Home again! Thank God we made it home okay from our Summit Ski Retreat with no breakdowns or broken bones. I was very pleased with the trip this year. However, this trip did spawn some new youth minister jokes and the return of the Absent Minded Professor (this is the nickname that one of my teachers in elementary school gave me). It seems as though I could not remember anything. The first thing that I forgot was discovered as we unloaded the ice chest and realized that I had forgotten all of our refrigerated items in the refrigerator at church. Not too huge of a deal, but the forgetting didn't stop there.

Last year was my first year to ski. By the end of the trip I was going down some "blue" runs and feeling fairly comfortable on my skis. This year our preacher, David Chisholm, went with us on the trip. He's the same age as me and a more experienced skier. By the second day he was egging me on to go down a black diamond with him. We found a "glade" to go down, which is basically an intermediate with trees (obstacles) to avoid and moguls. After going down it the first time I was feeling a bit of confidence. So the next time we went down I got the bright idea to video the preacher skiing in front of me down this same run. I guess I forgot that this is how youth ministers, Kennedys, and Sunny Bonos die. It hit me as I started down that I was probably filming my own idiotic death so I found a stopping place and put the camera away.

Maybe the worst thing I forgot was one of my teens. Too add some irony to the whole ordeal the teen I forgot is in 7th grade and this was her first youth trip. Twelve years ago on my first youth trip as a 7th grader I was forgotten in the back seat of our church van. I fell asleep behind the drivers seat and woke up in the youth ministers driveway. Fast forward twelve years later and I become a youth minister and leave on of my teens skiing on the mountain. At the end of the day we all gathered up our stuff and loaded the vans. We had two vehicles so I guess it was easier for us to not notice one of our teens was not among us. We did notice when we were returning our skis and we were one pair short. Thank goodness the poor girl didn't freak out when she got to the "Village Haus" where we'd been camped out all day and found there was no one there. I'm even more thankful that, like my parents 12 years ago, the mother of the girl didn't kill the youth minister when he got home.

On the final day of the trip after rounding up all the teens and getting everything packed into the trailer we began our final run through of the house. I turned to one of the other adults and asked if he still had the house key so we could go turn it in. He searched his pockets and couldn't find the key. In the back of my mind I was already trying to figure out how I'd lost it even though I hadn't had it all week. After frantically searching everywhere it hit me...I opened the door the day before and stuck the key in my ski pants. No big deal if my ski pants weren't packed in my suitcase that was currently in the front of the full trailer we just spent a good time loading. IDIOT!

When all was said and done I finally got to come home and see my beautiful wife and daughter and give them hugs and kisses. One of the parents and the preacher also, lovingly, created some new youth minister jokes that I'll now post for your enjoyment:

Why did the youth minister cross the road? Because he forgot his keys on the other side.

Why did the youth minister cross the road? Because he left a teen on the other side.

Why did the youth minister cross the road? He can't remember.