Right before school started, I was able to get away for a weekend with some of my girlfriends for the most relaxing retreat to Hocking Hills. I should give full credit where credit is due and mention that it was our husbands who planned this trip, picked a date, booked an Airbnb and each took one day off work so we could do this.
Before I begin with the fun recap, I just want to write a quick note on adult friendships. Ever since I got married and moved out of my college dorm room, I’ve struggled to make friends as an adult. Don’t get me wrong- I’m very outgoing and usually extroverted and have no trouble striking up excellent conversations with other women. Sometimes even deep conversations. I have many people in my life that I would consider “friends”, but it has been a long time since I’ve felt like I have those DEEP FRIENDS. For years, I tried everything to develop those kinds of friendships, but it just never happened. I joined MOPS. I went to every women’s event for our church (and other local churches). I joined a blogging group. I went to events. I tried to join a gym and take some women’s classes. I prayed. I invited people over for dinner and dessert and fellowship. We had playdates. And I still didn’t feel like I had those friendships.
And my takeaway from those years of my life is that I will never tell anyone HOW they can make friends. Sure, there are some things that need to be done in order to make friends (like talking to someone, probably leaving the house, etc). But I believe that just like in many other parts of life, there is often a season of drought in friendships. This might come from life circumstances (being home with tiny children, working a full time job, traveling frequently, etc). And sometimes there is just no real reason- there just is a drought. Those years taught me how deeply I need to cling to the Lord in my loneliness. How He is the giver of all good things- even friendships. How no matter how right I do everything, sometimes I still don’t get the results I want.
And then sometimes God just blows me away by giving me a gift that I never even expected and had nearly given up on. And I’m finally in a season in my life where I feel like I have REAL friends as an adult. The type of friends who will answer the phone in the middle of the night and will listen to me sob on the other end of the phone. The type of friends who remember my birthday and make it special. The type of friends who know my kids and my husband. The type of friends who care for me when my husband is on a stressful call or one more person posted something really ignorant about his job on social media. The type of friends that were the first people I saw in person once we agreed to lift the lockdowns for our families. The type of friends who will call me out when I’m being unnecessarily grumpy and tell me that part of the problem is me in the first place. Ha.
These friendships didn’t start as weekend retreats. It started as us getting together about twice a month at my house after we had put the kids to bed. It took one person who is so good at planning (that would be you, Jess!) and would make sure to text everyone and find a time that worked for all of our schedules. It took consistency.
It’s not all perfect. We sometimes disagree. We still have a lot of growth to do. One member of our “group” wasn’t able to go on this weekend retreat. I don’t know if these friendships will last forever, or if they are a gift for a season. But I’m thankful. That is all- I am thankful.
Anyways- back to the point of this post- our weekend retreat to Hocking Hills!
We left Saturday morning and drove the 2+ hours to Hocking Hills. It’s a fun drive because most of it is not on the highways. I absolutely love, love the country and was so thrilled to be out in the middle of nowhere!
We weren’t able to check into our Airbnb yet, so we wandered around the town of Athens. We walked the streets, got some coffee, looked in some shops, got some takeout lunch and some cookies and then headed to the Airbnb. Athens was such a cute town, and they take their mask-wearing seriously! We were all amazed at how EVERY single business had creative signs saying “wear your mask”! Agree or disagree with that, we were glad that the entire town was so clear on their stance.
We spent the rest of the day at the Airbnb just relaxing. Literally just relaxing. There was silence. There was some conversation. But mostly I was able to just sit and think and write and journal and read my Bible and take a walk.
Since none of us felt particularly comfortable eating in restaurants and going out in public much, we opted to bring our own food and eat all our meals at the Airbnb. We each were in charge of one meal and it was such a fun way to be together. I ended up cooking Saturday night dinner, Christine was in charge of Sunday morning breakfast, and Natalie cooked Sunday evening dinner.
After cleaning up dinner, we pulled out a game and played that on the floor together. It was a HILARIOUS game and I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in months. It was seriously EXACTLY what I needed. Like hook me up to an IV of laughter because laughing that hard felt like healing after these months and months of stress.
Sunday morning we woke up to a beautiful day an incredible breakfast by Christine! She’s an amazing cook and is always coming up with CREATIONS in the kitchen. I wish I had a picture of breakfast, but I was too busy eating it to snap one! She made zucchini waffles with sausage and fruit. It was SO good.
Sunday we planned to be our outdoor day and we left fairly early in the morning to walk a hike and go tubing down a river. It was a FUN day. I LOVE being outside and adventuring, so this was the perfect day for me.
We started out by hiking Ash Cave in Hocking Hills. Its a very easy hike to the cave (I believe it is even wheelchair accessible) and then you can continue on after the cave for a more strenuous and longer hike.
We probably hiked a little over two miles and then headed back to the car because we had a tubing reservation to get to!
We drove through the winding backwoods of Hocking Hills (dramamine recommended if you are used to the flat cornfields of Ohio!) and arrived at the tubing place.
Y’all. This place. It was a tiny shack on a huge lot. The entire lot was turned into a disorganized parking lot. You had to offroad it and then basically just make yourself a parking spot because nothing was marked. No clear directions. We finally get parked (it was iffy) and head up to the shack. The lady at the shack says “we’re pretty casual around here”. NO KIDDING. We picked up our tubes and then decided to also rent a cooler holder raft for our lunches. The signs said no alcohol, but we clearly saw everyone else putting multiple alcoholic beverages in their coolers (one group filled an entire kayak with about three cases of beer). We were kinda chuckling and also kinda terrified wondering what we were getting ourselves into, especially since I was the only one who had ever been tubing before. We finally got loaded onto the bus and taken to the drop-off. The bus driver told us it would take us a good 3-4 hours, but if we decided to party along the way it could take up to 8 hours. We were clutching our pearls at this point.
Once we got into the river and were on our own, we had a blast! We are so glad that we brought our lunch along and enjoyed snacking the entire time. We also grabbed a paddle and that was helpful along the way. The river wasn’t crowded, but we very rarely were completely alone.
It ended up taking us about 2 hours to get back to the landing (I guess we are real party poopers since we came in an entire 6 hours in front of those who have the party-on-the-river reputation!). Once back at the landing, we dumped our tubes and left. No one was there to check us in or make sure that we were alive and that we had actually returned the tubes. I mean…seriously…we could have lost a person in the river and that company would have no clue! It was so disorganized we were feeling stressed out. The actual tubing down the river was so relaxing, but the company that facilitated it was “very casual”. It was obvious that many people loved the company- probably because they knew how casual they were and knew that they could away with most anything. It seemed to be a good working relationship, but if I went tubing again I would probably choose a different company just so I felt a bit more safe and a little less casual. Still, it was such a fun memory and we will laugh about the “casual company” for a long time to come!
After our tubing adventure it had started to rain, so we headed back to the house and ate the most delicious lasagna that Natalie had pre-prepared before our trip. Natalie is such a wise woman, so it makes perfect sense to me that she had a delicious meal prepared that she only had to heat up! Brilliant, I tell you!
After dinner, I pulled out a puzzle and started to work on it and Natalie and Christine joined me. We finished about 80% that evening and I was so sad that we wouldn’t be able to finish it before we left in the morning (there is nothing more satisfying than finishing a puzzle).
The next morning we got up and I quickly finished the puzzle. We packed up and checked out and headed back home! It was such a wonderful few days spent refreshing our souls and making some memories.
Sounds like fun and just what you needed.