It began as one of the worst days of my life. I’d just finished a week of work at a summer bible camp in Rome, New York, and I was looking forward to spending half the weekend asleep. Much to my chagrin, that was not meant to be.
That warm Saturday morning at 7 a.m., I was awoken by one of the loudest noises I’d ever heard. Though I was momentarily terrified for my safety, I quickly remembered that another group that had been using our campgrounds for the week was scheduled to leave that morning. Evidently, I was bearing witness to some sort of horrid departure ritual in which the campers wailed like banshees to, I dunno, summon Cthulhu or something. More likely than that, it was to wake each other up, along with all of the deceased in a 50-mile radius.
Groaning, I waited and waited for the chaos to subside. Now, if you know me personally, you know that I next to never get genuinely angry at anyone. You’ve probably only seen me mildly annoyed. That said, the one thing that will set me off is needlessly being kept from sleeping. If there’s someone next door playing loud music, or, God forbid, a cacophony of apocalyptic proportions taking place right outside my cabin door, I’m liable to go Super Saiyan (or, as in this case, lay there wrapped in blankets and loathe all of existence like a human burrito of agony and despair). Needless to say, I wasn't exactly tickled.
Anyway, an hour later, those folks, bless their hearts, were still going strong. I’m pretty sure the following week’s newspaper read that about a hundred had been hospitalized for throat and lung injuries associated with sustained use.
Sure enough, they eventually left and things quieted down. By that point, I knew I had no chance of falling back asleep, so I decided that I might as well bite the bullet and get on with things. It was a typically awkward morning after that. I lost my glasses, stumbled over to the bathhouse, walked into the showers half naked to find a bunch of my friends cleaning them. You know, the usual. You don't quite know what “awkward” is until you find yourself in a bath house in mixed company wearing only your plaid pajama pants. At a bible camp. Yeah. Oops.
Utterly resigned, I slunk back to my room and waited it out — fortunately, now that I’d fulfilled my embarrassment quota for the morning, my glasses were allowed to reappear. Not much of note happened for a while. Since it was a weekend, pretty much all of the other staff members left the campgrounds, so there wasn't much to do — not that I particularly felt like doing anything at that point, anyway. Eventually, I found myself and a few others lazing about in the sun. Since we needed some way to fill our afternoon, we started throwing out ideas, which eventually led to us walking to a park down the road.
Initially, our stated goal was that we were searching for musical inspiration. My good friend Matt had had a rather disgusting experience working maintenance that week, and we were composing a song about it. If that was our game plan, we hardly stuck to it. It was an absolutely beautiful day in July and we ended up chasing each other across meadows, singing and playing music, exploring some trails through a nearby wood, and just generally relaxing and having a great time together. Before long, I was lounging in a tree playing the ukulele and looking out over a beautiful cornfield as Matt snapped some way off and my friends Caleb and Susannah (now married!) ran around and played in the cornfield. We hadn’t a single care in the world. It was like we were just little kids again.
As we walked back, I realized that I’d never been happier. Here I was, strolling down a gravel road with some friends as the light of the falling sun filtered through the breeze-blown leaves. All was right with the world. It was odd — on the surface, it'd seem like nothing particularly amazing happened that afternoon. I didn't win the lottery. I didn't go skydiving. I just went to a park and hung out with some friends. Still, I’d never felt more in touch with the idea that you really can’t buy happiness. A miserable morning had given way to one of the most carefree and joyful days of my life, and it took nothing more than a couple great people, the joys of music, and the beauty of nature.
To this day, whenever I'm going through a tough spot, I flash back to that day. I envision myself perched up there in the branches of that tree reclining and playing music as I watch my friends playing below, their faces lit up yellow by the setting sun. I’m not absolutely sure why memories such as these stick with me in such vivid detail, but I know that I learned that day just how blessed I was to have the friends I had and how important it was to appreciate the simple things in life.
