goodbye snow mountain

(to be read @ LCI final banquet)

From the Pinewood hallway to the Blueridge porch
The disappointment of Commons and the consistancy of Bergwiches
Dostoevsky and Kerouac on the near-perfect Admin couches or the log outside my tent
This has been a summer I'm so glad to remember

God has blessed me with people
He gave me all of you guys
For a few short months I got to laugh, hike, read, camp, and work
With the finest future leaders and caretakers of different little spots of earth
Calvin College has to offer

I'm so glad to have met you
At school I probably wouldn't have gotten that chance
Stepping out of former cliques and into this fellowship
Has been just the living in the present that God willed

But God has also blessed me with anguish
Every Monday night and every worship service
My heart has ached - confirming its longing to pursue its purpose
God has called me to play bass - But this summer I was called to fast
How perfect are His restoring ways
And I see that this is just what I needed

Thanks God for these people
Thanks for this fast
Thanks for the most cool comfortable summer evenings in the nation
Thanks for the Divide, the Indian Peaks,
and for Trail Ridge Road

And thank you friends, for your love
For all the things you've taught me about myself
Thanks for Gray's but not Torrey's
Thanks for the Waterfall and Blue Ridge trips
Thanks fellahs for not wandering off and breaking ankles
Thanks for the Bergwiches
Thanks for the hallways of Pinewood and 1st Blueridge
and thanks for growing along side of me.

You'll all be remembered as fine companions along this part of the journey.

home sweet home

There's something about that place.
The smell of smoke, coffee, hot dogs through the night

Something about a place owned and run by peers -
Makes me feel so at home

I've been travelling the nation looking for its equal
But it takes a certain over-Dutch flavor
For a coffee shop not to be Yuppie
It takes a certain conservative atmosphere
For rebellious youth to want to be there all night
Takes circumstances that could only happen in one place.

Chess playing lunitics
Yellow toy hardhats
Loud highschoolers banging on tables
Zombie movies
Posters of cool bands that even the employees haven't heard of
Smoke, a lot of smoke.
Some laptops, some homework, some Scrabble
Most for here but some to go
Poloroids

Poster board and maker signs, and
Chalk boards, both with typical "we don't care about you" indie over-sarcasm
Bathrooms repainted for a new round of witty vs. stupid
Johnny Cash

Look, here comes a jock and his pretty girl
Every single eye is turned
They won't last ten minutes

There's no place like Grand Rapids, so there's no place like Morningstar