Day 109

engagement. power outage. airplane. sudden goodbyes.

these things all happened today. let me explain.

over the past couple weeks, one of the video guys, ryan, had started talking about proposing to his girlfriend. plans were made and there was an airplane, but before all this, the power went out for a while. today was bright and windy and warm in the sunlight and cold in the shade. the sky was clear but it smelled like rain. every wednesday of camp is unplugged day, so there's no media to run because all the qtown meetings and such are at the fireside. no highlights to make, no lights and powerpoint to do, and no power to do them with. good timing.

but ryan had arranged for an airplane to accomplish some 'arial shooting' of the camp. he asked his girlfriend to come with for the ride and as they approached the open field from the sky, the campers were arranged to lie down and spell 'will u marry me' on the wet grass. soon the buzz on the ground met the buzz of the dipping plane. the pilot somehow got shots of the goings on inside the plane as he continued to fly. tomorrow's highlights should be good.

earlier, before all this, i said goodbye. a couple here, both named kim and individually called 'big' and 'little', left today to follow a recent calling to go work with an inner city ministry in new york city. big kim was the head of camp maintenance and also the pyro guy who did fireworks for each week of intros and part of the music video and the weekly concert and everything in between. remember i was with him, shooting from below and dodging burning fireballs, during the canada day fireworks when he lit the huge ones off by hand cause the detonator keys were lost. his wife is really kind and helpful and talented and did a lot for camp and even for me as well. big kim looks a lot like the hippy man from into the wild, massive, strong stature and long hair and a very similar face and dialect. he came to say goodbye this morning and invited me to come visit them in the states sometime. he said that if it didn't happen now, we'd see each other again someday and as he walked away, i pictured him as an angel or something like that that he would someday be in heaven, flowing hair and big build and big laugh and smile. they'll both be missed here.