Camping Just Sort Of Puts Me In A *Mood*
Camping Just Sort Of Puts Me In A Mood
I never update my livejournal account unless I've got something really angsty to write about. Although there are a variety of LJ users who write about non-angsty things, and I guess I could link to their names but I don't feel like it, and besides, there might be that one friend who reads who I link to and announceds 'tool! You think my livejournal's melodramatic? That's NOTHING!!!' And I'll never hear the end of that.
So I won't name names. But I think this qualifies. It has to deal with ex boyfriends. And camping. And ex friends I went camping with. And I'm pretty certain none of the people I ever dated or went camping with read this thing. (And any of the ones that did only *thought* we were dating. Because I'm a tool. See above.) So anyhow. I'm a tool (that much is clear) and I've been invited to go camping by two parties in the last two weeks.
The first is invite was extended by an ex who had often discussed with me our mutual desire to one day just have a big old camp fire somewhere with friends. A late night under the stars with a bag of marshmallows, a cooler of beers, and each of us armed with our guitars and no shame whatsoever. His email was: 'let's you, me, and my roommate go camping this weekend.'
On the one hand, I don't think that there is any lingering chemistry between this young man and I. On the other hand, there's the last time I went camping.
The second invite came from none other than the Coney Island Book Club. We read about the New Jersey Pine Barrens for one of our last meetings, and there was this proposal that we seize the upcoming federally sanctioned vacation day and all go camping together in the pine barrens. The pine barrens are an unusual, fascinating, and unexpected place (the nation's largest, most delicate freshwater reservoir located in... the heart of New Jersey?) and the Coney Island Book Club is populated by intelligent individuals, none of whom have ever professed a certain level of interest in little old moi.
Color me toolish, kids, but I don't have my sleeping bag anymore. In fact, I'm pretty certain the family dog whizzed on it a few years back. And the tent didn't make it into my city gear. Or the mess kit. So no camping supplies, no mess kit, and a pocket knife as long as my big toe. On top of that, let's consider the last time I went camping.
I remember it like it wasn't the summer of 2001, ever so long ago. I had just broken up with one of only two individuals who I will, if I see them on the street, openly hiss at, and possibly attempt to kill, and I was persona non grata for the next three weeks while everyone tried to rally around the individual known in several circles as Pet Rock. But I had a few new friends in the DC area, including a young man who I had gone out to dinner with several times, who was a summer RA at the University of Maryland. He was a sensitive individual who was studying to be a therapist, and was mostly looking for someone who could drink with him in public. As an RA, everyone can guess how hard that was. That was where I, freshly turned 21 perhaps 72 hours prior, fit in to this plan of his: going camping.
We were going to Assateague. An island off the coast of Maryland. Don't bother googling it. I will sum it up for you right now: tiny island with wild ponies. Wild ponies are not pretty to look at. In fact, they're pretty ungainly. But one day out of a year, like some kind of bizarre mammal rush party, they surge across the 300 meters of sand bars and rocks to the mainland, to go hump the other wild ponies on the other side. And then, when they're done - without even saying 'wow ma'am, that was amazing' - they run back.
I am afraid to say that I am not even making this up.
And all the camping sites on the island were booked for that week anyway. We went a few weeks before that.
But as he told me, it would be me, and his two friends from the therapy program, and we would all grab some beers, some firewood, and some food, and just spend the night on the beach, upwind of the port-a-potties and the wild ponies.
I'll spare you the details. Here's the summary: we saw one wild pony the whole time. While eating lunch, a tame deer tried to steal my ham sandwich out of my mouth - it was not ok, and I realized the my fellow camper was calling a fake number when he said that he was calling his friends to find out why they weren't there yet. I figured out long before he shrugged his shoulders as we were already on the beach with a firepit dug and down to our bathing suits, that they would show up if they showed up, that they weren't showing up.
To this young man's credit, I believe that he'd carried through with this deception not because he wanted in my pants (though he would not have said no, except possibly on the grounds that we didn't have enough of an emotional connection, because he was that kind of guy) but because he really wanted to go camping. And as such, I just tried to ignore the awkwardness of sitting in the slowly chilling air on the beach in Maryland, talking about that stupid psychology game involving the horse, the ladder, and the cube, and him suggesting that I looked like I needed a backrub after we'd gotten bored with staring at the cloudy belt of the milky way. I decided that I didn't. When my firestarting abilities were praised ten times, I said thanks each time. And when he repeated that he was with a cute girl by the fire, and it was really romantic, and it had been a long time since a relationship, and he wasn't sure if he was bi or straight but just looking for someone to care for him, I related my experience with dumping the Pet Rock for someone with a pulse. And when I woke up in the tent, halfway through the night, he'd hooked a single pinky finger against my arm outside the sleeping bag.
Let's get something straight here: I am not the center of the known universe. I am attractive with the right lighting I suppose, but the most I can really say for myself is that I am young, nubile, and have no facial scarring. And this is all the strength of the appeal that I think that I have. In three or four more years, I'm probably going to miss the opportunity to be courted by a whole lot of awkwardness. But that night, I don't think I was suffering exclusively from delusions of appeal. That night represented the longest stretch of time that I have ever experienced. Grass grew faster than that night in a pup tent with ponies and LL Bean as our chaperones.
So right now? When you say to me hey sicklittleplant, let's go camping? I say sure! But this time, you bring the tent, and *I'll* bring the awkward. Let's sit around the camp fire and discuss Kierkegaard, periods, and least favorite sexual experiences. Yes, yes, let's do that. And drink Mike's Hard Lemonade. Or Zima. We'll make it like the last time!
Yes, yes, let's go camping.