50 Days of Gratitude: Day 7

At the last minute we decided to spend this afternoon/overnight at a spot we’d long thought looked like fun. The Vintages, in Dayton OR, is a community of travel trailers from the 1950s and 1960s, restored and used as a traveler’s destination. There is a pool and a clubhouse and a large gathering area with firepits. There’s a lovely general store and old school bicycles are available to borrow and ride about the area. In the surrounding area are multiple vineyards and tasting rooms.

We are in an Airstream that is the same vintage as me! It’s cozy, to be sure, but such a throwback to a simpler time. (Arguably, it’s simpler for me because I was so new to the planet.)

The thing we’ve enjoyed as much as anything here, though, is the community firepit gathering in the evening. At night, this place looks like a twinkling fairyland as the thousands of lights in the trees and above the firepits create so much charm. The guests of each trailer stroll to the firepits with a beverage in hand and maybe more to share, and sit with people they don’t know and….well, get to know them. Last night we were with a couple about our age who had just learned that their dog probably has cancer. They clutched hands the entire evening. There was also a younger couple who had inherited his grandparents vintage RV and wanted some ideas about how to retro-fit it. He graduated from Ohio State and was from NE Ohio, so we had that conversation too. His grandfather was a UCC pastor and in their last conversation before his death, the grandfather asked his grandson to help him learn to get people’s pronouns correct. The young man said he was so proud of his grandfather for that. What a holy story to share around a firepit with a stranger.

Today I’m thankful for intentional places of conversation and I’m thinking about how the Church can do this in a better way. Or just how I can do it in a better way. And I’m thankful for the folks we met last night and for a grandfather who left this world wanting to honor and respect others.