there are things at night that are better not to behold
This weekend Aimee B and I camped at White's Beach in Brunswick, Maine. It was the most relaxing camping trip I'd been on in a long time, adequately funded and utterly lacking in agenda.
Once when I was a kid, I visited my grandfather at his house in Florida, and joined him and his second wife for a walk in a nearby forest. "Look, this is what he likes to do," she told me, as if narrating a nature documentary about very tall, suspender-wearing men who strolled the southern woodlands beneath curtains of spanish moss. My grandfather had been walking a bit ahead of us when he came to a dead tree, about six inches in diameter, and pushed it over. It was felled neatly, taking no surrounding branches with it, and he smiled in satisfaction.
My attempt at pushing over a dead tree to use for firewood was not nearly as graceful. I hesitated, and the top wobbled, broke off, and hit me in the head. I laughed, paused when I felt something warm and wet trickle past my ear, and then began laughing uncontrollably when I realized blood was running down my neck. What is it about camping that makes head injuries unbelievably hilarious?
Aimee, who had watched in horror while I insistently dragged the dead tree back to the campsite and began to saw it into pieces, surveyed the damage. We decided we ought to seek medical attention, so we called my mother. "My mom is gonna kill me," I said, completely forgetting that I would be turning 27 in a few weeks.
We retreated to the campground bathroom, where Aimee poured vodka on my head and picked bits of bark out of the wound, then rinsed it out with saltwater. We got back to our drinking.
On the second day we visited L.L. Bean and the Desert of Maine. It began to rain as we were eating dinner back at camp. We drove into a nearby town with the intention of seeing a movie, but ended up drinking by a hydroelectric dam under a light drizzle. That Aimee would suggest this as a lovely way of spending an evening is probably my best example of why I consider her excellent traveling company.
White's Beach is pleasantly desolate even at peak season. I spent a lot of time on the swings and wandered around by myself early in the morning while the crows were still out fucking around like I used to when I was a gangly kid in a thrift store nightgown. I bought goggles at a drugstore. When we stopped at my mom's house on the way home to pick up the cats, she took Aimee and me out to dinner and we played Jenga at the table. Sometimes my mother tells me she misses watching a couple of ten year olds having a good time. You can never go back, but you can pay homage.
Once when I was a kid, I visited my grandfather at his house in Florida, and joined him and his second wife for a walk in a nearby forest. "Look, this is what he likes to do," she told me, as if narrating a nature documentary about very tall, suspender-wearing men who strolled the southern woodlands beneath curtains of spanish moss. My grandfather had been walking a bit ahead of us when he came to a dead tree, about six inches in diameter, and pushed it over. It was felled neatly, taking no surrounding branches with it, and he smiled in satisfaction.
My attempt at pushing over a dead tree to use for firewood was not nearly as graceful. I hesitated, and the top wobbled, broke off, and hit me in the head. I laughed, paused when I felt something warm and wet trickle past my ear, and then began laughing uncontrollably when I realized blood was running down my neck. What is it about camping that makes head injuries unbelievably hilarious?
Aimee, who had watched in horror while I insistently dragged the dead tree back to the campsite and began to saw it into pieces, surveyed the damage. We decided we ought to seek medical attention, so we called my mother. "My mom is gonna kill me," I said, completely forgetting that I would be turning 27 in a few weeks.
We retreated to the campground bathroom, where Aimee poured vodka on my head and picked bits of bark out of the wound, then rinsed it out with saltwater. We got back to our drinking.
On the second day we visited L.L. Bean and the Desert of Maine. It began to rain as we were eating dinner back at camp. We drove into a nearby town with the intention of seeing a movie, but ended up drinking by a hydroelectric dam under a light drizzle. That Aimee would suggest this as a lovely way of spending an evening is probably my best example of why I consider her excellent traveling company.
White's Beach is pleasantly desolate even at peak season. I spent a lot of time on the swings and wandered around by myself early in the morning while the crows were still out fucking around like I used to when I was a gangly kid in a thrift store nightgown. I bought goggles at a drugstore. When we stopped at my mom's house on the way home to pick up the cats, she took Aimee and me out to dinner and we played Jenga at the table. Sometimes my mother tells me she misses watching a couple of ten year olds having a good time. You can never go back, but you can pay homage.