It was Christmas Eve. I was 16 and feeling sad because my dad told me there was not enough money to buy the dress I wanted. We did the housework early that night. So I figured Dad wanted extra time for us to spend together. Instead, he dressed himself again and went outside. “Come on, Elizabeth,” he said eagerly. “Dress yourself warmly! It’s cold outside.”

Outside, I became even more upset. Not only wasn’t I getting the dress, now Dad was dragging me out in the cold. There, in front of the house, already was a big sled (雪橇). Whatever we were going to do wasn’t going to be a quick job. So I unwillingly climbed up and sat next to a big box, the cold already biting at me. We pulled in front of the woodshed (柴棚) and started loading wood into the box. Finally, I asked, “Dad, what are you doing?” “Have you been to Mrs. Clark’s lately?” he asked. Mrs. Clark lived about two miles down the road from us. Her husband had passed away the year before, leaving her with three children to raise on her own.

“Yeah,” I said. “Why?” “I rode by just today,” Dad said. “Little Jake was out digging around in the woodpile (柴火堆), trying to find a few pieces of wood to struggle through the cold winter. They’re out of wood, Elizabeth.” That’s all he said. Then Dad went to the kitchen, fetching a big bag of flour, a side of bacon and something else in a small bag and asking me to load them into the big box too. I tried to think through what my dad was doing. We did have a big woodpile, meat and flour, so we could spare some, but I knew we didn’t have any money. Mrs. Clark had closer neighbors than us. Why was it our concern? Nearly half an hour later, we made it to her house.

Then we unloaded the wood behind the Clarks’ house and knocked on the door.

The big box was opened.

On Saturday, we gathered at the hall to witness the award ceremony for the senior scouts (童子军). Receiving an award on such a day was a great honor for any scout, and all desired to be the scout selected to give the summary of the year’s activities for the association.

I was not the one selected to give the summary and for that, I was grateful. I could hardly stand in front of a large crowd to make a speech, but Sean could. He was selected to do the honor because he was the President of the Boy Scouts for schools. My job was much simpler. Being the Vice-President, I was very much behind the scenes, content to ensure that everything was in smooth running order.

It was an hour to go before the ceremony began, and I had put the finishing touches to the stage. Walking down the stage, I saw my teammates in a state of panic. When they saw me, they ran to me to tell me that Sean met with a traffic accident and would not make it to the award ceremony. Someone else had to give the summary. All of them looked hopefully at me, and I could feel my knees beginning to collapse.

All their arguments against my unwillingness were valid. I had a copy of the speech as well as the benefit of having seen Sean rehearse (排练) it. I was the Vice-President and therefore should take his place. Finally, I was firmly told not to decline any longer and they said that they were convinced that I would do the right thing. I sank down onto the floor, totally shocked by the situation.

I knew I was not a confident speaker, and the thought of presenting a summary in front of so many distinguished guests horrified me. To think that the fame of the scouts would take a beating because of me! The burden of responsibility troubled me greatly.

But there was really no way out of the situation.

As I stood on the stage, my heart beat violently.

I had a trip to New Mexico last year, a trip I still remember very well to this day. I went to a place called Philmont and attended a summer camp. There were thirteen people including me. The entire 10-day hike we took through those mountains went well, except for the second day, because of the terrible weather.

It had been a nice sunny day up until we were halfway to the camp we were staying at that night. Then without a word it started raining gently. There was nothing too bad and certainly nothing we couldn’t handle. We put our raincoats on and continued on our way. It stayed raining slightly for a while, so I decided it would be a good idea to say, “Well, it can’t be much worse than this, right?” And in less than five seconds the thunder crashed around us. It almost sounded like a laugh, as if it was laughing at us. Then the rain started to come down harder, and then, the hail (冰雹) came.

Getting hit with balls of ice in the middle of the New Mexico mountains was not something I had ever thought would happen to us, but here we were. All thirteen of us were wishing at that moment that we could go home. But we quickly abandoned the idea. It was freezing, and my feet felt like they might fall off. Wet, cold, and carrying 40 pounds on our backs, we hiked on.

But soon enough we got lost for about a mile because of a mistake that our “Navi-guesser” made on getting us to our destination. At the same time, one of our boys got a minor case of hypothermia (低温症). We decided to stop for a while, unpacking our tents to get into a nice warm sleeping bag. I don’t know if you know this, but unpacking camping gear (装备) in the rain was not very fun, especially setting up a tent.

We came up with a solution.

The rain stopped just as we were about to start.