just keep swinging

I think I'm fully into the swing of things now. I've gotten into a nice state of busy where I have things to do most of the time but they aren't really stressful things. I'm working afternoon/evenings which was tough to get used to mentally but it means I can actually make programs happen--evening sports for kids and community members, fitness classes, arts and crafts clubs, school newspaper, etc. This week we're starting P90x for teen guys and zumba classes for teen girls.

I really love the school community and I really love my job. Loving the people first makes me love my job because these kids want to grow and develop, and I want to give them the chance to do that. Tonight four 11&12-year-old girls came over and we were sitting around the table talking about things they want to see happening after school. Besides sports, they want to do drawing, painting, 'learning old ways', woodworking, dance, school newspaper, creative writing, knitting, beading, cooking, taking care of the environment and a singing/karaoke club. What a list! I'm always astounded when I ask the kids what they want to do. It's one thing for a group of adults to sit around and scheme up programs for kids, but really they do have dreams for their school and community. I'm excited to give them a chance to be invested in their school and to see them thrive in that--it actually gives me chills!

I got to bring 5 boys and 4 girls between 10-14 to a three day Dance Jamboree this past week--such a fun adventure! We picked kids on the basis of good attendance, work ethics, participation in class, etc..  None of them had taken a dance class before and at first they were a bit hesitant to participate in the dance instruction workshops. I told them they didn't have to like the styles of dance, but they had to try them out so they'd have a fair judgment. So they were brave and tried. They learned about different cultures and discovered that they could do things that initially looked difficult (like some of the harder partner-turns in Cuban/Salsa dancing). I had a brainwave while we were there: the grade 8/9 teacher tells me how her kids are petrified of doing presentations--so I want to start mini dance-sessions in class for all the grades so the kids can practice being comfortable in front of people. I'm not expecting miracles, but this weekend I saw dance cause change. I saw an 11-year-old boy who's very small for his age and picked on by his older brothers step out and grow a lot of confidence. He found a way to express himself where he didn't have to be big or loud, he just had to be able to move. I wish I could show you the way he was beaming the whole drive home yesterday, I almost cried.

Last week I got to reconnect in La Ronge with a childhood friend who I hadn't seen for almost 10 years. She's married and pregnant, but still the same girl and only 3 hours away from me. It's nice having some kind of a network in the middle of nowhere. We're making friends up here--there's an RCMP officer and his fiancee that live across the road from us, and other new teachers who are lots of fun. But I'm realizing increasingly how much I took Church community for granted when I was in North Bay.

Sending love to my friends and family and church family and work families--I do miss all of you. But my heart takes strength from knowing God's got me here for a reason. And there are a lot of people here who really need love, so until I get a clear message otherwise I won't be wishing I was somewhere else. It does mean something to me that people would care enough to read this and follow what's going on in my life though--proof to me that God is good, and I am blessed beyond measure!

Retreeeat! Retreeeeaaat!!

Some days I feel like I'm in Narnia. Patuanak is beautiful, but small--and when I'm here I feel like I never want to leave. I know there are things happening back home, but when I'm here it's like time stands still and I can get back to the beautiful basics. It's amazing how much time we actually have when we aren't commuting or running around doing errands. Sweet time--time to breathe, go for walks with the neighbour girls, enjoy dinner with new friends, stop and shoot the breeze... Life was supposed to be more like this, I'm sure of it!

This weekend Mars and I traveled into Beauval for a weekend Ladies' Retreat at Pine Ridge Bible Camp and I feel like a whole new world was opened up to us! This was my first trip out of the Patch in three weeks. Culture Week was cancelled because of a death in the community--which meant a normal work week researching conferences/festivals, creating programs, getting to know the kids better. By the time the bell rang Friday afternoon I wanted to run down the hallway and high-five everyone! The drive outta here was beeautiful--golden yellow birch leaves against a clear blue sky, nothing like it! BUT the thing that really got me was when we crested the ridge (that's right--Saskatchewan has a hill!) where the camp is situated--we had a panoramic view stretched beneath us of the lake and even more of the incredible fall colours. 

We stepped back in time when we walked into the cabins--naturally rustic, and complete with woodstoves and outhouses! It was sweet to be away from everything and in the company of beautiful women who love Jesus. It was overwhelming, really.. We were telling them that it was such an answer to prayer to meet people who serve the same God as we do--and they were telling us that they had been praying for someone to share Jesus in the village of Patuanak. They said the man who founded Northern Canada Evangelical Mission had done so after being heartbroken by the people in our new hometown. I was floored by that--God was speaking straight into my heart saying that although we don't feel like our job here is a big deal (and in the grand scheme, it really isn't), we are here to be part of a bigger purpose that was started a long time ago. God's heart for Patuanak is very clear--He wants people to be transformed from the inside out as they put their faith in Jesus Christ. And our heart for the Patch should be the exact same as that--living to love God and love people by sharing the Truth of Jesus with them.

Yesterday we went canoeing, soaked up the sun, and recharged our batteries.. Today after we left retreat (with a lot of contact info for a lot of sweet ladies!) we went grocery shopping together for the first time, picked cranberries, came home and cooked/cleaned/did laundry, ate dinner on the front steps (which made us feel like the biggest hicks), even went for a run together.. Life is good, God is SO good to us, and He keeps showing us that He's got this whole thing worked out so that He gets all the praise and glory He deserves! We couldn't have imagined life being so sweet in such a strange, storybook kind of way--but we just keep trusting that He knows what tomorrow holds and he'll prepare us for it one page at a time!

off to work she goes..

Being done almost a week on the job, I would like to report that I'm still alive! My first week in town I had a lot of time to explore and play outside, cook, bake bread, clean, and do arty things. Now comes the task of learning how to juggle so that I can still do the things that make home more relaxing and enjoyable. The nice thing about being a recreation coordinator is that my time is split between coordinating and recreation--so this week is filled up with meetings and paperwork, but next week I go to cultural camp with kids from the school and their parents.

The culture of this reserve is unlike any other I've ever seen. Most of the residents subscribe at least to some degree to Roman Catholicism, so traditional spiritual events like pow-wows, smudging, and sweat lodges are barely spoken of. In the past week there have been events like vigils for National Suicide Awareness Day, and a Gospel music Jamboree (which I caught the tail end of with some of my little friends). The church in town holds Mass every week which seems to cater more towards middle-aged and older generations of the town, although attendance is by no means booming. Aside from saying the Lord's Prayer every morning in school, the children and youth seem fairly disconnected from the faith of their parents.

Something I love to see though is how the older generation cares about teaching their children traditional ways of hunting, trapping, fishing, beadwork, and tanning moose hides. At the culture week, if they shoot a moose then the kids can watch and learn how to cut it all apart! Then we get to eat it, om nom nom!! People here are friendly to me, but it's sweet to connect on the level of being northerners. I'm noticing that when I tell them I'm from a town only slightly bigger than this, and that I grew up seeing moose in the back of my neighbour's truck, they tend to let down their guards and joke around more with me.

Ah, did I mention that I love it here? I love that even though work can be hectic, we can get away from it. Mars and I went for a walk with our two little walking/blueberry picking buddies tonight and watched the last of the beautiful sunset--the girls wanted to race down the road so we were running and laughing with them. It's so sweet that we can find enjoyment and delight in simple things again. Those girls are just delightful, they've been great for pulling us away from our adult lives, we thank God for them every day! He's so so good to us..

Other quick updates: We're making better friends with the other teachers. It's been nice on the weekends so we've gone canoeing twice, SO fun. Two of the RCMP officers in town live across the street from us so we're making friends with them and their significant others--they want to have us over for wings and to go four-wheeling. It's nice to have other people around who know the feeling of being far from home and in a whole other world!

I was hit in the face by this verse today :
"ONE THING I have desired of the Lord,
That will I seek:
That I may dwell in the house of  the LORD
All the days of my life,
To behold the beauty of the Lord,
And to inquire in His temple." (Ps 27:4)

This is just our temporary home. We make the most of the opportunities God gives us while we're here: we hold up God's truth as our banner, we love Him and honour His name, and we love the people He has given us to love. At the end of the day, that's why we drove across the country.. We could have done that anywhere, but for whatever reason God wanted us here. Mars and I take time to pray together so that we remember why we're here--it's a blessing to have jobs, but we don't love work itself. It's just a means of being able to be here and be with the people here.. And so we work, and we try to work well. But pray that we don't lose sight of what's really important--that we set our hope on Jesus Christ, the One who started this and is going to finish it!

beginning at the beginning

how did this all go down?

I'm just sitting in my living room in Patuanak, Saskatchewan. Those words are still strange to me a week after arriving on this small claim of God's land. I drove through this province in March with my foot heavy on the pedal, wanting nothing but to be away from the endless stretches of farm fields. But that isn't where my story started...

 It started in 2008 when I met Marsena and we started talking about how we wanted to someday live and work on a northern reserve. The thought of living in a place that embraced traditional ways of trapping, dog sledding and canoeing seemed incredible. But what really drove us to head north were hearts that wanted to see those lives rescued from brokenness and made new by the truth of Jesus. So we prayed that if God would have us go to the north that He would make it clear to us when it was the right time.

I didn't think that 'right time' would ever manifest itself in my life. It was the start of 2011--I was going to graduate, Mars still had a year of teachers' college ahead of her. We still talked about going up north, but we both knew it wasn't likely that in another year it would work out for us to go. I was working full-time doing respite care for families with special needs, loving my job yet knowing that life could take me anywhere at all. But it didn't. I stayed in North Bay for the year and made plans to go to school for massage therapy the next fall.

This March found me road-tripping west with my cousin Erin. It was a whirlwind--we drove from Sudbury to Thunder Bay the first day, then landed in Edmonton late the next night. As we drove across Manitoba and Saskatchewan I remember thinking "I hope we don't have to stop here for the night--this is the ugliest stretch of land I've ever seen--now I know why people fly west and skip central Canada." God really has a sense of humour...

Then came one of the craziest summers ever. Two weeks after the trip west, I got an offer to plant trees for May and June. I called the families I worked with and they were so supportive of my going--one of my families even bought me a tent and some supplies for my birthday/going away present. With that I opened a new mini-chapter of my life.

We lived in tents and I planted until my body, mind and spirit were in a bad state. Then I quit. I've never been a quitter before, but this round of planting was pretty miserable. I told one of my crew members while we were driving to our plant camp in Chapleau that I knew I was going there for a reason. I was blessed to have an amazing Jesus-loving couple take care of me on days off--our tree-checker was a Christian too and he'd come pray with me on my land. But they made me homesick for people. I needed to realize that I couldn't spend my life serving trees or some hippie ideal that had been lingering in my head--I was made to love and serve God first then people second. How could I ever be satisfied living for something else?

Now it was the last half of June. Marsena was finishing her additional qualifications for teaching in North Bay when it blew upon facebook that she'd gotten a job. I was excited for her.. Really excited.. Thenn mostly excited.. turns out it was a teaching job on a reserve in Northern Saskatchewan. Ungh.

I had my moment of "ew, Saskatchewan" then messaged her to say I was coming. And that was it. Suddenly the dream of two 19-year-olds that seemed like it would never materialize... DID!

I mean, it took work and planning to get here. I called the principal of the school the next day who said I could certainly supply teach and told me to apply for a position as School Community Recreation Coordinator. So I sent him my resume and somewhere between working and visiting friends all over Ontario non-stop in July, then being totally absorbed at camp for August (what a blessing to be there!), I got an interview for the job!

This brings us up to last week. My dad sacrificed his week off to drive with me across the country, which I am so grateful for. As we drove north from the Battlefords with dad behind me in a rental, I saw a little bear. No big deal. Driving along with dad behind me in a rental, I saw a deer coming out of the ditch in front of my car. No big dea... wait.. not a deer? NO, IT'S A TIMBER WOLF! I've seen them before, but I've never seen one canter across the road--this thing was huge! I know because an hour later, driving along with dad behind me in a rental, I saw another one not nearly so big (don't worry Grandma, there are TONS of dogs here that keep the wild animals far away from town!). Wolves? Bears? Endless stretches of trees and dirt road?.. I am so not in the city anymore! Yeehaw!

After a long few days of driving, we got to Patuanak. Mars had been here for two weeks already setting up her classroom and getting all of our utilities straightened out. Almost as soon as I got in, there was a call asking if I would go for my interview the next morning. That was last Friday.

Deep breath...

Yesterday I met with the Director of Education and today I signed a letter of offer. I am now an employee of English River First Nation working with the school and community members to facilitate programs that nourish the physical, spiritual, cultural needs of the entire community. I start work on Monday, I have an desk in the main office of the school, and I have to run a meeting next Friday for a Community/School Action Plan steering committee. Talk about INSANE. I can't even connect the dots, they don't make any sense at all, but I love this community and once I have more time to wrap my head around this job I know I'll love it too.

So please pray for me, I need to find my strength in Jesus. This is going to stretch me a whole lot, but I'm excited to work with the people here. OH and by the way, there is a river beside our town (we canoed on it already!) and on that river are pelicans--Weird! More updates with photos to come!