I just had one of the best weekends with some of the best people out there, and I loved every second about it. We took a little weekend off the grid at Lake Champion, a Young Life camp in New York. It was a perfect weekend with long days and short nights for turning friends into best friends, discovering your true self, growing in faith, enjoying good music, dancing the nights away, and making unforgettable memories.
Only a little over three-hour car ride from Penn State campus, we started our drive on Friday afternoon. We stopped at Wendy's for dinner, where I was disappointed to discover that not everyone gets the 4 for $4 with a Frosty instead of a drink, but I didn't hold it against anybody. The rest of the car ride flew by as we spent most of it jamming to old-time Taylor Swift and other classics from our childhood. Thankfully, the rest of the weekend was filled with plenty of opportunities to scream some really good songs at the top of our lungs. At each meal, we sat around a small circle table with light music playing in the background. We enjoyed each other's presence and some delicious homemade meals, needless to say, better than the dining halls on campus. But at least one song per meal, everyone would stop eating and all 500 plus college students in the dining hall singing loud and proud. We sang along with a duo band called "Sawyer" as they played and sang a variety of songs for us a few times a day. They were super talented girls, to say the least. As if we hadn't had enough, we sang more around the campfire one night.
All this singing that was going on, you know there was dancing too. A dance party happened one night, where my new go-to dance move was displayed. At Lake Champion, I learned the true value of the Macarena because you can do it to literally any song. This is so valuable to me personally because I can't dance, but I can do the Macarena. As much as I don't like dancing, I think I have to say one of my favorite parts of camp was square dancing. I had never done it before, and I think my experience showed, but no doubt I still had a good time. It was a fun way to unwind and learn something new with a lot of awesome people, and that combination made for a fun night.
Singing and dancing was awesome, but our speaker was better than awesome. He was an emotional guy and easy to listen to. He shared an incredible message each time he spoke to us. He would read a story from the Bible and then would share a powerful message that related to us as college students. My personal favorite was his message about how often of our lives are lived on the surface, sometimes without even knowing our desire to live below the surface. He encouraged us to start to look below the surface and go a little deeper. This hit me pretty hard because I feel like I do live that way, and it encouraged me to go out of my comfort zone a little bit.
A few dance parties, a lot of Taylor Swift songs, one 30 oz carton of Goldfish, four amazing messages, and an infinite number of memories later, I am officially thankful that I got to spend 39 hours with so many amazing people at Lake Champion. Needless to say, we loved this weekend for us.
