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Catching Frogs

“Do you want to wake up at five tomorrow morning?” I asked one of my campers before bed. It was the night before the closing day of that camp week, after a long day of activities.
“No!” He said. “Wait, what for?”
“To catch some frogs.”

My camper had been very disappointed. A couple days earlier I had let him and a few other boys catch frogs during our swim time in the dugout, and had lent them a container from my bag as well. He had caught a number of frogs, and had transferred them into smaller containers, hoping to take a couple home with him when he went. However, that same evening he had been told by another counsellor that he couldn’t keep the frogs in containers over night. As a result, he had let them go that evening, hoping that he would be able to catch some more the following day when the whole camp went to the dugout for games and swimming. But, once he got there, he wasn’t allowed to go to the side of the dugout that had the frogs, as he needed to stay with the rest of the group. And there he was, at bedtime that night, feeling a little disappointed about the whole thing. So, when I asked if he wanted to catch frogs the next morning he had a huge smile on his face. “Yes!”

That night as I lay on my bed, I wrestled through the situation. I had already been deliberating over what to do before I had even asked him. Taking a camper all the way over to the dugout early in the morning, by myself, with no life-jackets (they were required in and around the dugout)? I just couldn’t decide if this was something where I should be asking for permission, or asking for forgiveness after the fact, if I needed. I thought back on all my past boyhood disappointments. Rocks I couldn’t take with me when we left places. Sticks I couldn’t carry home. I can see why my parents didn’t let me at the time – and I’m glad for it now. But, how hard was it to spend some time one morning helping a boy catch a few frogs?

So, at five in the morning, my alarm went off and I strained my eyes into the darkness. ‘This is ridiculous,’ I thought. ‘There’s no way I’m catching frogs at five in the morning – in the dark.’ I closed my eyes again, and dipped in and out of sleep for almost an hour. Then, just before six, I woke up enough to look out the window again. It was just beginning to get light – enough to see frogs, at least. So, after a lot of shaking, poking and whispering his name, I finally woke my camper up. And a couple minutes later, there we were, two boys, both in hoodies and shorts, making our way up through the trees and over the hill to the dugout to catch some frogs.

It’s wasn’t very long before we got to the spot. With our ankles in the water we walked through the grass and small reeds, stopping when small spots of green would bounce across the grass, or plop into the water. I very quickly found out that I’m really bad at catching frogs. I really am. I would get so close – close enough to feel their little bodies slipping through my fingers, or bouncing off my hand, but I never got one. Thankfully I could at least keep them from getting to the water so that my companion could pounce on them and hold them gently in his hands. There’s something about seeing a little boy chasing after frogs that brings a smile to your face. It’s like seeing a bird in flight, or a dolphin jumping out of the surf – just to see them doing what they do best. He was a little boy, and had obviously mastered the skill of frog catching – something I must have missed out on in my youth.

Half an hour later two boys with three green leopard frogs, and one brown wood frog, headed back over the hill and across the grass toward the cabins. Their flip flops squeaked with water as they walked, and their faces beamed with smiles as they carried their precious amphibians in their little orange container. Sometimes God sends along little blessings and encouragements, just to remind you that there is a reason you are doing what you are doing. For me, this was just that.

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Fragile Places

Some places seem to be much more fragile than others. This summer, I had the opportunity to go and help out at a Bible camp just for a couple of weeks, to help as a cabin leader. At the start of the week, kids would pile into the camp with their parents, some nervous, some excited to get to know each other and enjoy the games and many excitements of camp. And for the whole week, I would find myself extremely busy and happy spending time with the nine twelve-year-olds in my cabin, counsellors, and all the other kids running around the camp as well. Doing devotions, praying together, eating together and playing games together, we soon got to know each other very well, and before long we felt like a little family – the nine boys, myself and my junior counsellor.

However, before long, the week came to a close. The kids packed up and got ready to home. Dirty clothes and numerous little injuries told the story of all the fun they had. The night before the boys had to leave, some talked about how they wanted to come back next year and do the same thing – that we should all come back next year and be together again. I was happy to hear that they enjoyed it, and to hear them long for a ‘repeat’ in a way, but I knew the truth – that this week could never be repeated again. Camp is a fragile place. It lasts for a week, and in that week there’s an amazing mix of kids and counsellors, which makes the whole time so worthwhile. But this mix of kids and counsellors and experiences can’t last forever, and it can never happen again. It just won’t. Never again will all the same kids be together, with all the same counsellors and be able to enjoy being together all over again. That’s life.

MCS, my old boarding school, is a fragile place. I can remember in my final year of high school, lying in bed, thinking about the changes that would take place when graduation day came. Never again could I walk through these halls I knew to find the same friends in the same rooms. Never again would I take my toothbrush at bedtime and seek out the company of the guys in my class while I brushed – to sit on their beds and try to talk through the toothpaste to them. We would all be replaced. Soon these rooms would be someone else’s, or they would be left empty – as they have been. Some of us might come back and visit and, by chance, may even be together at the same time, and be able to re-live some shadow of our experiences in high school, but it would never be the same.

Some places are solid. Like a tree or house – even the school building we spent so many years in, these places stay more or less the same. Of course, there are always changes. Trees grow bigger, houses change – but they are still there, they continue on. You can climb a tree you climbed in your youth and sit on the same branch, and look out to the same view and, for the most part, it can be the same.

Camp and boarding school are like grenades. All the fragments and particles share space and memories together for moment in time, but when their time is up, the pin is pulled and all the pieces explode across the world – blown into a million tiny shards. Exciting. Painful. Never again can they be put back together. Never again can they be the same.

However, this doesn’t make the fragile places less precious. I really hope my feelings are never mistaken for bitterness or anger, because it’s not like that at all. These places are still so valuable, and the experiences and memories don’t lose their meaning because of the violent separation involved. But I know that some places and experiences will never be the same. One might gather a few fragments to piece together something that looks similar, and bears some semblance of the original object, but still, everything has changed.
These are the fragile places.

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My Blue Trunk of Memories

I opened up my blue trunk today. My trunk that holds the things that mean a lot to me. I always find it to be such a strange and exciting moment. I go into it thinking that there are probably things I can get rid of now, seeing as I have changed over time, and yet I always surprise myself. It’s like discovering treasure. Some of the things I can hardly even remember until I’ve seen the little things hidden inside. I open up an old candy tin to reveal little trinkets I’ve collected over the years. I have a couple flag pins, from both Canada and Pakistan. There’s a squished penny from the dinosaur museum in Drumheller, which I can still remember begging my dad to let me buy. There’s a ‘dog-tag’ my senior class made when we graduated, a shield necklace with a verse on it, and an old plastic patakha dart that looks like it’s been through a lot of life. I look at each of them with a fresh wonder, and slowly put them each back into the tin. Everything is important, every little piece of memory.

Below the tin is a box of coins from all over the world – Middle Eastern, Oriental, South American and European. Some are sorted into plastic sheets by country, while others are in bags and little containers. Still others lie loose in the box. I suppose I couldn’t be bothered to put them into any kind of container at the time. The coins still intrigue me, and I find a few lying around I have collected recently and throw them in too, before closing the box.

In the trunk are my high school banners, an old shawl, an afghan scarf, a knife from nepal, a painted teapot, a couple picture albums and some other odd treasures. Inside a folder are old stories I wrote when I was younger, or pieces of them. There’s a little book I printed with my brother too. They make me smile as I see the little boy with a big imagination and huge hopes for these ideas. Now they sit in my blue trunk.

Below all these is a folder of papers. Page after page of old report cards, boarding reports and school awards. And as I skim through the pages, I can’t help but smile. Not only is it like walking through the life of a little boy growing up, but it’s as if I’m walking through the life of my parents, watching this little boy grow older in time. One report says of my little kindergarten self, “He understands basic concepts of size and shape, sorting, counting number recognition and measurement.” Another reads “Josh is ready for grade one work, which he should cope with easily.” I’m glad I made it into grade one. I feel that would have been a problem otherwise. Some of the comments are just downright hilarious. My P. E. teacher from my public school in Pakistan wrote “during P. T. display, the movement of your body was flexible.” Glad to hear it.

As I read through these forms I can’t help but think about my parents, and what they thought of this little boy, who was “quiet” but “enthusiastic”. I can’t even remember those days, or my thoughts and memories at the time. I smile as I see myself growing through the years. Thankfully I always did fairly well in school, so my reports are generally encouraging, but not all of them. There are the few that tell of the times when I was not very pleasant to have. One from junior high reads “Josh has shown little interest in being a part of junior high boarding life. He also has not happily joined in the organized weekend events.” I can remember those times. I can remember my attitude, and I can remember the people around me who were disappointed. But most of all, I can remember and imagine what it would have been like for my parents to read this about me. It makes me embarrassed even now. Thankfully it was a passing theme, and I soon grew to have a better attitude in school and boarding life, and to be the happy, hardworking boy that I once was.

All through these pages, time and time again, I see my parents love for me. Even the fact that they cherished all these reports, right down to my little kindergarten self, and filed them away for me to have later in life. I can’t get over how special my parents are, and how much they cared about me all through my years growing up and now today as well. They loved me through good and bad, and always pressed me to do better and to be better – not just at school, but in life and in my character. I can remember the talks we had when I wasn’t doing well and I had let them down, and I can remember their joy when I may them proud and did my best. But most of all, I can always remember the love.

Opening up my trunk is always a very introspective journey back into memories. Surrounded by these pieces of myself, and of my past, I seem to forget the present altogether. And it’s not until I happened to glance into a mirror and saw the bearded face of a twenty-year-old staring back at me, that I realized a lot of life has gone by, and that I’m not that little boy I’m reading about in the pages. And yet, I am somehow, because as I read through the pages, and hold that old white patakha dart, I almost feel as though I was eight again, putting these things in my old candy tin for the first time, because I loved them and I wanted to cherish them.

Mummy and Daddy, I just want you to know, once more, that I love you so much, and I’m so thankful for all the love that you have given me over the years.

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Prairie Rainstorms

Lately I seem to go for bike rides at the strangest times. I find with the long summer days, when daylight lasts until 10:30 at night, my perception of the day is often different than it would be normally. Instead I find myself setting out on a bike ride at 10 pm, thinking to enjoy a quick half hour of sunlight with some twilight as well. But, what would have appalled my grandparents more than the lateness of my trip would probably be the fact that I left the house in a black t-shirt and shorts with no helmet as well. It struck me as funny that I had just happened to be wearing all black when I left, but being too lazy to go back and change, I set out all the same.

As I left, dark thunderclouds loomed over the West side of town, bursting with brilliant flashes of lighting. I could feel the winds picking up, blowing the cool night air past me, as the smell of oncoming rain filled the air. It reminded me of Murree and the nights when I would lie awake watching the clouds pour over the hilltops as they boomed and crashed, shaking the windows in their frames. This night, as I rode, gazing at the sky beside me I just wanted the sky to break loose. “Give me a real good storm”, I prayed, as I caught myself again spending too much time looking at the sky and not enough looking at the path below me that was getting darker by the minute.

Our town was wrapping up the week of its annual Westerner Days fair, and as I rode past the park where the events had been held for the day, I was met by all kinds of people walking back to the cars, or getting on buses, hurrying to beat the darkness and the oncoming rain. Then, turning back toward town I coasted through quiet neighborhoods and shut up houses, as the sky threw a bluish-purple light over the streets with its streaks of lightning. Only as I started to turn home did the drops of rain begin to fall, slow and scattered at first, but building in time. Thankfully I wasn’t far from home, as very quickly the rain grew harder and harder, though still sparse. In fact, I had reached my neighborhood with little more than a drop on myself, though I could hear them landing all around me on the road and roofs of the houses. Then, just before my street I had the pleasure of having a marble size drop of hail hit me right on my head, stinging like a rock. I made it the rest of the way, holding one hand over head and eyes as I pulled into the driveway, moments before the clouds burst.

By the time I had gotten inside after leaving my bike in the garage, rain was showering down from above. I kept all the house lights off. I could see the sky better that way, and I watched as huge trees nearby bent over in the wind. Occasional lightning would light up the whole backyard to reveal the thousands of drops that filled the sky and the grass that that glistened in the dark.

A prairie storm isn’t quite the same as a monsoon storm in Pakistan, but I felt that night that God made sure it got pretty close – close enough enough for me. And that evening I lay in my bed and listened the the rain continue to drench the earth below, and fell asleep happy.

hail

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Getting Warmer

Sitting on the plane on my way to Islamabad, I am finally beginning to realize that I really am going to be in Pakistan soon. It wasn’t until I reached Toronto that the white faces in waiting lounges began to grow scarcer, and very soon I found myself almost alone amongst Pakistanis traveling back as well. And I, the out of place white face, finally felt oddly at home again. All around me, Urdu has replaced the usual sounds of English, and with the flavourful taste of chicken curry and rice for supper on my flight, I know I’m getting closer. I’m getting warmer.

A flight attendant talks to me, asking where I’m going. Soon I find out he has studied in the same hills as I have, and even visited my school at times for sports matches. Another tells me that her family is originally from the Murree area as well. We talk about the beauty of the hills and the mountains, and how wonderful the weather is there. Definitely getting warmer.

I feel myself aging when I fly. When I was younger, the twenty hours or so of transit were easily filled, movie after movie, as I made my way through the available options. I can even remember watching a single movie two or three times in a row. This time I haven’t even touched my tv. In fact, on my last flight I found myself trying to turn down the lighting on the screen, just so it wouldn’t bother me as I closed my eyes and drifted into intermittent sleep.

Sleep. The one thing I hope to reap out of this trip. I know that the instant I set foot on Pakistani soil, sleep will become precious but fleeting commodity, so I hope to get as much of it as I can beforehand. With so little time and so many people to talk to, I’m not sure that shut-eye will be very high on the priority list. I still remember the days before my own high school graduation, as I talked late into the night with the other guys in my class. It’s not the nights you slept that you’ll remember, I told myself. It’s the ones that you didn’t sleep that make the best memories. And looking back, I think I can agree with that. It’s certainly not a principle I would hold to every day, but at the special times in life, its good to keep in mind what’s really important. I just take comfort in knowing that if all these late nights kill me, at least I’ll die happy.