An Ordinary Life, An Extraordinary Life

If any of these kind of relationships started developing on the ship, you were supposed to go talk to the chaplain, Jack Hill about it. Laura had already been meeting with his wife, Myrna recently and had told her about Isaiah 62. Laura had been interpreting the verses spiritually, thinking it meant that she was going to grow closer to God. When she had told Myrna, she said,          “Sounds like you’re going to get a husband”. We told Jack and Myrna our story and they considered it plausible. He asked us about physical guidelines, recommending we not kiss until marriage. I affirmed that that was my intention and he said that we should just carry on and see what happens, if circumstances would bring confirmation. As Don Stephens and his family had left the ship, we were going to watch a movie with a group of friends in his cabin that night. The Good Samaritan was also coming to Jamaica that day and was going to dock alongside us. Laura and I were both looking fo...

When I got back to the ship, Laura seemed a little frantic when she saw me. I had had no particular reason to tell her I was going on the trip so she didn’t know where I had been. She had been asking everyone where I was and when nobody knew she got worried. That made me feel kinda good. It seemed like she missed me or something. I said,          “You know who I was thinking about the whole trip?”  There was a pause,          “Who?”         “You.” Her face broke into a huge smile. As we were going on the beach trip the next day I said,          “I think we need to talk at the beach tomorrow”. Still beaming, she replied,          “Okay”.  All of a sudden my relationship theology resolve began to weaken. I started to wonder if maybe there was a place for boyfriends and girlfriends. The beach was called Frenchman’s Cove. It is a beautiful little inlet with brill...

There was a hotel with a pool at the top of one of the hills surrounding Port Antonio and the graduates were going to have their graduation party up there. Somehow, even though it wasn’t my graduation, I thought it was okay for me to invite Laura. She was friends with them all anyway. We were in the ship lobby when I asked her where the gangway enters the ship and everyone comes and goes. Laura was kind of hesitant about accepting my invitation, maybe because she wondered if I was even supposed to be inviting someone. So there, in the very public lobby, with everyone coming and going, I got down on one knee and implored her to come. She was very embarrassed and quickly agreed so that I would just get up. That night at the party, the other boys and I created a lot of commotion as we played a hard game of tag in the pool and I pretty much almost completely ignored Laura. It wasn’t on purpose. I was just having so much fun with the guys and she was mixing well with her other friends that ...

The next night, as we were sailing to Jamaica, I was up on deck watching the ocean in the moonlight when someone else came up. I couldn’t see who it was in the dark but, lo and behold, discovered it was Laura. As I was alone, she wanted to make sure she wasn’t disturbing me.           “Do you want to be by yourself? Do you want me to leave?”          “No, you’re fine.” We watched the water for a while and talked. Once again, something that came out of my mouth astonished me. We were talking about travelling and she said,           “I’d love to travel to Europe.” I said,            “I have a lot of friends in Europe I haven’t seen in a while, maybe we could travel together.” Now obviously, a single Christian man and a single Christian woman should never travel alone together because the close intimate experience starts drawing you into an emotional bond that usually ...

21 – Florida, Georgia, Jamaica, California, London, North Carolina I turned 21 in Florida. It’s supposed to be a big birthday in the US when you can start drinking alcohol legally. I didn’t like alcohol and I wasn’t intending to start drinking now. So turning 21 was no big deal for me.  While I was in Florida, I got to go see the Good Samaritan again and was especially happy to see my good friend, Ted McKenzie. I also had some time before I had to get to the Anastasis in Brunswick, Georgia where it was preparing to sail to an outreach in Jamaica.  There was a guy I knew in Florida who was a friend of the Good Samaritan. He worked in the construction business. He let me stay with him and work for a few weeks to make a little money. Once again, I’m not so sure I was really helping him but somehow I kept finding these people who were so generous to me. Then I took the bus to Brunswick to board the Anastasis. As I was there for Heidi Stephens's graduation, I went into her cabin wh...

I got another deal on a different mode of transportation. This time I decided to try a bus/coach adventure. I found a good deal on Greyhound with which I could travel anywhere in their network for a certain period of time. I thought this would be a good way to see more of the country too. Once again I flew to New York and began my bus odyssey to Florida. I had some time and had never been to Washington D.C. so I decided to stop there first. YWAM had a basement flat in a not-so-nice part of town not too far from the Capitol Building. They used it to house people for outreaches but didn’t have anything going on at the time. They just left the key somewhere for me and I returned it to the same place when I left. I never did see anyone. I stayed a couple of nights and had a day to check out all the sights. I walked and walked and walked. I visited the Capitol Building where I got to watch both the Senate and the House in session. I walked down the Mall to the Washington Memorial where I we...

Upon my return to London, since health care was “free” in England, I decided to look into seeing if I could get the strabismus in my eye fixed. I had heard of healthcare rationing and the nightmare waits for services but I thought I’d just give it a shot. It turned out that eye surgeries were not one of the services most in demand and I got a surgery date very quickly. I was told that what they had to do was shorten the muscle that was weak so that it wouldn’t let the eye wander. It wasn’t until after the surgery that I found out that they actually pulled the whole eyeball out to take care of it. If I had known that beforehand, I may not have done it. Although the surgery greatly improved the issue, the eye still has a slight wander. I was still working at Safeway but I wasn’t getting any modeling jobs. I realized that I was probably not going to get very far with the modeling “agency” I was with. I knew that I should just try to sign with an established one. But I was scared.  Hop...