In the rolling fields, with the musky soil drifting through the air is where it happened. By the crashing crests of the deep blue and under the wandering shade of the high maple trees is where it happened. Where my transformation occurred. Where I broke out of my chrysalis that labeled me “boy”, and was opened to the world with new found wings and big bright eyes with blurred vision. Vision that introduced me to the world of “man”. On that fateful day, my destiny was not my own. My actions were not my own. I was controlled by divine forces to step in and save a young butterfly from the maw of the black widow of death.

On that ominous day, the bright clouds came thundering in, their soft carcasses gently bobbing in the wind. The calm leaves on the bristling oaks shuddered with anticipation. The wind screamed it’s blissful song onto the rays of the beating sun. All in all, the day was magnificent. No one could have predicted the events that occurred that day. Not even me...

Now picture this if you will, I, a humble counselor working at a calm summer camp located on the edge of a small town in good ol’ Ontario, ignorant of any malediction to come my way. My eyes set on one goal and one goal only...

To have a good time! Every day of the week was nothing more than sun blazing enjoyment. No one could have predicted that an innocent game to get the kids involved in camp more could lead to such danger.

So there I was, helping a group of twenty kids pull an ATV up a small hill for this game called All Day Program. It was a game where for an entire day, the counselors took up a certain persona based upon the theme for that one day and enacted it. This got not just the counselors into the game more, but the kids into the game more as well. When a child sees the people they look up too, the people who care for them and act as parents to them for weeks on end, dressed as a wizard ( that exact day was Harry Potter themed and I was dressed as Professor Quirrell from the first movie) and shouting spells at each other across the dining hall, and even getting into full on wizard duels, standing on tables and shouting at each other like mad dogs, the kids tend to do the same, but back to the ATV.

So there I was, dressed as a stuttering professor in a Turban, helping kids ranging from six to sixteen pull this machine up a hill using a thick, coarse rope. In the middle back area, a girl of about the age of 8 was helping to pull the ATV. Her small, undeveloped legs barely managing to keep up with the hulking brutes that ran at full speed up the hill whilst hoisting this five hundred pound vehicle up a hill. During this mini race if you will, an unseen event occurred. The small girl, her name was Hope which I now find to be somewhat ironic, tripped up while trying to run alongside the larger boys and girls, which caused a stumble in the line all around her. Kids scattered out of the way of the coarse rope so they wouldn’t be lashed by it, for even though the rope was thick and slow, the rope was as dangerous as could be.

Hope, even though she was not the youngest girl there, for some reason could not react when she hit the ground. She looked up at the sky and lay in fear, as the mechanical beast approached her, with it’s gaping maw locked upon her. Little Hope couldn’t even let out a scream, for she was frozen with fear. Just as her rotten luck would have it, we had reached the climax of the hill where the road started to flatten out, and the soft grass was starting to turn into clogging clouds of dust where the ATV could freely roll. As the lifeless monster lumbered towards her, something happened. Of course the camp believed that something like this could perhaps happen, so there was a counselor assigned to sit on top of the ATV and stop it if something horrendous was to occur. As fate would have it, in other words more terrible luck, something blew out in the ATV, so neither the shift nor the break would work. The ATV was a terrible, unstoppable machine, rolling towards little Hope, with the rope still flaying on the ground.

Now, back to me. I was towards the middle of the line as this event occurred, and like Hope, I too fell to the ground, but I was able to scramble to my feet in time to witness with eyes unaccustomed to events that could be this horrible. Never before had I been face to face with such fear. This was not the kind of fear that would make one soil their loins or scream out. No, this was the kind of fear that locked a man into place, turning his legs to jelly, and stabbing a knife into his lungs so that he cannot breathe.

It seemed to me as If I had been staring at this event unfold for ages, as the machine rolled down, with tendrils fit to kill barbarians, coming down to slay this tiny child. My brain turned to mush and feet frozen in place, It was some divine force that pushed me forward toward the girl. At first, I went step by step, but then all of a sudden I went forward in long, striding lopes. I ran toward the rope for it was closest, and tried to grab on, but the uncontrollable lashing of the rope made it nigh on impossible. More than once, I was hit in the face by it. The demonic thing drew blood on my hands and face as I struggled to grab it, but finally, I got a hold of it and swung the rope with all my bodily might towards one side, hoping and begging that my plan would succeed.

As the rope swung and shot up thick dust, a screen of brown smoke fell over the machine and the girl. Nothing more than the crunching of the machine upon rock and my tired gasps could be heard. A morbid still had fallen over the onlookers as the ATV finally creaked to a halt. The girl was nowhere to be seen and I believed all was lost, but a single cry rang out across the field as realization of what occurred hit Joy.
My plan had worked. The ATV, instead of running over her and crushing Joy with it’s tremendous weight, had merely cruised over her, with Hope laying squat in between the wheels. With cries of joy and happiness, other counselors rushed to help Joy up from under the vehicle, her sobs streaming into their shirts like rivers of relief. I dumbly stood in the middle of the field, rope still in hand, my blood drying on my face. Realization of what I had done wouldn’t come to me for days to come. Even though the event felt like an eternity, It had occurred in only a mere matter of seconds. To this day, I still don’t understand why I didn’t just grab Hope and run off, but I guess I’ll never know.

My realization hit me about three days after. As I was saying my goodbyes to half the kids, because lets be honest, what kid stays at camp all summer, and I gave my final hug to Hope, it felt like something exploded in the pit of my stomach. I’m responsible for these kids, I thought. I hold not just their well being, but even their lives in the palm of my hand. A spark lit up in my heart and I faced towards the bright blue lake. The clouds no longer swirling in their ominous rhythm, and the wind no longer bellowing with fate. My eyes set upon a new goal, and a new life. My introduction from the life of “boy” into the world of “man” was rough, but to be able to help not just these kids, but to help others, I would have to look upon this new age with the eyes of a man, and the heart of a machine. The heart that keeps me pushing forward, and never lets me stop in my quest to venture into the eye of the storm. Into the world, of man.