Why I’m going to the mountains.
By Haley Dake
There is an art form to finding ourselves in unexpected places where beauty and growth spring from fertile soil: showing up.
I’ve always been a big advocate of showing up, even when under-qualified and perhaps terrified, to the spaces and places where you are interested, convicted, curious … and seeing what is possible. This year, I have added a new word to my list of when to show up — hopeful.
I’m writing this piece from my salmon-hued upstairs office in our 1970s farmhouse on twenty-two acres in Bastrop, Texas, a town of just 10,000 people thirty-five miles east of Austin. My family’s recent move from East Austin to Bastrop was a decision in the category of hopeful. I didn’t see myself here two years ago, or even one year ago for that matter. Nor did I see myself marrying a botanist-farmer-turned-landscaper husband five years ago this October, or becoming a mother of two in my late 30s. Our oldest son, almost four, is mastering the finer points of bedtime negotiation. And our youngest, 22 months his junior, the craft of no and mine. My days are full of logistics, dishes, laundry, zoom calls, snacks, and snuggles. I’m constantly re-choreographing the dance between personal and professional, career and calling, self-interest and self-sacrifice. I am content, but not without the daily work of righting my swirling storylines: you are doing too much, too little, you are falling behind, you are right where you are supposed to be, this is not enough, more than enough, good enough for now.
I told myself the move to Bastrop was largely for my husband, his sizable landscaping equipment, my two boys, and their childhood playground. I was hesitant, but hopeful. I am now seeing that this move is also, in the most surprising of ways, for me.
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With my background in outdoor education and love of time in nature, I’ve long been a fan of Wayforward Adventures, a Christian ministry based out of Del Norte, Colorado. This November, I happened to open their email announcing just three spots left for 2023 summer trips. Each summer they take over 40 groups — churches, families, teams, couples — backpacking in the San Juan wilderness. They provide the gear, guides, and food. All you have to do is show up and carry your load. I felt prompted to put down a trip deposit, without a group in mind. Something, someone, compelled me to sign-up.
A few weeks later I invited a group of similar-life-stage women to join me in June. The group was grateful for the invite, but the commitment was too large, too unexpected and unplanned for this season of life. The Holidays passed and New Year arrived, now two weeks shy from my deposit drop-dead date. Making sure I got my money back was top of my to-do list for the coming week.
That Sunday, Christian and I took our boys to the small bible church on our street, Grace Bible Fellowship, where roughly a hundred friends and family gather each Sunday to study, worship, and fellowship. During worship, I looked to my right and all I could see was two almost-full rows of young women, most of them high school girls I did not yet know.
I heard a small voice. Them. And I kept hearing it. Them.
These girls need to go to the mountains.
On the walk home, I told Christian about what happened during church. Taking a group of high school girls I didn’t yet know on a week-long trip this summer was not on my 2023 to-do list. We were just getting to know this church. Wasn’t that coming on a bit strong? I kept thinking about it all week.
The next Sunday, I went up to their youth leader, Laura, after church and said something along the lines of…. “hey! I know you don’t really know me yet, but I’ve got this opportunity I wanted to share with you.” I gave her the quick sketch, and her eyes grew wide. “We’ve been wanting something like this for our youth for a long time, but didn’t really know how to get started…”
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I asked for an extension on my deposit date and we prayed and fumbled our way through convening parents and inviting the young women on this trip. Fast forward a couple months, and Operation Chipmunk is in full swing. We have 8 youth committed to going and 3 chaperones with 1 trip spot left to fill. Most of these girls attend GBF, two are co-workers at the local grocery and fast food shop. For some of these girls, it will be their first time outside of Texas or away from home. And for most, their very first time backpacking.
These girls have taken this invitation and are running with it at full speed. They are showing up. They’ve planned a dozen fundraisers between now and June: date nights, lasagna bakes, street clean ups. They have started bi-monthly backyard campouts with the entire youth group. Hiking boots and State Park passes have been purchased. Thirty-one people from went hiking two Sundays ago after church.
Tomorrow night we’ll gather in my pink office for another planning meeting, talking about where to find discount gear and how we might blow our fundraising goals out of the water so we can take the entire youth group hiking this fall.
Aren’t we the lucky ones when God uses us? When his Spirit spurs us to do something we didn’t imagine or see for ourselves and we lean into the hopeful unknown?
Only one month into this planning process, my imagination has been expanded through the creativity, inclusiveness, and work ethic of these young women. I am now part of a vibrant, multi-generational, proximal community and we are doing things together. These women are bold, brilliant, and beautiful. My life has been enriched a dozen times over. I cannot wait to see what God has in store for us this summer when we show up to Base Camp June 1st.
I hope we, me, are all reminded and freed to be exactly who we were created to be.
“A true vocation calls us out beyond ourselves, breaks our heart in the process and then humbles, simplifies and enlightens us about the hidden, core nature of the work that enticed us in the first place. We find that all along, we had what we needed from the very beginning, and that in the end we have returned to its essence, an essence we could not understand until we had undertaken the journey…. The authentic watermark running through the background of a life’s work is an arrival at generosity…. Perhaps the greatest legacy we can leave from our work is… the passing on of a sense of sheer privilege, of having found a road, a way to follow, and then having been allowed to walk it. ”