picture courtesy of Anne TaintorI imagine myself a camper akin to how I imagine myself a runner. I have all the gear: running shoes, a jogging bra, and ipod with suggested "running" tunes and in one brief moment in time I could keep a 11 min/mile pace(not an inch more without throwing up, six miles, max)...Therefore in my head I am a runner.
I tell myself I am a runner, not a walker but a runner. And this is true until I lace up my shoes in the present day, attempt to run around the block only to be woken up with a booger covered four year old's finger poking at my chest because I took a rest at the neighborhood playground and later passed out some where around mile two. But dammit I am a runner.
The same goes for camping...I camp therefore I am a "camper" (pardon my terminology but at a loss for another term for a camper.) Anyway, we have an eight person tent (large enough for me to Zumba in), an air mattress, sleeping bags, lanterns, a hammock and a couple of flannel shirts to play the part. I definitely l-o-v-e the idea of camping like I love the idea of running. And yes, I can survive in the rugged outdoors for a night, eating hot dogs gently coated with sand and smelling somewhere between a hamster cage and my favorite BBQ joint. And if the truth be told, I don't mind the bugs and dirt, the food and the sticky sap that gets just about everywhere, the 1/2 mile walk to the bathroom, or the constant boredom. So that would make me a camper, right? But here is my question and maybe the one thing that distinguishes me from the rest. These camping folks, do they ever worry? I mean r-e-a-l-l-y worry, because I worry all the time while camping. And no matter how much I try to fake my outdoorsmanship I cannot get over the constant reoccurring thoughts of:
The 6ft bear that is lurking behind the pine tree ready for me to turn my back so it can drag my child off into its torturous den, but not before ripping off our faces.
Or the 10ft giant rattlesnake hidden in the pine straw that
Or the rabid five fingered raccoons that are dexterous enough to open up a cooler and steal my marinated chicken tenders, and later mistake my toes for tenders.
Or that pack of twelve coyotes that are hiding out in the glen waiting for us to close our eyes so that they can pounce our tent and bite off our noses and finger tips.
And the worse of all worse cases the idea that Jason Voorhees and Leatherface have shacked up together in a cozy two bedroom cabin up the hill and they will be combing the area at sundown looking for someone wearing flannel to join their ménage à trois.
A runner- maybe, child of the eighties- definitely, camper- yeah not so much.
