Confessions of a Non-Camper

[elwynsattic]

Thanks to phoenix-glow, my memories of camping have been refreshed, some pleasant, some not, and some straight out of a Three Stooges episode.

• 
  I used to play "campout" in as a child in our living room under a card table covered with a blanket. That's actually how I discovered I was allergic to the smell of new carpet. :)
• I went on a camping trip with high school friends and ate so many "smores" that I literally made myself sick.
• On the same trip, my "friends" initiated me into that age-old camping custom, going into the woods on a "snipe hunt." At the time I thought maybe they were pulling a fast one, but I wasn't sure until we were in the woods and I was blindfolded. Never did find the critter for some reason.
• My parents had a camping trailer that would fold up and could be hitched to the car. When it was set up, the sides extended out (used as bunks) and the trailer was supported underneath with a series of bungee cords and pulleys (don't ask me about the mechanics). One night my father forgot to attach the bungee cords. I went to one bunk, my parents went to the other, and BOOM! The trailer tipped to one side, just like a seesaw. My mother was so unnerved she didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
• At a large family reunion one year in Michigan, my parents took the trailer to sleep in. It could ostensibly sleep 5-6 people: two in each pullout bunk and one or two on a mattress that fit on top of a table. In reality, the trailer made my kitchen look like a palace. Three people (my parents and I) in that trailer tripped over each other like the Keystone Cops, and if one was claustrophobic--well, 'nuff said. Anyway, I was a teenager and I was sharing the trailer with my parents in one bunk and an aunt and uncle in the other. We settled down to sleep and, to my chagrin, my relatives and my parents snored like trains. At home, at least I was insulated from my parents' snoring by our bedroom doors (and a window air conditioner, if all else failed). In the trailer, we were so close we were practically up each other's noses--and now there were FOUR snorers instead of two. I spent the next few nights sleeping in a lawn chair in the basement of my aunt and uncle who were hosting the family reunion.
• My parents and I were camping somehwere in Canada. I think the place was called Brownlee Lake. I remember laying awake in the camper, trying to see the stars through the very small window above my head, and a scared but pleasant thrill ran through me as coyotes or wolves howled in the distance. 
• At the same campsite I remember being surprised as one of the boys swimming in the lake suddenly removed his fake leg below the knee and continued splashing. It looked entirely real--and it floated.
• Camping with the Girl Scouts. It was unseasonably cold. Thanks to my father's penchant for careful planning and having the right equipment, I had a heavy down sleeping bag that I still own to this day. I was the only Girl Scout who wasn't freezing her ass off--the rest of them had sleeping bags that were probably purchased as Blue Light specials at K-Mart. (The blow-up air mattress that went under the sleeping bag was great for riding waves at Rehobeth Beach). The camping trip was cut short by a few days due to cold, rainy weather and troop leaders who listened to all of our whining. I do remember that the "pot luck" soup was good--everyone brought a canned good that was tossed into a kettle. (In my college days I tried something similar with the contents of my parents' liquor cabinet for a party, with interesting results.)
• My Dad had the patience of a saint when it came to getting up a couple of times at night at a campsite and walking his little daughter to the bathroom. Of course it was pitch black and I couldn't see two inches in front of me without my glasses anyway. Somehow that same patience went away when I got older and he tried to help me with my math homework and teach me to drive stickshift.
• To this day the one thing I hate about camping is having to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom. Then you go back to the tent and instead of falling asleep you lay there and worry about how long before you have to get up and go again. However, the worst is digging a hole and shitting behind a tree.
• My first "real date" was a guy I met on a camping trip. His name was Hal. He said his family's home had been decimated by Hurricane Agnes, and that they were living in a temporary trailer in their backyard. He asked me if I wanted to go for a "long walk" or a "short walk" in the woods. I was too nervous to try the "long walk." I think we went square-dancing that evening.
• Went on one camping trip with friends. Our friend's asswipe brother & friend camped in a site nearby, but not too nearby, thank goodness. They went hiking with beer in their backpacks. They spent the weekend getting so trashed that they used the outside of their tent for a toilet.
• On the camping same trip, we passed campers in a Winnebago the size of a small house. I wondered aloud to a companion if it had a bathroom. The driver of the Winnebago overheard me. "Yeah, it's got a terlit!" he shouted proudly.
• There was the camping trip with friends when four of us were in one tent and two were in the next. Our female friend in the next tent (who shall remain nameless) was not known for having a sense of humor. We overheard her boyfriend-at-the-time telling her a joke: "Why do Scotsmen wear kilts?"
  "So sheep won't hear the zippers." Absolute silence. Absolutely, totally politically incorrect, but absolutely hilarious when overheard from the next tent at six a.m. No offense intended to the Scots.
• Another camping trip with the same friend. She brought along food that had been sitting in her cupboard so long it could probably be carbon-dated. She opened a box of cereal one morning. She claimed they were chocolate chips... we thought they were mouse turds.
• I think it was the same trip when three of us went for a hike and two kittens followed us back to our campsite from a farmhouse. They were so tired they could barely stand up. We fed and watered them, put them in the back seat of the car, and dropped them off in their yard on the way home. If I hadn't already had cats, I would have been tempted to keep them.