Days 152-157: Wrapping up LA (2/4-2/9/21)

For the rest of our time in Louisiana, we’ll be staying with the Talbot’s in Baton Rouge, with 3 retreats in 6 days. The first retreat is less than a mile away from the Talbot household at Our Lady of Mercy in Baton Rouge. It was an 8th grade school retreat, and the youth respected the heck out of us, which made my life as retreat leader pretty swell. We met one of the funniest retreatants all year, a kid who went by the nickname “Fluffy”, and had to do Co-Ed small groups, which worked out beautifully! That evening, I nearly bursted into tears as I received a chicken teriyaki bowl for dinner, something I wasn’t expecting to receive before coming back home to Seattle, and ended the evening with some low-stakes poker with the boys. . . On a free day, Grace and I put on the schedule “The Hunt 2021”. An idea given to us by Team 8 when we hung out with them in Arkansas, it is a massive scavenger hunt around town, with two teams collecting various city items and completing different challenges via photos and videos. It was a 4-hour competition split between 2 teams, while Grace and I were headmasters. It was very successful, as both teams had alot of fun exploring and doing the various things, and the winners were awarded free Smoothie King, a famous smoothie chain down in Louisiana. It was extremely filling, but so so good. For dinner, we tried crawfish pie, which is a famous dish down here because, well, crawfish. It was really good, had the consistency of chicken pot pie, but it was crawfish. I was surprised how much I liked it, given I am not a big seafood guy. The rest of the evening was really chill, the scavenger hunt and smoothies took alot out of them, but im glad the plan came into fruition. . . The next few days I basically have off, which is really strange but will make sense eventually. First, I had a retreat off in Hammond, LA, with Sally! It was my first retreat off with somebody this year. We didn’t have much planned for the day, but just enough for us to have a packed day. We started by driving to Chesterton Square, where lies the only statue of author G.K Chesterton in the nation. This is significant because Sally went to a school called Chesterton Academy in Minnesota, and his life has greatly influenced Sally. Her reaction to seeing the statue were the same as one receiving the surprise Christmas gift they have asking for all year: so full of awe and joy. From there, we went thrift shopping, ate lunch as the Mariner’s Inn, and chilled out doing our own personal things at a coffee shop called PJ’s. We returned for mass and dinner at the church, St. Margaret in Hammond, and drove home for the night. An awesome day off, making me miss retreats off with people for sure. . . We have come to a point in the year where other team members can lead certain team activities, such as daily team prayer and weekly team days, which are usually led by Grace and I, the Team Leaders. Some people have begun leading team prayers already, but today was out first Team Day led by teammates. We chose Brenden and Katherine, who created a gator-themed team day, as gators are a big team joke being in the south. The main event was going to the Baton Rouge Zoo, which was so much fun! Very little Covid restrictions since it was all outdoors, and because it’s down south, it’s not cold to do it. They also had us make gator-themed arts and crafts, as well as “gator shopping” at a dollar store, which essentially means “find the best item in the dollar store that can be used to catch a gator”. It was really creative, I gotta admit. We ended the night with watching the Super Bowl! It was not a great game by any means, but I enjoyed watching sports with my team, since only a handful of them enjoy watching sports. I needed it so bad, mainly since I forgot how much I missed sports, so praise for that. . . I got to sleep in for 9 hours the next morning, since it was our team no-obligation day. It was the longest I have ever slept on NET in both my years, and I enjoyed it. I took my time getting ready in the morning, then took a walk to grab some kombucha from Whole Foods down the street. Later I went to Raising Cane’s with the boys, and just chill for most the day. It was beautiful. At around 4pm, we left for Breaux Bridge, LA, where we would have our retreat tomorrow. We would only stay one night there, before returning to Baton Rouge, so we only packed for one night and left our suitcases at the Talbot’s. They stuck us in cabins at an RV Park, which had pretty pond views. We had awesome team time in the evening, which included Chapter 4 of Andrew’s book “Captain of the Rosemary”! Aw, you guys, this book, I’m so excited for it to come out on shelves someday. . . I had once again another retreat off, making this 5 chill days in a row for me. As a Team Leader, I am obligated to have a day off per weekly schedule, and having days off on back-to-back retreats was kind of happenstance, but also for good reason. Grace is returning home for a couple days for her twin brother’s wedding, so I’ll have to lead the team by myself for awhile, which is a tall task so I’ll take the rest now. I spent my day off in Breaux Bridge with Katherine, where we had a few things in store. The main activity was visiting Lake Martin in Breaux Bridge to see real bayou gators. Our trek was successful! We found some gators, but we also experienced the breathtaking views of the bayou and lake. It was so quiet, so peaceful, it was surreal. We also ran into a NET alumni on the lake! It was totally unexpected, and praise that we encountered him, as we could tell it brought back alot of memories for him. We went to lunch at a cute shop called Tante Marie, and chilled for a couple hours at St. Bernard’s, where the retreat was, doing our own personal things. After retreat, we returned home to the Talbot’s for one last night. Up next: Mississippi! We have a packed week full of retreats, and it’s going to be AWESOME! I’m looking forward to the busyness of it all, and how God is going to work through us. Keep praying for me and my team, and I’ll see you in Mississippi!