The truth is that I hadn't intended to go to Congress. I'm at the latter end of the 20somethings, and though I've always enjoyed congress, I figured my Congress years were behind me, when, out of nowhere, I was invited to be part of a Young Adult Ministries group that you'll understand a lot more about
after Congress. And while I don't have to go to Congress, it was important (in other words I was easily swayed). I actually started to get excited. I'm staying with some great friends from the great white north (i.e. New Brunswick and British Columbia, Canada, eh), and I'm riding down with some of my favorite people from my church. So, as I said, I was growing excited.
And then came the loss of one of my very favorite people and friends, Cory McCool. Everyone who knew Cory loved him. He was special. Cory McCool was my friend. And my neighbor actually. Growing up Cory, and the entire McCool family lived directly across the street. He and I once stood in our front windows and waved across the street to one another. I remember one time when Cory got a new drum set. He said, 'stay right here, I'll go inside and you'll still be able to hear me.' And sure enough, Cory ran in, and played with all his strength. And then in the middle of a great roll, he suddenly stopped, walked outside, and with a sheepish expression said, "mom's on the phone." Cory then went on to describe the melodious sound of his drumset, since he wasn't able to play it for me :). It was actually Cory who showed me how to shoot a basketball for the very first time. That's right, Cory McCool walked across the street and played basketball with me.
But everyone knew Cory and loved him, and when we grew up, and both moved off Madison street, I was sure Cory would forget about the little girl who he used to wave to from the window. But he never did. When he started dating Jina, he introduced me like that, "Jina, this is my friend Sarah, we lived across the street from one another!" Years later when Mylon came along, he introduced me the same way.
Man, I loved Cory. He just made everyone feel special. We all thought we were his best friend.
My boss, at the church where I work, actually is Cory's best friend, from childhood. Robby Emery has been my boss for 9 years last month. Monday morning, after his best friend is buried, Robby will be leaving us for a new position in Texas. So this was my last week as Robby Emery's assistant, and it was this week that his best friend, and my favorite neighbor passed away. I hope that this week I did the very best work I've ever done. I hope so. For Robby, and for Cory.
This was an exhausting week. The world feels less without Cory in it. Like there's less love, and less friendship.
Tonight was the funeral. And wow, I have never in my life been to such a funeral. Not ever. A funeral where his beautiful, beautiful wife (who hugged me and asked if I was ok), danced and worshipped, because that's the way Cory would have wanted it. His whole church worshipped. Cory would've been so pleased.
There's no one else like him in all the world. I love you Cory.
I didn't have a chance to compose this on Saturday when we arrived here in Nashville. I did not realize that Nashville is in the Central time zone. Both my car's clock and my phone automatically adapted via GPS to the new timezone, I suppose I should have realized that we made really good time on the drive in, but I wasn't paying that much attention--I was more worried about not losing the Bishop as he followed, and also avoiding speedtraps. When we arrived, we thus had several hours of free time prior to NABQT orientation. Seeing the State Capitol in the distance, I decided that that would be an interesting building to investigate. On the way, we stopped in at Victory Park 
and noticed the war monuments dating back to commemorations of the Civil War. On further investigation we discovered that the War Museum is located on the premises, and is open free of charge. Despite it being a museum, my kids were actually interested in the uniforms, armor and weapons of the various states and eras. It's an interesting attraction, if you have the time. Upon exiting the museum, it began to rain, so enterprising man that I am, I directed the group to enter the library (the library is connected to a parking garage which is connected to the Renaissance). Since we still had several hours to kill, we browsed around the public library. It's impressive in both its collection and its architecture. The Public Library has some special collections, along with a Civil Rights room. If you have a chance, take a look around.
Quizzing is long-since underway here in Nashville. Round one is completed, and round two has begun. Several teams have now, sadly, been eliminated from competition. The team I coach happens to be one of those teams.
saic of styles at best), I can make a somewhat educated yet speculative guess that the trends this this coming week will be more GQ than ever for the male....complete with bowties, vests, and somewhat tight blue jeans amuck. It will not suprise me one bit if some trends border-line on the clown-like such as the Vatican inspired picture above. One may think this guess a bit imaginative, but I foreone love dressing formally (and therefore somewhat clown-like), and we must remember that it was the most recent youth congress that a speaker literally dressed himself in a batman mask (pictured at right).
I have managed to secure a small urban living space in downtown nashville. I have been to a number of NAYC-like events in recent years, and I have stayed in a number of facilities--ranging from small-roomed hotels within walking distance of the venue, to standard sub-urban, breakfast-included, three story hotels within a thirty-minute drive of the conference venue. I must say that I prefer the former, and fortunately I have, as I've said, secured a nice little one-room in downtown Nashville.
I'm with Sarah--when you hit your late 20s, things like Youth Congress seem decreasingly important. The run-up to NABQT/YC was busier than ever. My J-term class at Urshan Graduate School which I took over the first week of June was intense, followed by the exam. Not only was I catching up at work, but church seemed to be ramping up at the same time. The kids are also a handful, and everything seems to be increasingly busy. Indeed, the weeks approaching NABQT were so busy that I've ended up flying by the seat of my jeans. It was only 3 days prior that I discovered I needed to take Friday off from work, and found out at the same time that I would be driving my car. Over the next three days, I also had to teach at the daughter church in 
Atlantic City (80 miles away), teach the teen class on Wednesday, attend meetings, finish up a few projects (didn't happen), find time to get my car serviced, have dinner with the parents, teach a personal bible study, and then maybe I could start to think about packing... Around 2am Friday morning (slated to leave at 9:30am), I ended up with a pile of clean laundry; much too tired to think about matching said clothing, I stuffed it all into bags and figured I'd sort it out in Nashville. Luckily I have some decent taste in clothing (feel free to disagree, unless your name begins with Pa and ends with tresa). In any case, after a 14 hour drive (including an overnight in Bristol, VA), I've arrived! Thankfully I have a small number of quizzers this year for which I am responsible (3 as opposed to 8(?) last year). A larger number of quizzers always means less personal attention, and I'm all about the personal attention, since that's what affected me the most in my quizzing career (individual time with my coach, now pastor). It also means I have more free-time and flexibility, which allows me to do such things as attend the '8' event on Thursday...In the mean time, we're the second quiz of the morning (see the matrix on upcquiz.com), so I should probably make an attempt at sleep.
Whereas many of the next several blog entries will most likely be about the North American Bible Quizzing Tournament (frequently called NABQT), and whereas some of the readers of this blog may not know much regarding this subject, I will attempt to resolve these two seemingly frustrating facts by explaining a little about the ministry of Bible Quizzing.
