CAMPING

Not what it used to be?
Or not the girl I used to be?

I think our big camping trip we had planned is going to be a bust this weekend thanks in totality to the Great Brandino double booking. Who knew the Big B was such a popular item? I asked him only about 50 times if he was sure the weekend of the 19th was okay. We have been planning this trip since July. He decided to call me last week to casually announce, "I can't go on our trip. I forgot it was the deer hunt." Lame. Could kill.

Remember that one Havasupai trip when all I packed to sleep with was a $5 hammock? While Nicole was loading toilet paper and commenting, "Better safe than sorry", I threw my hammock and ramen in my pack and replied, "Better light than safe." Dangling and swinging in the wind between two riverside trees with NO blanket, I cursed myself. Live and learn.

Baby changes everything.

To pack: huge ass tent, ice chests, hot dogs, play pen, baby blankets, baby clothes, bottles, diapers, snake-bite kit, first-aid kid, practically my whole entire house.... you get the idea. I practically have to adjust the tire pressure due to the enormous load in the back of the Vue. The logistics of camping with a child damn near take all the fun out of it, especially without your husband there to share in those logistics and hovering.

I am remembering the days: Itty bitty backpacking tent, 0 degree ultralight bags, water purifier, and nothing to feed me but fly line and a butane stove. There is just about nothing better than eating a fresh trout from the Colorado, drinking its ice-cold water and feeding fish skins to ring-tailed cats... not much on the agenda or on your back. Now THAT is fun. Waking up to a thin sheet of ice on your tent while in the middle of a herd of buffalo on the North Rim used to be a novelty and still would be... if I were not concurrently wondering if my baby was hypothermic, breathing, or about to be stampeded.

The mere thought of packing this whole house up and hauling it away only so I can chase Anika around, worry about her falling in the fire, getting bit by fire ants, or being kidnapped by some barren, hairy Eastern European woman and smuggled out of the country where even Amber Alert can't reach her just about turns me off to the whole experience.

I guess it's still always worth the work but... not without my hubby. I need his help but MOSTLY I just want him there for his comforting, cozy and somewhat aloof companionship. He may be a weenie for abandoning us but I LOVE my little absent-minded nutty professor.

Oh no he dit-ten.