Random Thought

I'm going to start putting down random thoughts/memories i've had. Because i feel like i've done some pretty cool (sometimes bizarre!) things! And i don't want to forget them. So this is MUCH more for my benefit then anyone elses...

This morning, out of the complete blue, i thought of something that happened while i lived in St. George.

I worked an amazing job at a Wilderness Program for troubled teens. This really was an amazing, life changing experience--for me! I don't know if it helped the kids, or just kept them clean for a while, but it did help me.

One of the staff that i worked with was this fellow Don. Don was cool. Don was a polygamist that only had one wife. He was interesting and different, and a great guy. We had a really cool schedule, that worked 8 days on, then had 6 days off. During Don's 6 days off, he would sometimes do "escort" runs. Escort runs were when a parent didn't think a child would go willingly to the program, so they paid the escorts to come in and pick the kids up and bring them to the program. For obvious reasons, two people were required to go on a run, and when a female student was involved, one of the escorts had to be a female.

One day i got a call from Don, who said that he had a run that he wanted me to do with him. I guess the female that was supposed to do this run had something come up and couldn't' make it. The run was to ALASKA. Having never been to Alaska, I jumped on the chance to go. :) The pay was also pretty good! Anyway, so they bought us plane tickets, we jumped on a plane and went up to Alaska. We got up there, and were supposed to catch this little puddle jumper plane to hit up the town she was from. We called the main office of the escort biz when we got up there, because our flight had been cancelled--and found out that the girl had run away from her "hometown" to Juneau (where we were at). They had a houseboat number that they thought she might be staying at, so we very tv-like "staked out" the houseboat to watch to see if she'd show up.

We'd been there a few hours, and she hadn't shown yet, so NATURALLY, we went to a national park (where we saw some black bears! but i don't consider it in the wild, cuz they lure them out in the open with fish!), then went out and got some freshly caught Alaskan Salmon. Normally, i'm not a big fish fan...but this was GOOD!) Then, we went to the police. They were able to help us find a few more places she could be, and then found out somehow that she was at this "flop house" in a trailer park. They came with us, and had us wait in our car, while they went in and took her. They had to take her into custody, then with our paperwork, we were able to take her. It was too late to get a flight home, so we got a couple hotel rooms.

Now...here's a "it's a small world" story. While i shared the room, me and this girl got a talkin'. She was a ward of her aunt and uncle, because her father was in jail for shooting her mother. She was in the room and saw it happen when she was just a little girl. In FACT, there was a book written about her family and all of this that happened. Can't remember the name of it, buti immediately went out and bought the book and read it. As i was reading, i saw that this took place in Vincennes, Indiana. I had a roommate (Brian, Tall Bear) from Vincennes, Indiana. I mentioned this to him, and it turns out his DAD was part of the investigation into this murder.

Just crazy. Anyway, we brought her home with no incident. She was very accommodating to us given the circumstances. She said that her aunt had pretty much had her in some sort of custody since she took her when her mom died--because she got quite a life insurance policy and her aunt had access to that as long as the girl was in custody of some kind. Of course, that could be entirely fiction. You never know if you should take the word of a troubled teen. :) Regardless, she caused no problem, and the next day we had her to her little program.

The end. :)