PAINTBALL!!!

Despite the fact that this was only my second time paintballing, I had a blast!

To understand what a great time was had, I need to lay a little background.

The participants: Matthew Ma., age 11. Matthew's friend, age 11. Matthew M., age 14. Jose P, age 16, Jesse B, age 13, Will B, age 14, Kyle, youth pastor of undeclared age, and me, 17 in 4 days. Jesse, Will, and Jose are all experienced paintballers. Kyle is too, but his gun was broken most of the time.

The battlefield: Jesse and Will live out in the country, and have a nice fenced area with trees, brush, rocks, open area, and some tires and such that they had set up. The main areas of the field are as follows. A high slope, with sheep paths (no joke, they have sheep.) worn into it, and several large trees spread along it. A middle area with plenty of brush, and an open area in the middle. A "road" skirting the middle area, muddy, with 2 garbage cans, and 1 rock to hide behind.

The games were fairly easily formatted. 2 teams, equal or close to equal numbers and skills, 1 team hides, the other team moves in. Get hit with a ball that splats on you, you are out. Easy enough.

With the background laid, I will jump into the chaotic mishmash of stories I have from today.

Jose seemed to like working the upper slope, and I knew that.  One game, I was up there, expecting him, and saw him hidden behind some rocks and bushes. I poked my head out, and was nearly rewarded with a shot in the head. (Everyone was wearing masks) Jose kept trying to move himself out, just a tiny bit, and I kept him back. Eventually the adavantage was with me, and I was able to pepper his location with shots, and eventually he called "Out!!" Later, I found out that he was trying to move to get a perfect shot at my teammates. Apparently at least one of my shots found its mark, because Jose said that his goggles on his mask were suddenly covered in paint. That was me.

Jesse was at a slight disadvantage, he was playing with broken tibia and fibia, on his right leg. However, this was his home turf, and he is good, and he has a good gun, so I had no qualms about shooting him. He was the only one left on his team, and he had been sitting in a nice bunker, but realized he needed to be moving. He moved onto the road, and he and Kyle were trading shots. I started moving up on his position, from the rear. He was trapped. I'm walking up, and I can see he is looking for Kyle around the bend, not even checking his rear. One shot, right in the leg. I thought the leg was the most humane.

Jose decided that he needed to be in the middle area, never mind that Will was stationed there, or that I was covering it. He just starts running into the middle area, and of course, I had to take a shot. Once he got close to Will, I held my fire, to avoid a friendly fire incident. Will, did not hold his fire. He lit up Jose. I felt bad, Jose was getting demolished by Will, and I had already "killed" him. He had 3 welts from that.

Kyle was not having a good time. He kept having to work on his gun, which is never good. The one game where he was on my team, we were working the slope together. About 3 minutes in, he realized that his gun was firing blanks. Jose had a defensive position ahead, and Kyle bluffed his way forward. Jose left the slope and moved into a bunker, because Kyle and I were moving up on him.

Riding the bus home, I saw a pretty interesting thing, and had a bit of an ephiany.
Interesting thing was a black man and white woman both aged 45-55, standing with their faces about 3 inches apart, yelling about something. A woman who had been outside for a smoke, was hiding behind the door of the restaurant they were standing outside. She poked her head out, gave me a look, laden with meaning, and pulled back behind the door. I would not have noticed this, except every man in the back area was looking at this couple, and I got that feeling when enough people are looking at something, that feeling that makes you look too. As we drove away, everyone was looking at each other, and the man sitting next to me smiled and said, in broken English. "She's not happy."

My ephiany was about the arrangement of seating in a bus. The crazy people who talk to the driver, the people who are only going a little way, and the people who are too lazy to move any farther back, they sit in the front. The business people, the little old ladies, the nervous people, and the homeless people, they sit in the middle. The people who are going a long ways, the field workers, the introverted crazy people, and the confident people sit in the back. Next task, figuring out why.

Tommorow is another paintball day. I will have pictures!! Thanks to Mom for giving me a ride up there, Jesse for jumping on the whole idea, and taking charge, and Kyle, for letting us borrow his stuff.