The Mess Hall on Mountaineer Lane | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: The Mess Hall on Mountaineer Lane | Previous Challenge Entry
By Tammy Ortung
04/29/20
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I hadn’t been to Camp in almost twenty years. My Pap had been a Boy Scout Ranger at Camp Mountaineer and every family gathering was spent here. When Pap passed away two years earlier, my cousin and I took a trip down Mountaineer Lane. We drove past the new, and much larger, Ranger’s house. The old structure had been a tiny cinderblock rambler too small to accommodate our large family, so we’d often stayed at the Mess Hall during our visits.

The beautiful wooded area that had previously lined the gravel road leading to the Hall was now surrounded by heart-breaking devastation. The Forest Service had recently clear-cut the entire area for the marketable timber. Now instead of a hidden oasis blanketed by nature, we could clearly see the Mess Hall from the top of the hill through the butchered trees, stumps and scraps left behind.

As we drove toward the Hall, the building seemed significantly smaller than I remembered, seating only four hundred people instead of the thousand in my memories. Yet even this skewed perception didn’t stop the childhood recollections from crashing into my subconscious.

Though we couldn’t tour the inside of the building, I remembered it as well as my own bedroom. At one end of the large rectangular room, a twenty-five-foot-high stone fireplace with a large hearth that sat eight adults was centered on the front wall. I loved that fireplace. It was not only beautiful and massive, but also served at the focal point for most of our family gatherings. Year after year we sat around that haven for hours singing old country gospel songs or square dancing, while Pap and his buddies jammed on their guitars, banjos, and fiddles.

We were always on the go, playing tag or running through the swinging doors, halfway down the long wall, that led to the huge stainless-steel commercial kitchen with gray concrete floors, to steal one of Gram’s homemade rolls or help ourselves to leftovers. We often unrolled the fifty-foot long, three-inch thick, dusty, canvas mat that always sat ready in the back-left corner and practiced gymnastics, played football, or had wrestling matches. Always careful not to bump into the folded-up cafeteria-like tables that aligned the remainder of the wall to our right. During summer months, we would run in and out of the double doors along the far wall, opposite the kitchen, that led outside to a ten-foot-wide concrete covered porch that extended the entire length of the building and overlooked the large gently sloping lawn.

One Christmas, when my cousins and I were twelve or thirteen years old and driving our parents toward insanity, they allowed us to spend the night at the Mess Hall—with no adult supervision. The Hall was rarely used in the winter, and consequently wasn’t heated, so the boys built a huge roaring fire. In the far back corner of the large multipurpose room, through a Jack-and-Jill bathroom, was a bunk room where the kitchen staff usually slept. We all struggled as we dragged mattresses out of the bunk room, through the restroom, across the long, vinyl tiled floor and strategically placed them around the fireplace for warmth. All night long we huddled around the crackling flames, telling stories, laughing and relishing in our unique freedom, before exhaustion consumed us and we finally fell asleep.

I was always fascinated by the gas heaters that hung from the high ceiling like long LED lights found in a warehouse. Their pilot lights illuminated the room with a blue-red glow that kept the darkness at bay. I sometimes stood under those heaters for what seemed like hours whenever the cold would turn my bones to ice—chilled despite all the running around and the jackets we always wore.

The Mess Hall didn’t belong to us in any tangible way, but was merely ours to use for a season. Though many years have passed, our family still feels a sense of ownership over Camp Mountaineer and everything in it—especially that Hall. The memories created there are ours to cherish and reflect on for the rest of our lives.

I never realized how blessed I was to have such a special childhood. I didn’t know others lived with abuse, neglect, and shame from family who were supposed to love them. I couldn’t even comprehend such evil. Yet this awareness makes me even more thankful that we have a Savior who defeated the darkness and offers His unconditional love and peace to everyone.

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