Meeting Former Acquaintances and Riding Again

We spent the weekend at Redeemer University College in Ancaster, Ontario.  We had lovely dormitory apartment accommodations with laundry facilities.  On Sunday afternoon we had the largest “celebration rally” of the tour with over 1,000 people in attendance.  Geographically, we are in the land where Sea to Sea was conceived and there is great support for the tour.  We’ve had churches provide over-the-top SAG stops and dinners.  Sometimes the amount of food seems to contradict our cause of fighting poverty.  Yes, we need a lot of calories when we’re biking, but we could not bike enough miles to work off all the food we’ve had offered to us in the last few days.  If only we could package that food and send it to those who really need it.

One of the speakers at the rally on Sunday called us heroes.  Personally, I believe that is an overstatement which puts us on a very undeserved pedestal .  We’re just normal people doing what we can to raise awareness and funding for a great cause.  Some of us ride bikes.  Some of us work in the kitchen.  Some of you donated money.  Some of you influence systemic change.  Some of you move to foreign countries.  We all do our part.  None of us can fight the cycle of poverty alone.  We talk to people along the route every day and explain what we are doing.  Some people volunteer a donation while others wish us well and bid us safe travels. 

I unexpectedly connected with a former colleague from our teaching days in Visalia, California.  Vicki is now serving as the pastor of a church in Breslau, Ontario.  It was good to reconnect and to hear about her life, even though it’s had its share of unexpected events, and of her plans for a walking pilgrimage on the El Camino De Santiago in Spain next year.  Someone told her that it is a life-changing event.  Two of the founders of Sea to Sea spoke at our Peleton meetings the last two nights and referred to Sea to Sea in the same way.  I think one of them hit the nail on the head when he said, “You don’t yet know what impact this tour will have on you.”  Significant events have a way of shaping us for years to come, often in surprising ways.  As I’ve looked back over my life, I can recognize some defining moments, but I had no idea of their significance at the time.

Crossing paths with former acquaintances seems to be a recurring event on this tour.  Rudy saw a familiar-looking face at the Trenton Christian School where we stayed last night.  It turns out the man was a teacher at Dordt when we were students there, and the father of one of Rudy’s soccer teammates at Dordt.  He commented, “Who knows when our paths may cross again!”  This seems to be a very true statement, given the groups of people we interact with.  (There is no end to Dutch Bingo on this trip!)  Today I met a woman who worked with my sister for several years at Calvin Christian School in the Minneapolis area.  What fun.

It’s amazing how these meetings happen.  I’ve recorded several of them here in this blog, but I’ve probably missed some as well.  They seem like meetings of chance, but my theology says that God has his hand in everything and there is no “chance.”  Vicki and I were not best friends or anything, yet it was good to see her familiar face and to catch up on the main details of our lives.  What is it that makes connecting with a former acquaintance a good thing?  Maybe it reminds us of a certain segment of our lives and prompts us to remember those days and people from a distance.  Sometimes things look much different from a distance than they look up close.

I thought I would have more time to write this post, but we should leave this library (and our Internet availability) soon if we want to make it back to camp for supper.

My big news for the day:  I road twelve miles of the route on my bike!!!!  The view was clear, the breeze was fresh, and a sense of freedom teased my musings as I biked along the shore of Lake Ontario southwest of Kingston.  I am thankful to be riding after only four and one-half weeks since breaking my fibula.