Missing Eyebrows

Have you ever done something with 100% assurance that it was going to work the way you thought it would and completely resolve the situation exactly how it should and just knew with all your heart that your way was the best way possible only to have your actions create the exact opposite effect that you had planned?

The summer I turned 12, I was able to go to Girl's Camp for the first time. For those of you who aren't familiar with Girl's Camp, it's the summer camping experience created within the Young Women's program of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Every summer, for a week, young women throughout the Church head off with their leaders into the wildernesses of the world to learn and grow and have a lot of fun.

My mother was and is always at Girl's Camp. In fact, I don't think I can remember a summer that she didn't go to Girl's Camp in the last 20 years! In any case, I was happy that she was going to be there for my first camp experience. It made me feel safe and assured that my week would be fun and I would still have a little bit of home with me :)

Camping with 100 other teenage girls is EXACTLY how you think it is: CRAZY. As you can imagine, leaders spend the majority of their days and nights striking the perfect blend of teaching, comforting, refereeing and loving. Not every girl wants to be there but by the end, I think that every girl is glad she goes, if only to be able to share her horror stories with her friends over lip gloss applying in the locker room at school in the fall.

Honestly though, the magnitude of teaching and spiritual learning that happens is amazing. There's much to be learned about not only physical survival but spiritual survival as well. Much of my early spiritual foundations were laid and cemented at Girl's Camp.

I was a complete tom boy and loved the dirt and sweat and camping and cooking over the open fire and all that jazz. It was awesome! I went back every year that I was eligible and even as a leader later in life. It's one of those things that I never grew tired of.

My first year, there was a lot of adjustments to be made. Obviously when you get a bunch of girl's out in the woods, there is going to be some mischief. The newbies are always the ones to get picked on the most and that year I fell asleep in a lawn chair and got toilet papered as well as scared to death on a "snipe" hunt. All in good fun, though and it made for good stories to share later.

That year, I also had another experience, while hilarious in nature is also just now beginning to have deeper meaning to me as I reflect on it.

I like to do things my way. I feel like I am fairly intelligent and well-meaning. However, it is hard for me, once I make up my mind about the way things should happen, to let go of that vision and see things any other way. As good as my intentions might be, I am often short-sighted and in my life, that has caused myself, and others who know and love me, some heart ache.

During the course of my first week at Girl's Camp, we were required to prepare food in a few different ways: open fire, dutch oven, etc. One evening, my mom had a bunsen burner out and we were using it to cook something, I can't remember exactly what it was but I was in charge of the item over the bunsen. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, the burner was in a can, a sterno-like apparatus that we had actually made ourselves with cardboard and wax, also a part of the learning and fun :)

When it was done, my mom asked me to put out the burner and tossed me the lid. In my mind, this was like a big candle so the way to put it out, again, in MY MIND, was to blow as hard as I could. Well, for those of you who know, you can probably complete the story without me telling it.

I drew a big breath into my lungs and then without hesitation, blew with all my might on the burner.

BAD IDEA.


Just as I was about to blow, my mom screamed, "NO!" But to no avail. Encouraged by the massive amounts of fuel, the burner was like a blow torch and exploded in my face, completely erasing my eyebrows and any other hair on my face, as well as causing some painful second-degree burns.

Now, as you all know, my face is completely fine (cute even) so I haven't sustained any long-lasting scars from that moment. I spent the next few days nursing my burns with cool water and love from my mom. But in the end, my face was fine but my behavior had changed forever because I had learned how NOT to put out a bunsen burner.

Good thing to know.

In any case, I wonder why that experience doesn't come to mind when I get so hell-bent on other ideas that I think will make everything right or better or just different? Why do I always have to do it my way? It's selfish, really, when I contemplate the fact that there are billions of other people with just as many good ideas as me.

In my heart, I feel genuinely sorry for some of the ways in which I have behaved or things that I have said that I thought were "the best thing," "the right thing," "the only way that things will work," and so on. I know that all my ideas aren't bad and actually many times, my way is a great way and it works.

But, I want to be open to more ideas, to more ways, to more people, including those I love and who love me. I think I would move through life a little less clumsily and a lot more satisfied with the outcomes of each day.

I also know it would certainly make me more open to guidance from up above and who couldn't use a little more of that :)

Either way, I hope to have less moments of fire int he face and be able to keep my eyebrows, and heart, just right.