Howdy,
About camping, What if?—or, If only …
I’ve danced around it, so time to get into more of the meat of this week’s topic. Camping. And getting to it.
Camping is fascinating, right?
Camping is something …
Camping is hope, nestled in high expectations and assumed promises, like the unloaded and set-up camper stretched out and sagging happily in a swinging hammock.
Happy camper. That’s a happy camper.
Relaxation.
And when not relaxation, it is: adventure; escape; junk food that’s fun in the moment; campfire stories to tell and more to make the next morning; and epic to be.
I do apologize for the familiar introductions so far this week, but if you can bear with me, I really am having fun taking a stab at cutting and inserting and flipping words and keeping meanings and changing meanings and just seeing where this leads.
I’m not sure if I know how to write upbeat, encouraging accounts of camping that capture that wild anticipation and open sky expectation for such trips, but that’s what I said I’m going for, so while see what I can do. Like I said, that kind of sounds like fictional camping—blurs of my experiences and the writing craft to create the happy, fulfilling wilderness experience that we plan to have camping and eating beans from a can. Can’t beat it.
Finally, let’s get to the anticipation of camping, in all its idyllic glory and allure. Write a world where every camper is a happy camper.
We’re going camping. You’re going camping. That’s even better, right? You get to go. It’s not just me and my family leaving you behind in this 100-degree heat while we escape for the beautiful green mountains of evergreens (when not on fire or a dying brownish-orange from bark beetle attacking after our years of drought in the Sierra Nevadas) and a picturesque high country valley with an ice-melt stream flowing through. Can you hear the water rushing? There, it’s rushing. A small waterfall. That’s cool! I love that kind of thing. (As Titus would say right now—this is his current, three-year-old, phrase—“I love that.” Or, “I love this.” Or, “I love these.” Or, just a rapid repeat of anything of those versions or a few or all of them jumbled together. Titus loves things. You should go shopping at Costco with him right now, like I did today: “Oh, Daddy, I LOVE those! Can we get ‘em. I love that.” Oh, Daddy! Oh, Daddy … Oh, Daddy! Oh, Titus … You know what? Sarah loves when Ti says he loves something. We all do. It’s lovely, and hilarious. I love that. Right, Ti? Atta, boy.) A small waterfall: you can hear it rushing over there. Here, it’s trickling, and you can hear the creek bubbling. The babbling brook.
You’re going to want to get in there: that ice-cold snow melt making it’s way past camp and down the mountain. Because you. Are. Sweaty. Yes, you are sweating. It’s the hustle and sweat of packing. Loading all your family’s earthly and unearthly (whatever that is or could be, but be say “ungodly” about hours so I figured I could step out and try “unearthly” about things: but, come to think of it a bit more, it doesn’t make a ton of sense, so let’s just agree to fictionalize it and romanticize it—make sense?) into and on top of your family automobile and if you’ve got a bike rack on the back of or mounted in front of your weighed-down vehicle you could completely encase your car in cra—crazy camping gear. It’d look kind of like when Sarah and I loaded up our tandem kayak (pre-children) with camping gear strapped to the nose and the back from tip to tip of the boat and we prayed we didn’t tip because, really … we wanted to float. I don’t know what we would’ve done—and this isn’t fictional—if we had not made it across the lake. Seriously. Rookie move. But a great trip. That was fantastic camping. An evening paddle across a lake and setting up a tent at the mouth where the main creek and lake met. Wilderness-y. Just us and the wild of it. Wild.
We were sweatin’ it, getting across that lake. But that’s a different kind of sweat. For perspiration, you can just dive in the lake. It’s wonderful.
So, sweat is part of the anticipation. That excitement about going, about being just about to be on your way, that makes the exhausting hustle lifting and carrying and organizing Houdini fits okay. It’s all okay, because it’s exciting and doesn’t really feel like work until you realize you’re worn out. And haven’t left yet.
You realize, you need to leave, and it will all be okay. You’ll be camping. Happy thought for the happy camper. I love this.
—Billy
Reading. Writing. Living.
Word Count: 139,575 / On Pace: 147,950 / Year’s Goal: 200,000
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