It all started with an idea. It wasn’t a complicated one, really, but an idea that lodged itself firmly inside my head ever since I was a boy old enough to play pretend.

This idea fueled my imagination, my future, and most importantly, my trip to Africa. This idea? Adventure.

I had always been an adventurous kid, dreaming of grand voyages taking me around the world and beyond. Growing up, I would write stories upon stories about the team of characters lucky enough to depart the normal and pursue something grand.

Even at college – despite the five years of social conditioning I’d gone through – I retained that childlike love for adventures, always knowing that someday I’d get my chance.

My chance came through a facebook comment in February of 2010.

Ryan Payne was a good friend of mine I had worked with at a summer camp in Maryland the year before. We’d kept in contact over the fall and spring semesters. Ryan had created a video for Valentine’s Day based off a song he wrote.

As a digital media major with my emphasis in film, I enjoyed watching his video, and told him so. His reply came quickly, saying that he’d like to someday do some filming with me.

It was at that moment that I knew I’d throw in the bait and see if I got a bite. “I’ve always wanted to go film a documentary somewhere in the world,” I wrote back to him. “I was thinking Africa might be a fun place to go. Wanna come?”

I waited hours for his reply, knowing full well that if Ryan wanted to go, my adventurous dream might take place. His reply got the ball rolling. “Dude, I’d love to go. Let me know if anything comes up.” That was just what I needed.

I knew I always wanted to go to Africa. It was only in the last eight years that I wanted to go there to film. The thought of being able to go to a place and live without bounds, to tell a story using a videocamera, and to lead a team into the wild unknown seemed like something out of a book for me.

It almost seemed too good to be true. I wrote Ryan an e-mail outlining in more detail what I wanted to do and how I wanted this idea to play out.

He wrote me back saying he was in. It was time to take our first step.

“Step” was the tentative working title of the documentary. I started to plan out the idea inside my head: to tell a story of the steps we took to get to a place, and then tell the story of the steps people took to get to us.

I told my best friend Luke Lillard about it. We had grown up together, and had been through it all during the 10 years of our friendship.

Excitedly, I told him about the plans I’d been making to go to Africa with Ryan – whom he knew from serving at the same summer camp – and then asked him the big question. “Do you want to go too?”

I told him that the adventure stories I loved had three characters sticking together through whatever plot they were wrapped in.

It’d be great to have him along, too. After taking some time to think and pray, Luke came back to me a week later and said he was in. Now, as Ryan coined it, “the trifecta is complete.”

I sent out emails to friends and family asking them if they had any contacts in Africa who knew of a place we could go. Two weeks later, I had nothing.

I told Ryan that perhaps he should start asking around to see if anyone he knew had a location for us. That Sunday, he called me and said he knew where we were going.

Zimbabwe.

Editor’s note: This is the beginning of a three-part series about the “Step” Documentary. For more information on “Step,” visit www.stepdocumentary.com.

Author