For Sunday, March 30, 2008                                      Drummer Column, Gibbs, 808 words

 

Into the Wild with accoutrements

 

     This summer has been dubbed Camping Summer by me just now. I haven’t been out in the woods in too long. As you know if you’ve been reading this column over the years, I used to be the backpacking club advisor at the high school. I spent every summer in the California backcountry, hiked 1,000 miles, rafted a dozen rivers, explored caves, endured countless bouts of poison oak.

     Then in October of 2000 I twisted my back carrying a table. All that wilderness jazz went right out the window. I spent the next three years unable to sit down without excruciating pain. I went through therapy, acupuncture, epidurals, exercises, Vicodin. I spent my waking hours coming to terms with my new future – a lifetime of chronic misery.

     Then the pain went away around the fifth year. I found I was able to work hard, tote barges, lift bales once again. If I overdid it, I got sore, but it was acute, not chronic.

     I spent the next few years catching up on my chores. I’ve been fixing things for three summers. We bought a couple of houses when the stock market went in the crapper, and now it’s my fate to maintain them or pay professionals.

     Happy to announce I’m caught up for the time being. Summer 2008 is mine all mine. That spells road trips and random left turns. Yosemite here I come.

     I can hardly wait. Here’s my idea of a favorite day in the woods: Get up. Go. Build a fire. Make coffee. Drink coffee in front of the fire. Socialize. Watch the morning sun rise over the campsite. More coffee. Eat breakfast. Wander off and do something – hike, swim, climb, explore, fish, ski, boat, read – return to the campsite in late afternoon, build a fire, cook, eat, watch the sun set, socialize with jokes and long stories, star gaze, turn in, flip my pillow to the cool side. No unique rituals. Just plain and simple leisure.

     Speaking of leisure. We camped with our children and grandchildren for a weekend last summer. Chad and Kristi had a huge tent with an inflatable mattress and fluffy pillows. Susan and I slept nearby in my 2x8’ stuff-tent on Therm-A-Rest pads with clothes jammed into t-shirts as pillows.

     Next morning, Chad gave me a hard time. “Dude. What are you doing sleeping on the hard ground? You should be nicer to your wife. Why are you making her sleep on that elongated pancake?”

     I explained, “We like to travel light. She’s comfortable. We’ve been sleeping on these same Therm-A-Rests for 20 years.”

     “Dude. That’s what I’m saying. Move up. Get an air mattress. Think of Susan.”

     To this Susan said, “Yea. Think of me.”

     “Hey, wait a minute. You’ve been sleeping in my thumb tent on these pads without complaint all these years. Now suddenly you’re uncomfortable? Thanks a lot, Chad.”

     “Face it, dude. You’re both getting older.”

     Last week I blew $500 at REI. I did not buy an air mattress. I bought a new sleeping bag and two nice latest-model Therm-A-Rests. They’re thick. Inches thick.

     Chad won’t like them. He favors his king-size floater with its electric pump. I’m hoping Susan will like them. Chad’s having an influence on her.

 

     On the way to the cashier, feeling ambivalent, I walked past a camping display in the tent area. There was a cot, and it caught my eye. It was six feet long, a foot off the ground, and firmly padded. Folded, it fit snugly into a small bag. I bought one. It’s not a mattress, but it doesn’t need a pump.

     If Chad starts ragging on me again in Yosemite about my poor suffering wife, and she decides to chime in, I’ll whip out the cot. That will put them in their places. Or I’ll look like an idiot.

     I can hear him now. “Dude. What is that? You bought your wife a cot? What, is she in the army? Come on. What were you thinking? Pamper your woman.”

     “Cut it out, dude. You’re blowing it for me.”

     Nice thing about REI: you can bring anything back for any reason. We’ll see how these new accommodations fair in the field. If Susan doesn’t like them, I’ll trade them in on a Serta.

     Besides Yosemite, we intend to visit Crystal Basin, Kennedy Meadows, South Fork of the Yuba, Dinky Lakes, and maybe down the coast to Andrew Molera Park near Big Sur. We will go other places of which we know not yet. Random lefts will determine that.

     We expect to be taking the grandkids with us as often as possible. I look forward to showing them the splendors of nature. I shall get many vicarious thrills watching them climb and jump about. We will all go barefoot and grow calluses on the soles of our feet.