How The Cookie Crumbles

Day 261

I’ve spent a lovely hour and a half visiting with two of my favorite high school mentors.  A husband and wife team, the two of them guided many of my friends and I, students at an Indiana boarding school, to make good, thoughtful choices during our formulate teen years. 

My alarm on my IPhone buzzes to remind me that I have an important Mushball game to attend.  I set it knowing if I didn’t I’d spend the entire afternoon chatting.  (I’ve been known to lose hours to one conversation.)  As I stand to leave, the Besses hand me a bag of homemade cookies. 

“I’ll save them for after the game.  A victory treat!” I say to which they respond that I absolutely need more.  Mrs. Bess rushes to find another dozen to add to the bag. 

Driving back to camp I recognize two little boys riding their bikes and swinging wooden mallets in the field in front of the chapel.  Let me clarify.  I recognize them as the ones that belong to me.  I turn right through Culver’s front gates and park by the field. 

“No Mushball?” I ask my husband who’s comfortably watching the game of bike polo from the front seat of our rented gold cart. 

“Tomorrow,” he says. 

“Wait.  Wait right here,” I say.  I run back to the car, grab the cookies and rush back to him. 

“Look what I got!” I say and open the bag wide enough for him to reach in and take a morsel.  “Great, right?” I say as he munches.  (I know because I’ve already eaten two in the three-block drive from the Besses.) 

When our boys (mine and a few others) take a break, I do the same to them.  Each boy eagerly accepts a cookie.  Bike polo really builds up one’s appetite. 

The game ends and we all head back towards camp.  I. and F. cycle. I take the main road to return and park our car.   Chaz and A. drive the cart through the field back to the cabin. Every time the two of them see a family camper kid they yell out to stop, speed over on the golf cart and offer up a cookie. 

I admit that anywhere BUT Family Camp, a stranger offering you a cookie might be creepy.  Here, it's a wonderful surprise on a sunny afternoon.  

By the time we meet back at the cabin, there’s nothing left but crumbs.  I know the Besses would approve.