I want to be meaningful. I want to love someone with all my heart and through that exemplify God and His love for us. I want be loved by someone. I want to be strong. I want to be real. I want to swear and love Jesus at the same time. I want to swear about how much I love Jesus. I want to quit my job at the bank, proving money’s not fun when I’m gone. I want to run a marathon. I want to get married and have kids. I want to teach my kids how to live rightly. I want to pray. I want to read God’s Word and hear Him speak to me through it. I want to fly in a plane. I want to go to Europe. I want to sing songs written by other people. I want to sing songs written by myself. I want to sing to God. I want to sing to my wife. I want to play in a band with friends. I want to get better at singing and playing. I want to help people who have less than me. I want to help people that have more than me. I want to see the truth. I want to find beauty in everything. I want to live simply and love deeply.

I want to live life in a way that pleases God and changes peoples lives for the better.

I don’t want to end up with a list of ‘I wish I would have’s.

We took a tiny detour because we were so close to Hillbilly Hotdogs in West Virginia. Some friends from church told us about this place a few months ago and I couldn’t wait to try it. It was tasty. And these garlic ranch fries were insane.

Two of the best people on earth - the lovely Steve Hart and Sue Jones – are coming down tomorrow to meet up with Kathy and I here in Cincinnati. Then we’ll all take off bright and early the next morning for our little mountain cabin that we rented for our Wednesday-Sunday stay. I can’t express how much I’m looking forward to a good road trip (about 6.5hrs to NC), a scenic setting, and some relaxation tossed with a healthy dose of adventure.

The plan currently is to climb Grandfather Mountain - about a 2000ft climb over 3ish miles and then back again. This makes for an almost 7 mile day of legitimate hiking goodness. I know if you are a real hiker and have been doing this for a while you may say to yourself “Wow that’s not that bad…” But, I’m still fairly new to this thing – so I’m hoping all of our legs and feet hold out for the long haul. I also hope Steve and Sue have at least some clue of what they signed up for when 2 months ago they said “Yeah we’re totally in for hiking a mountain that sounds like fun!” Hah!

Kathy and I did take about a 12 mile hike through the various gorges and falls in beautiful Hocking Hills a few weeks ago – but we weren’t as well prepared as we needed to be on the H2O front… so we made it, but it was rough and we immediately packed up camp and came home afterwards. That was our intentional, lesson-learning trial run. So I say full steam ahead! Grandfather Mountain here we come!

So roadtrip Wednesday, mountain on Thursday, relaxation/pre-wedding welcome party on Friday, wedding on Saturday, and back home for Echo Church goodness on Sunday evening. Then Monday off for recovery at home. I’m so ready.

Throughout the winter, I’ve taken on a more active lifestyle that I’ve ever really had in my life – walking and working out almost daily. Kathy and I have been setting fitness/recreation goals and have begun training to achieve them. I plan to expound on this in future posts, but at a high level: I wan’t to (and have started to) lose a good amount of weight, ascend to the peak of a moderate mountain this summer, and ultimately I would like to begin the journey of rocking out a marathon by training for and doing a 5k or two (or maybe even whatever a step up from that is. – still not in that world yet so don’t even know what typical races are… 10k? 15k? whatever.)

The point is, it’s starting to get nice out here in The Nati and I couldn’t be more excited. If walk a mile for lunch in 15 degree whether every other day now, how much better will life be when I’m jogging there in sunny 60 degree  breezes?!? Mmmm spring….