Last half we totally destroyed a cake. We put too much oil in the batter accidently, decided to cook it anyway, the pan warped in the oven and the cake batter slide all over and the thing came out completely uneven. After tasting it, and discovering that in addition to our other mishaps that we had also forgetten to add the sugar - we pitched it into the trash. I announced that we would try for cakki kaksi (cake two), and the girls got a kick out of my Finnish insipired optimism. From then on, every “do-over” was a cakki kaksi.
I started today with three new cooks. If the personality of last half was strawberry shortcake, the personality of this half would be steak. The new cooks are just a bit saltier, a bit more sarcastic, but still tender and genuine. They work hard and seriously and with compassion. All our food work was a breeze and I enjoyed the challange of getting to know them.
With the switch over of staff I instantly feel closer to those who are here all summer. Our Food Service director had the kitchen directors and crew bosses over for tea yesterday, and it was nice to just sit and gab with a bunch of girls. We talked about our staff’s and our boyfriend’s and our families. We gossiped, as women do, but in a way I never have. I’ve always been outside the typical ring of girls and never been one for female companionship. I can’t take the drama, the beautifying, or the self-conciousness that seems to be so intrinsic to that kind of socialization. But yesterday, sitting and talking with these girls, our gossip was about how we could encourage people, who needed to be reminded of their value, and who around us was exhibeting astounding service. It was gossip of how we saw God moving. And so in that sense, perhaps it wasn’t gossip at all, just talking. But for me, that moment with those girls was a first, to feel comfortable in a female collective, at peace, and proud of our time together. That afternoon speaks so much to the power of this canyon and the work God does here. Here He let’s us be - and the ugliness of our societal burden can just fall away, leaving fresh, vulnerable, and honest fruit of people, love, and trust to be explored, recognized, and disocovered.
As we start round kaksi, I don’t want it to feel like it’s a “do-over”or a “start-over,” but for it to be a continuation. Although I am making concious improvements at this point because it is a natural move, I’d like to think of the summer and the staff and the work as more fluid. It is not a summer cut into two halves, but a whole of continual motion. With this attitude I hope to be able to carry the vulnerability of my summer-self, the exposed personality and character that is protected and free here, and allow it to move swiftly and calmly into my outside lives at school, or home, or whatever else. Clearly we do not have stagnant identities, and I change when beyond this place, but perhaps a little of that vulnerability and honesty that made yesterday afternoon so sweet could begin to peak through in other arena’s, and perhaps, just perhaps, it could rub off on others too. If we don’t carry our lessons with us beyond the confines of the learning space, then what have we really learned? And what effect do they really have? There are some things, like a ruined cake, that must be thrown away and created again, but there are others, like our social movements and attitudes that are continual works and studies, that change and stretch and swell and grow over time. Those things never have a round kaksi, they simply continue in movement, never ceasing and constantly changing. If we can harness that idea, and allow ourselves to expand and contract when necessary, then God can move so freely through us and among us, that we might even forget that He’s there. That is until He blatenly shows up in the bottom of a tea cup on a sweet afternoon, or in the success of that second round of cake.
