Camping…in a Nutshell
Frantically searching for a buried soother in the depths of a crumpled sleep sack,
Patiently stroking a sleepless child’s hair,
Whispering empty threats, in a desperate plea for just a few more minutes of elusive, delicious slumber…
“But, I’m hun-grrryyyy…”
It’s so early, even the birds haven’t yet begun to sing cheery songs.
This is camping, in a nutshell.
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Endless lists,
Mountains of clothes, dirty dishes, filthy feet,
Argh!
Wind and rain, sunburns, broken bones,
Band-Aids,
Can’t get warm.
“I’m really hun-grrryyyy…”
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Sometimes I find myself wondering what on Earth possessed our family to commit to yet another weekend in the wilderness. (Well, perhaps “wilderness” is a stretch, but this is about as close to it as I’d venture with my lot.)
Despite the challenges, there’s something about camping on the West Coast with my family that has us coming back to it again and again:
Grains of sand cling persistently to the underside of tiny curled toes
Exhausted little arms wrap their way lovingly around my neck
Marshmallowed cheeks rest peacefully on my shoulder
Newly minted best-friends
Mesmerizing flames dance to the distant sound of laughter and delighted screeches of children
The way windswept tendrils of sun-bleached hair graze my arms as I envelop tiny shivering bodies still dripping from ice cold plunges into salty waves
When we stop doing and
Succumb to simply being,
When we trade our busy city-pace for
Island time.
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We connect.
Deeply and authentically,
We connect not only to nature,
But to the people and beings that inhabit it.
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In a comforting way, camping has a way of reminding us of
our smallness,
our insignificance.
It distills the important from the noise.
I can’t wait to do it again in two weeks.
In the meantime, I’ll be catching up on laundry.
