The Great Outdoors

What a wonderful time of year to be out and enjoying nature’s finest. This time of year, it’s warm, the rivers, lakes and streams are cool, and it’s so nice to get away from it all. I don’t know about all of my readers out there, but there’s that soft spot in me knowing when I kiss my husband he’s either going to taste like OFF! or Coors Light—warm, breathy, sweaty, buggy Coors Light.

A comedian once said that he couldn’t understand why people would bust their butt all year to climb the corporate ladder just to (while on vacation) pretend to be homeless. When I first heard that, I admit, I scoffed. This of course was until I met my husband— my days of camping in my parent’s trailer were over.

The first time my husband (then boyfriend) took me out in the woods, he came home to a giddy, much younger and dumber version of myself. I had picked up all the essentials for camping: a table cloth for the picnic table, trial sizes of various hygiene items, a roll of quarters for the state park showers, etc. I proudly showed him all of my goodies and happily chattered about how I loved to camp. When his silence was apparent, I looked up to see the shock on his face. It was then he informed me that where we were going, there was no such thing as a bathroom or picnic table. My stomach dropped and all I could think was “What in the hell did I just sign up for?!”

And so, after years of camping in the middle of nowhere, I have gotten used to the fact that everything is prepared in your lap, there are no bathrooms so you have to bury your own poop, it is wise to lock your food in the front of your truck, and baby wipes are worth their weight in gold.

This weekend, I had enough of normal life and needed to get away from it all. Since I haven’t made it to the rich and famous status yet, we could only afford to go camping — I mean, it’s not like I am a Kardashian or Hilton girl (only in my wildest and frequent dreams). So onward we went for our weekend of being unplugged. We took our daughter’s friend with us and we headed out as soon as we could on Friday.

We had a great time sitting in the river all day in the 90 degree weather, and it wasn’t until I couldn’t feel my feet anymore that we decided to get out of the river. Drunk, a little sunburnt and tired, we retired to our tent.

A few hours after dark I awoke to a half-flat air mattress. The tent was stuffy and the night air was stale. I tossed and turned and couldn’t shake the sensation that we were being watched. After coaxing myself to be brave (and reasoning that it might be something to blog about) I looked outside the tent. I couldn’t see anything and I didn’t have a flashlight with me. I remained as still as possible and over the bubbling of the river I swore I heard a bear rummaging around our campsite! I did the mental inventory of our tent’s belongings. I quickly surmised the only gun with us was in the cab of the truck. This meant that if the bear attacked, I would have no choice but to sacrifice my husband for the sake of myself, our daughter and her friend. It was a price I was willing to pay for safety. I stayed awake most of the night awaiting destiny.

The next morning, we woke up to blue skies, birds singing and two moody pre-teens who were done with camping. After trying to rally them to behave and enjoy nature, it was apparent that it was time to wrap things up and head home. As we cleaned up camp, my husband and I chatted about the night before and he too was tired because he was awake most of the evening. We never did see bear prints or scat, but both of us think there was a big animal waiting outside our tent. It was either a bear or a really great imagination on both our parts.

As pathetic as it is, a weekend of being unplugged only lasted 24 hours. The trip did give us time to get away from it all and reconnect.

It was during this camping trip that I learned pre-teens are probably easier to throw to a imaginary bear than it is a husband who outweighs you.