The Slack Attack: South Dakota

Sometimes, you don't have to plan.

I have a wonderful job that involves lots of timelines, reports, notes, follow-ups, and other myriad tools of project management. I like my job, but sometimes its nice just to do something without a lot of planning - and to have it all work out anyway. This weekend was one of those moments. Ever since I heard about it, I felt pretty strongly about getting myself to the Taize gathering in Red Shirt, Pine Ridge Reservation.

First, I have never been to that area of the country - and never to a true reservation. Second, it's been a little while since I camped and it's always nice to get a small reminder of the joy of regular showers

But mostly, I was looking for the Taize spirit. I know of no other group that has such a welcome openness among so many, from such disparate backgrounds.

However, there was a catch - I didn't exactly figure out how I was getting there. My thought had been to ride with Chicago folks, but the connections were light and the buses full. So I found myself googling for other rides and resources - and on Wednesday, I found a bus leaving from Minneapolis, a cool 4.5 hours from Madison.

So right after work on Thursday, I got on the road with a audio book of "The girl with the dragon tattoo" and headed to the bus. The people were kind, friendly, and pretty much all new to Taize. That didn't make them newbies, or lacking in experience, but perhaps there was a confidence difference

I had some idea of what I was getting myself into, and they were coming on the strength of the recommendations of others, or simply a Memorial Day whim.

We rolled into South Dakota after an overnight bus trip, went though Walldrug, the tourist maven of South Dakota, and pulled up to a gate with a cattleguard that the bus driver didn't want to go over.

Afte schlepping a half mile, we were welcomed by various people and then set up tents in the middle of a field dominated by cow chips and stubs of grass everywhere. I had no sleeping pad but found some level dirt to pitch a tent on. It was super windy so we had to get things staked down quickly, and between the warm earth and sky I felt a little sandwiched. The openness is actually flattening: it's like there's no room for anyone to exist between the blue and brown disks on the table (unlike when you are in the canyons between tables - which I would have called plateaus until now).

And then we went to prayer, and everything worked. The entire weekend, there was no rain (though as my friend Amanda says, God is in the rain), and a bunch of new people to Taize collectively willed that this would work. And it did, perfectly. 500 some people clustered on the edge of the badlands reconsecrated this sacred space with the prayer style that was so familiar.

And in between the prayers, we talked, ate (really cold one morning), and took an illfated 2.5 mile trek (as the crow flies) into the badlands where we were supposed to be back at 4:30, but didn't turn around until 5:15....oops. (bad cell service down here) As part of that trip, I was scouting ahead of the group as we tried to find a more direct route than following the very windy creek bed, but was not successful. Instead, I ended up having to clamor down the cliff face pictured in center left here (I found it on Google earth!) when the path I was trying ended in an unsafe drop. I got cactus spines in my hand, which are just now almost healed.

After that, our large group split up and the three of show shown bushwhacked a more direct route back to camp and food, just a bit late to dinner. We went up and down a few more steep hills and mucked through a small marsh before climbing out of a ravine, then up a set of steep hills back to the edge of the table. I was very happy to have brought five water bottles. To the left are the two ladies I climbed with after our triumphal return.

And then there was the comradery and friendship, as shown in the photos below. More of them are on Facebook - for now, I'll just say I miss everyone and that it was a great weekend.