer, and froze them in the staff house freezer! We commandeered a younger clergyman’s canoe one night, hulled it up the dinning hall bell tower, and skewered it five stories high, for him to find the next morning as he came for breakfast. Alan, I’m looking at you. Priceless!

We hauled a sailboat to the reservoir at the camp entrance, placed the lifeguard tower over top the mailbox, and greeted Captain John and his family when they drove in from Ohio to spend the summer on staff. Yes, we were wearing life jackets. The mailman was also duly amused. NY State DOT had the audacity to place a stop sign at the entrance to our road. It made a very nice card table.  

These were but a tiny fraction of the high jinks we took part in while on the summer staff.

One June evening, as the last light of the day was fading and the three of us were dead tired, I was lifting the last of the logs to the top of the stack. Clint and Dave swung a log onto the pile and Dave commenced to cutting the notches to keep it from rolling and solidly in place.

In an absent-minded moment, Dave rested the idling chain saw on his thigh. Yikes! Blood went everywhere. I lowered him with the front loader, Clint threw him into the cab of the truck, and off they raced to the Emergency Room at Auburn Memorial Hospital. Forty plus stitches later, Dave returned a wounded soldier to the sympathy of the female staff. Clint and I just rolled our eyes.

Dave and Clint were joined with other male friends over the years; Rick, Dale, Scott, Larry, Bob, Mark, Carter, and others. Casowasco gave us a connection. Experience gave us strength. God wove us into a tapestry of grace that continues to hold me over four decades later.

Guys will be guys; for which I am thankful.

…

The pool this morning was calling me by name, gave me my own lane, and provided me with the necessary buoyancy of grace to swim my 15 laps. Other than to count the laps ticking by, it was hard to meditate, to focus my thoughts.

Thoughts of the recent Homeowners Association board meeting were interrupted by yesterday’s FLACRA’s all staff meeting. As the chair of the board, they insisted I be photographed presenting numerous awards to their respected recipients. I’m not that photogenic!

Breaking news, interrupted thoughts, thinking about my recent introduction to members of two small country churches where I agreed to serve part time in retirement. Did they like me? They seemed really nice. Would we come to love each other as a pastor loves their flock? Please, Lord; I hope so.

Most trips to the pool bring calm, clarity, focus. Today, not so much. Yet, I’m thankful and the laps give my muscles a good work out.

…

Bob called staff meetings each week on Sunday evening. Campers had moved in, parents left (either smiling or crying), and our staff needed to coordinate requests and activities. The craft room needed more supplies. The store was running low on Maple Walnut ice cream. Three campers were allergic to bees and had Epi pens in case they got stung.

Most staff meetings were in Bob and Ruth’s living room. We piled in laying on the floor or draped over the chairs, giving each other back rubs (my, oh, my). We laughed a lot and shared common misery, like tales of Saturday cabin cleaning. A toilet needed unplugged, additional sailboats needed to be brought out of storage, and the dock needed to be leveled (especially on hot days).

The schedule was posted such that a staff member was in attendance at every campfire each evening. We led the singing, guided the devotions, and closed with prayers. Rules were spoken, such as, “no put down phrases,” and “since everyone is new, you have the opportunity to be yourself and create the reputation you want to live with.” Good stuff, right there.

The rest of the staff and I learned how to live in community. How to express our needs. How to listen and respond with empathy. How to communicate, especially with members of the opposite sex. Yes, romances came and went, ebbed and flowed. We support each other and when there was a need, we all pitched in. When there was grief, we all responded with words of comfort and acts of kindness.

Christian community, I learned, is a beautiful thing. It can be found in a local church or an AA meeting just as it can be created and found at summer camp among the staff.

And then, there was Mary Jo.

She was new to the Staff and by this time, I was one of the veterans. My dad was an ordained pastor, appointed by Mary Jo’s father, the resident bishop. A resident bishop in the United Methodist Church has a lot of power, especially over who is sent where to serve which church. Compensation and steeple size matters. Politics and pride were in constant tension with the good-old-boys network. Yeah, back in the day, the bishop and his superintendents were all back-room cigar chomping white male  deal makers.

There are a lot of skeletons in them there closets.

They didn’t get a long. My dad was stubborn, a Don Quixote charging windmills of injustice, destined to short-term pastorates in small rural churches with tiny little steeples. Bishop Yeakel exuded power and authority, looked like he stepped right off a movie set, and was loved by all; except for those who crossed him. He was right at home in the bishop’s chair in are largest cathedrals, wearing his pointy hat and flowing robes.

To say it was chilly between Mary Jo and me would be an understatement.

After so many weeks of the silent treatment, following one Sunday evening staff meeting, Mary Jo pulled me aside, got right into my comfort zone and said, “Look. Your dad doesn’t like my dad. My dad doesn’t like your dad. But. That doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.”

I was stunned by Mary Jo’s stark honesty, her willingness to take risks for the sake of building a social network and our staff community, and her humility to swallow a healthy dose of pride. Yeah. Wow. “You’re right,” I said when the Spirit gave me a shove to break the deafening silence. “I’m willing to give it a try, if you are, too.”

The following day, Don has me using the backhoe to dig the footer for the staff house addition. It had to be straight, squared at the corners, and forty-eight inches deep to get the footer below the frost line. To this day, I still think a backhoe is a thing of beauty. In experienced hands, watching a backhoe work is like watching a maestro conducting an orchestra.

I wasn’t alone. Slightly behind me, my peripheral vision got a glimpse of Mary Jo standing, watching me dig. I turned, smiled, and shut down. “Good morning,” I said as I jumped down. I figured there was no better time like the present to start trying to be a friend. “Whatcha upto?” I asked.

“I always wanted to give that a try,” Mary Jo confessed. “It looks so cool.”

What an opportunity, I thought. “Hop up and let me show you how.” She sat in front of me. My arms wrapped around her and my hands guided her movement on the control levers. It was a little like that movie with the pottery wheel and music, but not really. It was more like two people who God had brought together to become friends.

Later, I was seeking a seminary to attend after I completed college. Mary Jo invited me to visit her in Dayton OH. She was going to be starting her second year at United Theological Seminary. Though accepted and tempted with generous financial packages, I didn’t want to attend where my dad attended (Drew in Madison NJ) or nearby Colgate (Rochester NY). I stayed with Mary Jo and slept on her apartment floor. She gave me the grand tour and introduced me to as many professors as she could find.

I was sold. If it hadn’t been for God working through Mary Jo, my life and call would have gone in entirely different directions.

Thank you, Lord, for the gift of Casowasco, for the people who became such important influences in my life, for lifelong friends, for community, for grace and love, for your call to be an ordained pastor.