Spending a week loading, delivering and stacking firewood in Colorado can make a lumberjack out of any Dallas flatlander. Earlier this month my wife and I served as chaperones for the Christ the King Catholic Church high school youth group’s mission trip to Mineral County, Colorado. There were 12 of us from the Park Cities spending a week making a difference in a county that is 96 percent national forest. 

   This was our sixth year to go, so most of our youth volunteers had been before. This year’s rookies were the Hayward twins, Connor and Sam, both freshmen at Highland Park High School. They adjusted well to the altitude (8,800 feet) and to the week of service.

   We usually stay at the Fellowship Hall of the Creede Community Church but this year there was a conflict so we stayed at a guest ranch called The Antlers, located along the headwaters of the Rio Grande River.

   We work hard at projects such as cleaning the local cemetery, washing windows at the town’s museum, clearing the local baseball field, helping put a roof on a building at the fairgrounds and delivering firewood to the elderly and the ill. This year we delivered wood to Merl and Kathy Jennings. He is a great guy who is battling cancer. We delivered two loads to Phil and Diane Leggitt. He’s the retired county sheriff who earlier this year survived a fall that left him almost frozen to death in 20-degree weather before he was found the next day. Sheriff Leggitt has always split his own firewood but this year he appreciated the help of a dozen eager Dallas kids.

   We also played hard. At the end of a workday we’d hit the town of Creede for dinner and caught two excellent performances at the Creede Repertory Theatre, “A Wonderful Noise” and the improv “Boomtown”. We floated down the Rio Grande with Mountain Man Rafting, where one of our veteran youth group members, Patrick O’Boyle, was awarded an official “River Guide” cap by the guides themselves. It is a prestigious honor, given out only once per summer.

   The funny part about being in Creede, Colorado, during the summer is that I bump into more Park Cities people than I do in the Park Cities.

   At Kip’s Grill, John and Ann Delatour were sitting at the table to our left. To our right was Shelley Showalter and her group. The night before we saw Libby and Rusty Goff as well as Cathy and Sam Manning. Then one of my high school classmates, Libby Tucker Albritton walked in. It was Park Cities Night at The Antlers riverside restaurant. We saw dozens of other Park Cities friends while we were in Creede, including Bobby and Ann Manning, who now live in Boulder. Our daughter Maggie ran into Fulgham Bell, her spring basketball teammate.

   We’re back now. The temperatures with highs in the 70s and lows in the 40s are now just a memory as we re-adjust to the Texas heat. But one fact remains. This coming winter folks in Mineral County, Colorado will battle temperatures that can hit 30 degrees below zero.

   Several elderly Creede residents will stay warm (and stay alive) this winter because they'll have plenty of firewood thanks to some good Texas high school kids. 

   Kirk Dooley is a University Park writer. He can be reached at kirk@texmexbook.com.