“I’m a man hater,” I confided to Jodi.
It was August 22. My birthday. Day 12 of the race. We were cleaning up a park and I was trying to pull weeds out using a shovel, only one of the handful of tools that we had been given.
Jodi was asking questions, trying to figure out my story and she asked me why I felt that way–she was trying to convince me that there are men out there who are actually able to stick around and love you.
I told her, “Boys are all the same. They come, take what they want, and leave you with nothing.”
At that exact moment Colin came over and took my shovel away from me because he wanted to pull the weeds out himself.
“See?!?!” I looked at Jodi accusingly.
She hit her forehead with her hand as she shook her head and said, “Oh no.”
I write this ten months later while sitting in front of Colin, one of my best friends on the race. I tell him just about everything. He’s one of two men who have really impacted my life this year. The other is Matt, one of the first official friends I had on the race. He and Aubrey were the ones to greet me with a sandwich hug back in Atlanta just because I’d told them I wasn’t a fan of hugs.
They’re my teammates. They are more than just friends. They’re my brothers. They’re the ones who help me with my pack every single travel day. They remind me of who I am in Christ. They’ve been there when I’ve cried. They’ve made me laugh SO much. They’ve prayed over me with a passion that is hard to beat. They’ve pushed me to work toward my dreams. They haven’t let me settle for less than the best. They’ve feedbacked me when my actions haven’t reflected who I was made to be.
It’s month 11 now and things have changed. Our teams have been split up as the women do prostitution ministry in two Thai cities and the men spend time with children at an orphanage.
I’m going to miss Colin. He’s the only one who has been with me the entire 10 months. At first I didn’t know what a 27-year-old reporter from Texas could possibly have in common with a 22-year-old tree planter from Canada. In month three, according to my journal, I still wondered how we could ever be friends.
Now as we part ways I can’t imagine ever NOT being friends.
He’s played Truth with me and when that got boring because we knew everything about each other, he played Extreme Truth–the game in which you pick a random day in your journal and just start reading. He’s been honest about what growth in my character should look like, while always reassuring me that he loves me regardless of my faults. He knows me so well that he always knows when something is off even when I’m acting as if things are OK. He can listen for hours, regardless of how unimportant the things I’m rambling about are.
I’m going to miss Matt. He was the first person on the race who made me feel OK about not being a perfect Christian or someone who had it all figured out. We immediately became friends after I beat him at Friends trivia via Facebook chat. 
He’s made me laugh probably more than anyone on the squad and has made me grow in ways I never even expected to grow. We have fun together, but more importantly we’ve grown together. He’s the one who has always supported me in my dreams of storytelling by offering up any opportunity he could think of for me to help. He’s led me well even when I wasn’t a good follower.
We’ve shared moments we’d rather forget, including an especially hot day in Tanzania when we both experienced pretty embarrassing things in front of the other. But we also were able to laugh through those moments together, knowing that at the end of the day embarrassing things happen and all you can do is try to enjoy them as much as you possibly can.
Throughout this year, God has taught me so much about who He is, about who I am, but an unexpected surprise lesson is that men aren’t so bad after all.
Through Colin and Matt I’ve learned that boys take your shovel and run, but men fight for you, protect you and love you.
