There are several reasons I do not like to snowboard, but the most looming one on my mind as I hurl my body down a frozen mountain and a board waxed for even greater speed is, “What happens WHEN I crash?!” Yes, I admit it, the thought of a 250 pound dirt clod flying down a mountain trying to maintain balance not only scares me to near death but should scare everyone who shares that mountain with me!
Pray for me!
Put me in the wilderness with nothing but a tent, sleeping bag and my back pack (and gun of course) and I am right at home. I can stay in the mountains forever and sometimes wonder I was born in the wrong century but this new generation of extreme sports fanatics may end up being the death of me.
Not only do Shanna and James work at Mt. Hood Meadows for free passes but my entire family is filled with adrenaline loving speed junkies who happen to possess the same “crazy gene” as Shanna who, for her fortieth birthday, wanted all of her friends and I to pitch in so she could go on a sky-diving trip! Don’t even get me started on jumping out of airplanes!
So, like I said pray for me! Pray that I will somehow fall in love with a sport my family loves so much and that God would grant me the same crazy gene as Shanna and the boys! I say all this because when we go boarding I will do whatever I can to stay in the lodge for as long as possible. Not that I hate the cold, wind or snow, rather the speed and immanent crash at the bottom, which is why I was the only one in our lodge when I saw her.
She was holding her 3 year old daughter and staring over me and out the window at the rare clear day on Mount Hood in December. I guessed her eyes at maybe 30, clear, young and blue, even though she was mostly gray and from the back one might have guessed her in her mid forties. She wore baggy blue jeans that had to be five years old, worn tee shirt and I can only describe her as a hippie in appearance. I later found out she was has actually a Hawaii resident for the past seven years who recently moved to Washington State with her husband, and was on the mountain because her son was getting a ski lesson from her brother who was a Meadows instructor.
I invited her to fell free to stand by the window for a better view and we made small talk but I never even got her name. A few moments later Shanna got off work and we headed up to the mountain leaving her and her daughter at the window returning several hours later to pack our gear and head home. As we were about to leave Shanna looked down and found an earring lost hours earlier, “Praise God!” she exclaimed as she held the ring in her hand.
At that the Hippie Girl turned, stared me down with her blue eyes of fire and said, “I have to tell you something.” She had been holding it in for hours, testing the Lord, maybe throwing out a fleece or asking for a sign, and when that sign came through Shanna’s exclamation she moved swiftly like a hunter.
“The Lord wants you to go for it!”
Stunned, but knowing exactly what she meant I played it off, “What, like go for it in snowboarding?”
“No,” She shot back, “The Lord wants you to go for it in your ministry.”
“Do you know what I do for a living?”
“No, I don’t.”
“I am a pastor! Shanna come over here and check this out. Now, tell my wife what you just told me”
“The Lord wants your husband to go for it.”
