Storytime Tuesday

I had a huge dish of ice cream during a school board meeting tonight, and because of a little condition that the ancient greek speakers called "lacto intolerento". and my guts sound like a diesel truck on rough idle.

Which, of course, reminds me of a story.....

Meet Kyle. Kyle and I were in college together, although we didn't really put 2 and 2 together on that until nearly a decade later. We were both pastoring small churches in Cincinnati when I was struck with The Big Idea and we decided to go to Burning Man.

I formed a team of four including myself, then quickly added Kyle because he was a trusted friend. And he knew how to organize stuff. And he could cook.

Anyway...we all did a forty day fast prior the going. The four of us started in due time to break the fast a week or two before leaving for the Burn, but because Kyle joined the team a little late, his fast ran right up until the day before we left.

We'd rented an RV from an unsuspecting elderly couple. It was parked in our driveway, where we were loading it with bungees, rebar, propane, tarps, dust masks and pop tarts. As I loaded the undercarriage bins, Kyle stood inside wiring a Playstation to an overhead television for the 4,400 mile round trip we would do. In seven days. Including three days camping.

Did I mention it was really hot? It's important to the story.

As we got ready to leave, I hitched up a borrowed refrigerated trailer (we were bringing gifts). We all got on the RV....except Kyle had disappeared. I went into the house where Kelsey was cleaning up the dinner mess from the kids eating spaghetti. Kyle came out of the hall bathroom, white as Casper and quiet as a mouse.

We all kissed our wives goodbye (each man his own wife, except for the man who had none and therefore, kissed none) and climbed aboard the RV for the straight through cross country trip. I was at the helm. Adam rode shotgun. Tim 1 and Tim 2 sat at the table. Kyle sat on the couch and stared blankly at the window....for the first 90 miles. I promise you, he didn't make much of a peep, even when we blew all the fuses because of the trailer wiring the first 20 miles and decided to drive the other 4,380 without trailer lights. Finally, as we passed through Indianapolis, he spoke.

While not a perfect transcript (except for the third paragraph), this is general speech he gave in a quiet monotone.

I was wiring....the Playstation. It was hot. Real hot. I had broken my 40 day fast last night. On Outback steak and a loaded potato. I didn't feel to good. It was hot.

I went into the house, where it was really, really cold. The cold hit my face. I smelled the garlic from the spaghetti sauce. I didn't know if I'd make it.

I went to the bathroom and emptied myself of all but love. Then I laid on the tile for 45 minutes because the cool felt good on my face. But. I'm better now.

To be fair, he wasn't really much better until Nebraska, but he did recover. If you know Kyle, email him this link...he needs to know I remember him well. :) He is shown below, relaxing in the desert.