But I Have Promises to Keep

The woods are lovely, dark and deep
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost is on my mind as I trudge through eighteen inches of new snow at the Lake Wentatchee YMCA camp, where I am staying with the Bethany Community Church youth group over New Years'. Silent woods surround me, grey and black, barren trees conferring together on the pale, glowing ground of snow, mysterious woods calling with almost audible voices. But the plastic sled I drag behind me reminds me that I have a task to complete, that I must stay on the path and save wandering in snowy woods for another night. I am going to the woodshed.

"How did you sleep?" I asked a fellow youth leader at breakfast this morning.

He yawned and responded, "Oh, not good at all. I was up all night, keeping the fire going in our cabin. It was worth it, though," he nodded, smiling with satisfaction. "We were warm this morning. You?"

I grimaced at the memory of waking up to a below-freezing temperature inside my insulation-free cabin, pulling on icy jeans in my sleeping bag. "We were a little colder."

"Did you let the fire go out?"

"I... well, I was expecting... yes," I muttered. Excuses were plentiful. Yes, I spent many years in homes with wood heat, learning all the principles of not touching hot stoves and hauling split wood onto the porch, but at age eleven my responsibilities had ended there. I knew nothing about fires--how could I be expected to make one last through the whole night?

Excuses aside, the cold-morning truth was that I had gone soundly to sleep after I shoved a log into the woodstove at midnight, and did not wake until I could see my breath in the dim light of dawn. I, and no one else, had let the fire go out.

Like Frost's wanderer, I now have a promise to keep--I have promised four high school girls that they will pass a better night, and wake to a warmer morning. I pull the sled along the path and weigh it down with logs and kindling. I return to the empty cabin and carefully arrange the many sizes of wood, blowing and fanning the flames, gaurding the hot iron box as if were the only test of my responsibility, my adulthood, my love for these students.

I wonder who was waiting for the forest-loving traveler, what promises he had to keep, and if he regretted leaving the snowy woods behind him? As I sit near the warmth of a glowing fire and listen to the crackle of burning wood, knowing that people I love will be warm in the morning, I have no regrets.