Cornerstone is a church I was looking forward to the whole trip, and so I am glad that I did finally make it today.  Their pastor, Francis Chan is an amazing communicator, and I enjoy listening to his sermons as a podcast.  He is always very challenging and very progressive, which often is more a look backwards than forwards.  I met with pastor Matt Moore, and I am pretty pleased with the final podcast.

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So Friday night I went from the Radfords in San Mateo, to my cousins in Monterey, and then Saturday morning I came down to San Luis Obispo, to hang out with my buddy Justin.

I also stopped by Calvary San Luis Obispo for an interview with Pastor Bryan Stupar.  I had a good time talking with Bryan, and it was great to hear about how they do church in a college town.

Tomorrow I go home and the trip will be over!  But I have one last stop on my way home.

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So I have not told many people this, but I think it is pretty interesting so I will go ahead and share.  Throughout the whole trip I had a reoccurring dream, not every night, but at least 2-3 times a week.  The dream would go like this, I would just somehow be home, and say I was in West Virginia that night, I would know that I made at least to West Virginia, but somehow went home straight from there.  So I thought I had to either start all over, or give up on my goal of all 50 states, of course this made me freak out in my dream.  Sometimes I would be talking to someone in my family, or a friend, and they would tell me, “Hey don’t worry you did 37 states,” or however many I had done so far, “That is pretty good.”  And I would argue with them and say, “No I have to go back, I have to finish.”  It was about this time every dream that I would wake up and be relieved to realize that I was actually still on the road, and I did not just teleport back home.

I tell you this dream, beacuse recently I had a similar one.  I dreamt that I was back home, but there was no freak out, I was hanging with family and friends and just excited to be home, and starting life again.  I again woke up in the middle of that dream, and this time instead of being relieved that I was still on the road, I was disappointed.  This is how I knew, the trip is over, and I am ready to go home.

With that said, I am finishing up visiting with my good buddy Dave Radford and his wife Angela.  From here I will see my cousin in Monterey, another friend in San Luis Obispo, and then home.  I have 2 more churches to visit on the way home and I am pretty excited about them both.  One is Calvary Chapel SLO, and the other is Cornerstone in Simi Valley.  I am actually visiting Cornerstone on my last day on the road, and I am pretty excited about that cause Francis Chan, the teaching pastor, is one of my favorite preachers.

Well Sunday I had the privilege of sharing my story with Creekside Christian Church.  It went really well, they even made a little intro video for me which I have added to this post.  If you want to watch me at the service just go to http://creeksidelife.com/media/.

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I got into Brentwood Saturday night.  I have been staying with one of my old youth workers, Chris Kuykendal.  I have pretty much just been hanging out and being lazy, except for today I did go to the gym on Scott and Kathy Kirk’s guest pass.  I swam for the first time in 6 months, and I could barely do half a mile.  Friday I am going to a JH event with the church, and then Sunday I am sharing about the trip with Scott’s church.  I am excited about it, Scott even had me make up a flier to be put out at coffee shops and stuff.  Brentwood is a nice area, everything is new, and it is mainly young families.  I don’t know if I could live here or not though, but so far it seems pretty easy going.

I am excited to see Dave and Angie this weekend, and am also excited cause I have two more interviews left to finish off the trip with.  I am going to Calvary Chapel San Luis Obispo, and Cornerstone Church in Simi Valley.  Then I will be home, and the trip will officially be over.  Can’t believe this had been my life for the last 5 1/2 months.

I had a great week last week.  I spent the week with my family that lives in Redding.  First I went to my grandparents house for a couple days (dad’s side).  I had a great time hanging out with them, espcially my grandpa.  He is almost 81 years old and has cancer, and while that does make me sad, I still can’t help but be impressed at what a tough old brute my grandpa is.  This is not his first battle with cancer, it is his 4th go around with it.  On top of that he had a stroke about 10 years ago, and plenty of other health problems.  And get this, he smoked for 55-60 years of his life, the only reason he quit, and this is what my uncle tells me, is because for a short period of time after his stroke, he simply forgot that he was a smoker.  I will be sad when my grandpa passes, but really I am shocked that he has lived this long, some people don’t even see 55 years of life that smoke like he did, let alone 80.  It is a sad thing to hear him talk about Chemo and all the effects it has had on him throughout the years, but he is determined to last as long as possible, and I couldn’t be more proud of him.  Speaking of hearing him talk, every time he shared a story from his youth, I secretly recorded it on my iphone.  Now I was not doing it secretly cause I think he would not want me to, but because I think it would just confuse him to know I am recording him, plus I think he might be bashful in front of a mic.  He is an interesting man, and I want to be able to share his stories with the rest of my family long after he is gone.  Maybe some day I will have grandkids, and I can share his stories with them.

After visiting with my grandparents, I stopped by my great aunt Betty’s house.  I helped her with her computer, it was a pretty nice dell computer, but like any PC it was full of problems.  I think people over 60 that are not familiar with computers should just buy macs, they are so much easier to use for someone like my aunt Betty.  I felt bad for her, cause if I was not there she was going to pay someone just to figure out how to change the color scheme.

After that I went to my uncle Kent and aunt Dawn’s house to visit them.  I have two cousins there that live with them, Savannah and Jada.  Savannah is a HS athlete, and I was going to watch one of her games, but she sprained her ankle while I was there, so I didn’t get to see her play.  Jada is almost 4 years old, and she is just full of energy.  She is always singing, running around, or talking about something going on in her imaginary world.  It was a lot of fun to hang out with her, especially since I only see her about once or twice a year.  Yesterday I helped my uncle lay tile, he is a contractor and so it was cool to learn how much work goes into making something like a bathroom look so good.  After a long day of laying tile last night Kent, Dawn and I went to a casino.  We all had a great time, probably cause we all won.  I enjoy hanging out with my uncle, he is bold, loud, funny, and likes to have a good time.

I hope to try and spend more time visiting that side of my family in the future, I always have a good time with them, its just too bad they live so far away.

Tonight I am staying in Brentwood, and will be here for about a week.  My old youth pastor, and some of my old youth leaders live here, and so I am going to spend some time with them helping out at their church, Creekside Christian Church.

I left the fair early, I wasn’t exactly making much money.  I was only making a percentage of every video I sold, and lets just say videos were not the most popular thing.  I did make a good $100 in about 4 days of work though.  Its not a great wage, but its the most I have made the whole trip.  Before I left Sammy and did get to hang out at the fair.  Check out this little video we made.

After the fair I did go back to Zach and Emily’s house for a few days, but I finally left Monmouth yesterday. It was kind of hard cause I really felt at home there. I love the people there, and I appreciate the small town style of life. I don’t know why, but everything seems so much simpler there, maybe it has something to do with less billboards and signs around every corner, and more trees and nature, even if most of it is farmland. Before I headed out I stopped by Zach’s parents house and a had an encouraging talk with his dad, Dale. I want to take this adventure of Ryan’s and I make a book about it, but have felt very insecure about doing that. Dale had some good things to say that really made me feel encouraged about our story, and I think he is right. We have been on the adventure of a lifetime, seen the whole country, and seen the amazing things the church is doing all over the country and all over the world. I will put something together at the end of this, not sure what exactly yet, but a trip this amazing deserves some kind of record.

I rode about 245 miles yesterday, most of which was in the rain, or was at least cold and wet weather. Jerry recommend that I stop by Applegate Christian Fellowship on my way south, so I did.   I didn’t go to a service, but instead went just to check out their outdoor amphitheatre. It is a beautifully landscaped place, check out this picture.

One of the first things I thought being a tech guy is that there is no place for media, or videos, but then I quickly realized, that when you are this close to God’s beautiful creation during worship, you don’t have much need for videos or other media to help drive your service.

After I left the church, I found a trashy little campsite in Jacksonville for $15 a night. The place did not usually have tent campers, mostly just RVs, and mobile homes, and therefore the camper’s restroom was pretty run down. The shower had been used as a storage facility for quite some time, and there were a lot of spiderwebs over the urinal, which also had a trash bag hanging over it. Luckily there was one working toilet.

As the sun set I could see a beautiful display of whites, pinks, and dark blues in the sky. It reminded me to be thankful of God’s beauty even in the midst of a dumpy little campsite.

I went to bed early, around 9 pm, and I did not sleep well. I think I have slept on my little backpacking air mattress for as long as a person possibly can. I am frankly just sick of that thing, so it is a good thing that last night was likely my last night camping. I should have a house to stay in the rest of my trip home.

When I woke up this morning I felt soar and tired. But after I packed up all my stuff, got back on my bike, and turned the music on in my helmet, I was reborn with energy. I thought I would be sick of motorcycles by now, and there are a lot of things about riding a bike that I am sick of, but this morning I was as excited or more than I have ever been before to just ride. The mountains here are gorgeous and full of trees, and so I suppose that has a lot to do with my excitement. The beauty again reminds me to be thankful, thankful for this trip, thankful for all the new friends I have made and all the old ones I have visited, thankful for all the wonderful things I have seen all over this country, and most of all thankful to be alive and living as fully as I know how.