Longest Night
We left the Great Sand Dunes National Park unsure of where we were going to stop for the evening.
Sidenote, I just learned today that they have the word “Great” in them. It’s fitting, I had just been calling them Sand Dunes before and now I feel guilty I did not give them their appropriate amount of respect. My bad Sand Dunes. My bad. Totally on me.
Anywho…
Originally, we were scheduled to stay at the campground near the dunes for one more night and then do a full day of driving to get to Tulsa by evening.
But, Justin’s college chaplain and then good friend at Duke was preaching at his church in Tulsa Sunday morning…
If we left and drove as far as possible, maybe we could make it in time to hear his sermon and say hello.
If not, we’d catch up with him and my extended family on Monday.
I left it up to Justin and said I was good with whatever he wanted to do. He was driving anyway, so really did I have much say anyway? As long as he was good driving, I was good riding.
Plus, my aunt and uncle were flexible with seeing us and we were not up against any deadlines. We could take our time or push it.
And guess which one Justin decided go with?
If you know Justin, then you already know.
I take it easy, Justin pushes the limit. I am the sweet to his sour.
About an hour outside the dunes, we ran into a little sandstorm.
No big deal. Cool to see. Plus, we saw tumbleweed! My favorite weed!
Several hours later, we ran into a real storm. The alerts on my phone were going off for the town where we were considering csmping in…
Fortunately, we seemed to always stay just south of the actual storms and weren’t driving through it. We actually had a pretty spectacular view of the lightning off to our right. Avett didn’t like it that much, but seemed to take comfort that it was a ways away.
In fact, everything was a ways away.
We were in the middle of nowhere Texas or Oklahoma. Great place! You should visit sometime.
But seriously, even if we wanted to stop, there was no place for us to stop.
So we kept driving.
Finally around 1:30, I couldn’t keep my eyes open. I tried my best, but Justin gave me his blessing to close my eyes. He said he had a place to stop that was less than an hour away.
I woke up as he was parking the camper and then woke up again as we were leaving.
“What time is it?”
“6:30. We should be able to make the 11 o’clock with a little time to spare.”
When this boy wants to get to church, he will get to church.
I know how much he respects this friend and how eager he was to see him, so how could I get in the way of making that happen? And why would I?
And you know what?
We made it!
The kids woke up at some point south of Tulsa. We pulled into a McDonalds and while Justin ran into get them food, I jumped into the shower in the McD’s parking lot.
Another first for me!!!
And seriously, for as much fun as I made of the RV shower, it is pretty darn handy.
We pulled into the church parking lot with 10 minutes to spare.
Justin was so proud.
So if you can, shoot Justin a message congratulating him for pulling an almost all nighter and arriving to church on time!
He'll appreciate the recognition.
