CampCon
Yes, it's true. I went camping. Saturday my grandfather spontaneously decided to take my family out to dinner today (Sunday) to celebrate my birthday. (A month late, but who's counting?) None of them expected that I would be out of cell phone range all weekend and that I would only find out about it while driving home too late. All my adult life these spontaneous Sunday dinners worked out with the kind of always-at-home schedule I used to keep, or at least worked out with my addiction to communication devices. Today they all sat around the dinner table questioning the veracity of my brother's report, fifteen minutes earlier, of my whereabouts. "Matt? Camping?" Mom says they asked each other over and over again while sitting around the dinner table. "Camping? The same Matt I am thinking of?"
No mistake. We were unprepared, since in my imagination our hosts had a luxurious vacation home with mowed land like a golf course, with a lake on their property. I must have been thinking that no one in their mind would go camping otherwise. That is my own narrow-mindedness. It was a one-room condemned shack with no indoor plumbing and several condemned buildings which are scavenged for firewood every year. It made me feel all the more grateful for their gracious down-home hospitality, like the widow's mite. Rachel got the worst of my unpreparedness-- I'm fairly resilient when it comes to sleeping on the ground in freezing temperatures. Bugs leave me alone while eating her alive for some reason. And unlike her, I could go without showers and sanitation for two days if it's worth it. For me the hardship is the lack of internet access. Not even livejournal phone posts were working.
In this case it was worth the hardship. It was very affordable as relaxicons go. Highlights of the weekend included:
-- the huge potluck cookout (I brought the shrimp rings which were very well received)
-- swimming in the beautiful lake (we were not camping on the shore; it was a public park several miles away)
-- singing funny songs and telling jokes in wonderful company
-- teaching many people to play Navia Dratp, Emergo and Gnostica
-- giving big hugs to
-- backing up quickly when a couch was thown on the bonfire, and it turned into a twenty-foot tall solar inferno, that set logs on fire that weren't even in the fire pit
While swimming it occurred to me what one of the main attractions of a beach is. I noticed everyone was striking the water with their hands and moving lots of sand around on the beach. This behavior is not acceptable in other environments, but beaches are intrinsically stable. Water and sand go back to the way they were when you found them, so you can cut loose. Another thing I noticed is that lots of people consider inebriation to be a form of recreation. Oh yes-- and shooting guns too. To each their own. Enjoyment is like beauty-- in the eye of the beholder.
Bill said I seemed often out of place. But a time-traveler is almost always out of place anyway, don't you see? That's in my element. I felt well-received and on balance had a good time which I hope to repeat next year. With better preparedness.
Comments
treebones on Jul. 11, 2005 3:18 AM
I'm glad to hear it was fun for you, though.
flutterby68 on Jul. 11, 2005 4:42 AM
Where else but at Camp Con would Ox call for the sacrifice of the couch while people were still SITTING on it? LOL
sothisislife on Jul. 11, 2005 9:59 AM
Wow! You, camping? Glad you survived, and liked it enough to go back! :)
twoofdtm on Jul. 11, 2005 2:56 PM
YAY for hugging me!!! :D
Yay for me being able to call you mine!! And huge YAY for you coming and playing in the lake!!
It was much much much fun.
Glad you'll do it again too! If you'd like we can help you prepare for packing as well? Since you're new to it and all that is.
cosette-valjean on Jul. 11, 2005 3:34 PM — ?
Call you mine? I'm confused by this statement. Do you mean you were glad to have him all to yourself for five minutes?
Anonymous on Jul. 11, 2005 3:51 PM — Re: ?
She doesn't "mean" anything. So don't read any meaning into it.
twoofdtm on Jul. 11, 2005 4:15 PM — Re: ?
*laughs*
It's something I do. When he had helped me with the problem on Neopets that I mentioned to you Friday night I believe I was bargaining to have him work on it... So in payment, he got a hug, a kiss, and I called him mine. :D It doesn't really mean much of anything else except saying, "You're mine." So I guess, Yes, he was mine because I got him all to myself for five minutes. :D
The only person I "really" say that to is Frankie. And when I do that it's, "Mine" and I hug him. Or sit on him. We then argue over who belongs to who. :D
See? I'd have done the same thing on Saturday with you when we went into the lake, but if I had the boys would have gotten that whole, "oooh, girl with girl" look on their faces. :D And I say :P on that!! :D
cosette-valjean on Jul. 11, 2005 4:38 PM — Re: ?
Ok. :-)
bardicwench on Jul. 11, 2005 9:15 PM
I would have been at CampCon, except that Camping is evil scariness... *grin* My idea of camping is a motel 6! If it doesn't have a flush toilet and a shower, I won't go.
Glad that you braved the outdoors, though, and that you had fun.
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