Gore, OK - October 2011

There are times when the Lord either causes situations to happen or places you in the path of others for the purpose of learning.  We spend most of our lives learning, even when we think we know it all or can learn it by ourselves.  It is interesting to see how the Lord orchestrates natural forces and our lives to prove His presence, His love, and His control – all to teach us a lesson in life.

The project at the United Methodist Boy’s Ranch outside of Gore, Oklahoma, provided the setting for valuable lessons.  The Lord presented me with challenges that tested my humility, patience, futility, and patience.  At the outset, I was excited to be working on a ranch and helping to better the lives of boys who lived there.  It did not matter to me their stories, whether involving neglect or errant behavior or any reason.  I was anxious to serve the Lord by being a mechanism of change or being a model to the young men.  I realize every NOMADS project is different, much like the uniqueness of the many missions where I had previously served.  This experience tested my tolerance, fortitude, and endurance.  I sustained myself on faith that my Lord had led me there for a purpose.  I just did not know what that purpose was.

The NOMADS projects scheduled during the fall were open on a first-come, first-served basis.  I heard that the Boy’s Ranch was a nice project and it was highly recommended among all NOMADS projects.  Since I tend to gravitate toward projects that involve outdoor work and a farm setting, I was anxious to sign up.  After sending my application for that project to the NOMADS project administrator, I learned that I filled the last available allotted slot on the team.  Hurray!

Soon after signing up, I learned that my daughter was in a healing facility in Florida.  The facility staff asked me to participate in a Family Week scheduled during my first week at the Ranch.  It was not a matter of priorities for me; I simply needed to arrange travel to Florida and excuse myself from the first week of the project.  The Lord was already ahead of me on my arrangements.  Prior to the Boy’s Ranch project, I attended the NOMADS Annual Meeting in Iowa and helped with parking.  The team leader for the Ranch project was attending the Meeting also.  Further, he was helping with parking too.  We were able to meet and discuss my situation before the project began in Oklahoma, immediately following our week in Iowa.  He readily agreed that I should be with my daughter.  For me, the project could wait.

At the end of the Annual Meeting, I delivered my trailer to the Boy’s Ranch and left it there.  Early the next morning I was flying out of Tulsa on my way to Florida.  I spent a wonderful week with my daughter, which was a fantastic blessing in itself.  The week passed quickly and again I was flying across country toward Oklahoma.

The project at the Ranch began on Saturday evening, October 1, 2001.  Within minutes of arriving, a woman told me that everyone was attending a pie auction at a local church.  She invited me to go and ride with her and her husband.  I learned that the couple was not associated with the NOMADS but had been volunteering at the Boy’s Ranch rodeo for the past 15 years.

The pie auction was nice and it was perhaps the first auction that I attended and did not buy anything.  This is not to say I did not want to.  I had my eye on one of two very nice cherry pies, but due to what I would call sloppy auctioneering, the pies went to other people.  Oh, well, at least I got to see them.  I also got to see Elvis.  He must have been hiding among the beautiful hills surrounding the pristine Lake Tenkiller.  He paid a brief visit and sang a couple of songs.  I did not get the chance to meet him up close but, like the pies, at least I got to see him too.  He looked good for his age.

Sunday morning began with services at the Cookson United Methodist Church.  It was a wonderful service.  Oddly enough, the pastor seemed to resemble Elvis in a manner of speaking.  No, it could not have been.  Everyone knows there is only one Elvis.  ‘Uh-huh, uh-huh, thank ya very much.’  After church, our team gathered at a local trough for some good eats.  I got a chance to meet everyone.  As I had anticipated, all the NOMADS were very friendly and welcoming.

Assorted small jobs filled my first week.  I helped replace seats on bleachers beside the horse arena, fix a door on the announcer’s booth overlooking the arena, seal a new swinging bench that overlooked the lake, and seal two large wooden crosses.  My second week included more small jobs.  I helped install screen on a door and then mount it, mow around the bleachers, fix fencing around a chicken coop, and a little kitchen work.

I enjoyed working in the kitchen.  The leader in the kitchen was a volunteer not affiliated with the NOMADS.  She was gracious to pass around her recipes but the time spent with her was almost more valuable.  She divulged many secrets of cooking and ingredients.  I kept a notebook at hand and soon had a full page of notes.  For example, have you ever heard of adding Red Hots candies to applesauce and pies?  I helped make cobblers and fried pies for serving or sale at the rodeo.

My evening activities included two campfires – one on the lake with hotdogs and 20 or so boys at the Ranch and the other on a rock outcropping overlooking a valley while listening to one of the volunteers play a 1941 Gibson guitar.  I also participated in a community meal with the boys and staff.  I enjoyed interacting with the boys, hearing their stories, and sharing great times.  They seemed very polite, gracious, and hospitable.  I guess I expected them to be a bit rougher inside and out.

The staff gave our team a tour of the Methodist Children’s Home in nearby Tahlequah, which joins the Boy’s Ranch under the Oklahoma United Methodist Circle of Care for Children and Youth program.  The Children’s Home houses girls.  The boys and girls come together to participate in the rodeo and display their horse riding skills.  Following the tour, we enjoyed a fantastic meal at a local BBQ restaurant.  I have not yet experienced a NOMADS project where I went hungry.

Our NOMADS project officially ended on Thursday, October 13, but I volunteered to stay over and help with the rodeo.  My job was ‘flag man’ and I would raise a small flag to signal the timekeeper when riders began their riding competition.  It was joyful to watch the kids show off their creativity when they acted out a skit put to a popular song.  It was also fun to watch the kids ride around the arena.  Some of the games included two riders side-by-side holding a rope while they circled barrels (without dropping the rope), a Pony Express relay race, and riding after calves as they ran from one end of the arena to the other, and then guiding the calf through a gate.  Some of the kids were new to riding but all did very well.

Oh, in case you are wondering where the Lord’s lessons were, they were incurred through dealing with other people, not the horses.

The Boy’s Ranch project was fun.  I heard there is another NOMADS project at the Children’s Home in Tahlequah, which is associated with the Boy’s Ranch.  I would like to return to Oklahoma and participate in either project.

View of Lake Tenkiller from Boy's Ranch Lodge

Enjoying a 'Sing-along' at sunset

Site of our 'Sing-along'

View of the campsites for volunteers

The Ranch has LOTS of horses

Replacing boards on bleachers before rodeo

Rodeo arena

Cooking up a few things for the boys' hungry appetites

 

Fixed the door to the 'tower'

Sealed a new swing

Cooking ingredients for Fried Pies

Boy's Ranch Lodge

View from Lodge overlooking Lake

Have a seat here and relax by the lake

The girls get started for the rodeo

Warming up for the rodeo

Young rider shows off his riding skill

Rehearsing Opening Ceremony

Paying tribute to America!

Heading off the wild calf

All kinds of things were offered during the rodeo

Local school band practices

One way of getting around during the rodeo

Boy's Ranch - a beautiful place

Forest City, IA - September 2011

Following my NOMADS project at the Pine Creek Camp in Indiana, I headed over to Forest City, Iowa, for the 2011 NOMADS Annual Meeting.  It was an easy drive, fairly level roads, and more cornfields than what I saw in Indiana.  This Annual Meeting was much different from the 2010 Meeting in Marion, North Carolina.  (You have to read my earlier posts about that adventure.)

On Friday, September 16, 2001, I arrived in relaxed fashion, except perhaps for a bit of anxiety about having only electrical hook-ups.  I had not used my trailer where I had no water supply, outside of my freshwater tank.  So, as I drove into Forest City, I followed the directions given me beforehand and stopped by a local public campground to fill up on fresh water.  I found the NOMADS meeting place with no problem and headed across the campground to a spot near the bathhouse.  The place appeared as a mowed pasture littered with electrical boxes.  It was easy finding a level spot and I was good to go.

I checked out the bathhouse and found it very clean and accommodating.  It had about five or so cinder block shower stalls with hot water.  What more could you ask for?  I figured I would save on my fresh water tank and use the bathhouse for showers.

I had previously agreed to help with parking.  On Saturday morning, I headed to the entrance to the campground.  There, I found some NOMADS who seemed to be volunteering for parking also.  I ended up spending most of the day, except for my lunch break, greeting incoming NOMADS in all kinds and sizes of rigs.  Most were friendly folks but once in a great while I came across someone who was either tired of driving or just too occupied with their own world to be friendly.  It was a noble and worthwhile job although I found the overall effort to be a bit disorganized.  No worries.  The job got done.

On that weekend before the meeting got underway, there was an antique tractor show on a plot of land next to the campground.  I walked through the demonstrations of steam-powered tractors and displays of old tractors, some operable and some not.  I looked for a Farmall B-model tractor similar to the one my grandfather once had (and I drove to rake hay back in my high school days).  I found a couple that resembled the B-model but not exactly.  The plowing demonstrations using steam-powered tractors were fascinating.  The largest plow I saw pulled under steam was a 16-bottom plow.  I also saw a young guy operating his own scaled-down steam-powered tractor.  He really looked the part, complete with smudged cheeks and suet-covered overalls.

The meeting started on Tuesday so the previous Monday was available for tours and such.  I signed up for a ‘farm tour’.  Early on Monday -- early for me, that is – I boarded a big tour bus and headed out with the group of old-timers who probably once were farmers themselves.  For some reason, I do not think of myself as an old-timer but perhaps many younger folk would call me that.  In any event, we headed out of town toward what the tour guy called a ‘wind farm’.  I thought that term was a bit funny – more stupid than humorous – and soon learned that what I would see is a bunch of high-tech windmills.  The morning was very foggy.  The bus traveled along straight paves roads, turning now and then, until we arrived at what looked like a refurbished barn.  The barn was by itself near the road.  The only thing around it was one of the old windmills from years ago.  It was still very foggy and when I looked around, the old windmill was the only thing to see.  So, this is a wind farm, I thought.

The group headed up to the second floor of the barn, which more resembled an office building, and listened to one of the engineers tell us about the high-tech windmills that he assured us were out there.  It was an interesting talk, even without the windmills to see.

Next, we headed to a place that makes ethanol.  It looked like an industrial plant in the middle of cornfields, which it was.  As with the wind farm, a couple of engineers explained the process of removing carbohydrates from corn and making what amounts to moonshine – 200 proof, at that – and mixing it with cheap gasoline.  The other product from corn is protein, which is returned to local corn-growing farms as feed for animals.  I learned that sixty percent of the corn in the local area was grown for ethanol.  I did not know if that was a lot or not, but it sounded good.

Then, we headed to a ‘show-room’ farm for lunch.  Some insurance guy from town owned the place but he and no one else lived there.  A local caterer fed us a meal of a BBQ sandwich, chips, and a little salad.  I would have figured they would offer something good to drink like water but all they had was some instant sweetened drink.  The food was adequate though.  The interesting part was they fed us in what appeared to be a glorified tool shed.

The final farm on the tour was a winery.  I did not expect to see a winery in Iowa but I reckon they are everywhere.  I figured the winery would bring in juice from California but I was surprised to learn that they grew some grapes of their own.  The winery offered several types of wine named after local people and places.  It was unique and all and perhaps a little interesting.  Not being a wine kind-of-sewer (connoisseur), I looked around and headed back to the bus.

The best part of the NOMADS meeting for me was the silent and live auctions.  As last year, several tables were lined with all kinds of nice things, some more interesting than others.  I bid on a few things and ended up getting a couple that frankly I do not know why I bid on them in the first place.  Still, I like auctions.

As the meeting ended, I headed south to Oklahoma.  My next NOMADS project was at the Boy’s Ranch in Gore, Oklahoma.

Iowa cornfields stretch for miles

Campers of all sizes and shapes attend the Annual Meeting

Snug accommodations but adequate

Nice accommodations

Model H Farmall

Steam-powered tractor pulling 16-bottom plow

Each man on plow operated two handles

Iowa winery

Pine Village, IN - September 2011

Through my work with the NOMADS, the Lord allows me to meet the most interesting and friendly people in the world.  I ventured to a summer camp in Indiana and met some(more) wonderful people.  It is SO nice meeting and making new friends.  This is significant to me because for too many years I had few friends outside my workplace.  It seemed that once I made a friend through church or my neighborhood, he would end up seeing my wife while I was away.  That was no good.  Consequently, having my own friends, and good solid people at that, is a nice thing.  The Lord was changing that!

I had never spent any time in Indiana, just passed through it on my way east and west across the country.  The NOMADS project was at the Pine Creek Camp, a Methodist summer camp located outside Pine Village, Indiana.  It occupied many acres of wooded area.  Wandering along the many trails one would discover rustic cabins hidden away among the trees, a ropes course, horse stables and arena (and horses), outdoor worship area, retreat building and lodging, cafeteria, pool, and a hill with three bands of heavy plastic for the old ‘slippy slide’.  Deer and turkey routinely wandered through as if they owned the place, and they probably did.  A river – Pine Creek – bordered the camp on one side.  This project occurred in the early part of September (from August 29 through September 15, 2011).

The camp had a new director, a young guy right out of college who had been a counselor or something there for several years.  He and another delightful man ran the place.  Our team of volunteers helped close the camp and prepare for the winter ahead.  Our team included two couples from Florida (I guess folks from Florida head north in the summer to avoid the heat and humidity) and one from Ohio.  As I said already, all of them were wonderful folks.

The day I arrived was beautiful – mild temperature, blue sky – the waning days of summer.  I pulled my trailer into the camp and followed signs to the RV parking area.  What was different about this was the road – or trail – led me deep into the wooded camp by way of a narrow gravel path, across a small bridge that made me wonder if it would support my truck and trailer, and around a rustic area of a shelter, bathroom, and several campsites.  Cool, I thought.  I love the woods.

No one was around so I picked one of the empty spots and backed in my trailer.  Some minutes later, I met some of my neighbors and even later than that, the last member of our team pulled in.  I had heard it before that when a person pulls into a NOMADS camp, he (or she) will find instant friends.  That is very true.  I felt at home, although I tend to shy away from meeting new people.

The routine was very similar to the traditional NOMADS schedule.  We met at 8:00am for devotions at the Cafeteria building.  We worked sporadically, taking morning and afternoon breaks, and lunch break.  Nothing out of the ordinary and the breaks gave us good time to talk, get to know each other, and enjoy each other’s company.  We ended each day around 4:00pm.  Some of us would head into town to explore or whatever else came to mind.  It was very peaceful around the camp.

During our first weekend, Labor Day weekend, I drove through miles of cornfields to see an Amish area near the northern border of Indiana.  Along the way, I was amazed to see hundreds of high-tech windmills scattered among the fields of corn.  I heard they helped supply electricity for Chicago.  I also heard that farmers would associate with the power companies to rent area for the windmills, thus supplementing their farming income.  Good thinking, I imagined.  The only area taken up by the windmills was the small area for the base.  From a distance, the windmill does not look very big but up close, it is monstrous.  As I ventured farther north I settled into a local restaurant for dinner.  I was surprised to see a section carved out of the parking lot for Amish carriages.  I realized that I should not photograph the Amish people but I got a photo of a carriage parked near the restaurant.  A tremendous downpour of heavy rain came just as I entered the place.  I felt sorry for the horse but glad I was not driving through the deluge.  After dinner, I drove along side roads and highways to see many carriages moving rather swiftly, perhaps to avoid another downpour.

Our three weeks included a variety of tasks.  We cleaned and winterized cabins, tore down old hay wagons, installed windows, took down some of the ropes course, installed screens, load metal for recycling, and build a shelter on the side of the tool barn.  I especially enjoyed helping our ‘technical guy’ on the shelter.  The camp had no money to spend on materials so we scrounged wood from the old hay wagons and scraps from whatever woodpile we could find.  We had enough to frame the shelter.  Tin for the roof came from an old horse barn scheduled for demolition.  It was unfortunate that we had to evict some wasps from the old horse barn, but ‘you got to do what you got to do’.  The tin was longer than needed so we ‘cut and pasted’ into a new roof.  The shelter-building project enforced my building skills.  I had fun working on that project and learned a lot in the process.  I especially enjoyed working with our ‘construction engineer’.  He is a super guy!

During our stay at Pine Creek Camp, our team had two wonderful meals with the Camp Director.  The first was at his home where this young man cooked up a bodacious meal of homegrown vegetables.  He was quite hospitable, making everyone feel very much at ease.  For our second ‘team’ meal, we ventured into town to the local Country Club.  I do not mean to say that NOMADS eat all the time, but it may seem that way.  Anyway, we enjoyed good, quality time together filled with delicious food, pleasant conversation, and best of all – lots of laughter.

The Pine Creek Camp has a lot of potential for short and long-term work.  The head of maintenance and the camp director are both wonderful guys.  I would very much like to return to the Camp, whether as a member of a NOMADS team or independent volunteer.  I am not sure how hot the summers are or how cold the winters are, but spring and fall should be just right.

View outside the rear window of my trailer

RV campground at the Pine Creek Camp

Indiana's corn fields and high-tech windmills

Windmills and corn fields are 'multi-tasking' the land

Amish carriage parking area at local restaurant