Port Susan Weekend

A choir of tiny birds filled the forest with melody. I only saw one of them clearly enough to identify; a busy Oregon Junco. The rest will be there for another day.

Port Susan is pleasant even on a rainy Valentine's Day. Fragrant with cedar, carpeted by the leaves of Alder and Maple long past their prime, walking is enchanting to someone like me, too long in the city. The evidence of humanity is abundant. Small graveled clear cuts allow us to claim a space of our own. Connie invited us to her place for the long weekend. Now we are asking Y'shua to grant us an open door for our own graveled lot in the wild. Only native plants can be used for landscape. When we still lived in Robe Valley, I started learning about natives and am dreaming about my own wild culture.

The weekend was a good shake down, just what we wanted. The trailer had not been as pillaged as I had thought. My kitchen tools were all accounted for with the exception of a muffin tin. The camp oven is smaller than the standard oven in the house. So a sponge-cake pan is renamed "cookie sheet" and only six muffins can be baked instead of the usual dozen because the smaller tin fits the little oven. Since I did not make muffins it was just a note on the list. I had my stainless, thermal French press and had bought some delicious dark roast coffee for our morning cuppa joe. . .last August. Like most little stores, the Port Susan store only had Folgers regular. It was better than what I brought, but it was not what I wanted. I did not scare everyone with a grumpy caffeine withdrawal, so it was all good.

We had our meals together. Group meals are an element I have missed when Ray and I camp alone. We three shared food, laughter, heartfelt prayer. I learned a new table game, Rummycube (or something like that). It was, after all, wet outside. If there was any downside to the weekend, it would be that Connie is VERY allergic to dogs, and Rudy Valentine has become my constant companion. She is ok with him walking outside, but inside of my little trailer where Rudy has been our travel buddy this last year, was misery for her. I had to be careful going inside her space, making sure that I had on clean clothes. One time Ray was distracted with camp chores. He came in for dinner wearing a jacket that he had tucked Rudy into when they were cold. Connie did not say anything, but I could see her eyes swell and her face start to itch. I wish that was not an issue for us.

Port Susan has an elegant chapel. The Spirit of the Lord moves there. I came in a little guarded not sure what I would find. Silly me. Pastor did not speak of Valentines or dead Presidents but of children of God being a whole package, redeemed by the blood of the Son of God. We who by faith believe, recognize that there is no good deed we can do to earn heaven. Occasionally I forget that there is no sin that makes me worthy of rejection by God. Once we enter into a covenant relationship with Y'shua, we become new, a whole package. All of who I am, my finest works and my sin must be presented to God, not in trade for the hope of heaven because Y'shua/Jesus is my only hope of heaven. Nothing needs to be hidden. Everything on the path has shaped us into the people we are. God redeems the whole person to a new creation no longer anchored to the shame or the pride of my past. The message was the conversation on our walks and at our meals. "There is now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus" (Romans 8:1).