We went camping over the weekend, leaving Saturday afternoon, and staying through Sunday. Sure, it was only two-days and one night, but I swear to whatever deity you prefer, that I lost about 20 pounds of body weight through sweating my ass off the entire fuggin’ time. I probably added more humidity to the area than what is found in a woman-filled arena after a John Mayer concert.
We went to my friend's property, which is 10 acres about an hour or so from my house, and it’s mostly desert landscape set upon some hills of more desert landscape. It has some larger shrubs and some larger desert ‘trees’, but most of it is entirely exposed, dusty, and super hot. Plus, we helped work while we were there: cut down trees, cut up ones that were already down, fed smaller pieces through a wood chipper, and more. So not only was it just hot as shit while just sitting there, even in the shade, but we worked our asses off for hours on end. That part wasn’t what I was expecting to do.
Tits McGee joined, of course, as well as my nearly-18-year-old-son. We all bunked up in my new large canvas tent that I was super excited to try out, which is what brought me to the land in the first place. Just about any other local camp site was taken, as we missed our opportunity to head out earlier in the week to find something in the forests. Everyone and their neighbor's dog went out camping for the holiday weekend. And so, my friend's property wasn’t the first place we wanted to go, or even the 7th, but it was available. I really only intended to just set up, enjoy some quiet, meditate, read on my Kindle, even with the heat.
But, it was the exact opposite of that. The evening was awesome once the sun went down and the temperature dropped. I was able to enjoy my camping rocking chair, bust out the Kindle, feel a gentle cooling breeze, and maybe even smile at the experience. That part was nice, and sitting around the unlit campfire (fire ban, no fires allowed) and just chatting with everyone, eating bean burritos and veggies, and watching the stars unfold in magnificent glory, was pretty great.
I don’t have a good relationship with the desert. Sure, it’s beautiful in its own way, and in my state there are numerous state parks and national parks, with some of the most iconic views that are recognizable around the world – most of them being just a couple of hours drive from my house. I feel lucky and grateful in that regard. But, I only go to most of those areas during the early Spring and Fall seasons as it gets so damn hot the majority of the year, it’s not fun at all. At. All. It’s fuggin’ miserable.
Some people love the desert and find beauty in it during those crazy hot summer times. But those fuckity-fucks are lunatics and can go fuck themselves. Wandering around the dirt and sand and rock, while fully exposed with no water source available within ten miles, is absurd. It can be pretty on someone’s Instagram shot, and maybe in some old western movie, but that’s about it. While you’re there, and you feel the heat just roasting you from the inside out (even while in the shade you have to create for yourself), and your clothes are entirely soaked with sweat, and more is pouring down in a steady drip, you can look around, and it begins to sink in pretty quickly how fucked you are, but also, how fucking stupid you are for willingly going there and expecting a nice relaxing time. The desert just makes me hot, miserable, pissed off, and not a happy person to be around. All my zen-like personality and let-there-be-love attitude melts away pretty quickly, and the punk-rock vulgar side of me is not only exposed, but begins raging.
The new tent is awesome, and I’m very excited about it still. I’m looking forward to our next adventure, which will hopefully be this weekend (just NO desert landscapes allowed). I’ll drive to a deep forest like the Tetons or Yellowstone or something like that. It’ll be worth it. The tent is massive. All three of us sprawled out in luxury with the ability to add several more people and a few dead hookers comfortably, or about 15 hobbits worth, if we are speaking in Lord of the Rings terms. We were able to stand up and move around, and I swear to your deity, that I could do a cartwheel inside without killing anyone. The massive windows on all sides are a real gem, but through the night I zipped them up mostly for privacy, and to not get too cold. It was nice, though. Expense well worth it.
By about 8am the next morning, it was already hotter than Satan’s dried out, dusty vagina, and I was not in a good mood. I didn’t sleep the best, which is how it usually goes when camping – the first night is always an adjustment where every noise keeps me up. Sipping hot coffee while rocking in my camp chair, sweating my ass off, was a thrilling experience, for sure – end sarcasm. But, I was determined to at-least try to enjoy the morning camping coffee. I look forward to that anytime we camp. Usually, though, the air is cool, and you can feel a gentle moisture in the air. The birds start chirping and all the critters are waking up. Maybe you’re even lucky to have a nearby stream you can stroll by, or hang in a hammock while in the shade of large trees above. It’s more like a scene from Cinderella where the world is alive and beautiful, and it just looks so wonderful and peaceful and welcoming.
But, it wasn’t like that at all. Instead, the reality I was in was more like a scene from Mad Max, where it’s hot and miserable, and you feel like you’re dipping your wiener into a bucket of lava at all times, and you sweat in areas that you never knew could.
I knew my friend wanted us to hang around most of the day and help him more, but I said fuck-it, pretty quickly, and decided that we were going to have to bail early and head home. I could tell that Tits McGee and the kiddo were fried and beyond miserable as well, so we tried to say our thanks and goodbye’s and started packing up to head out. By then, the sun was raging and destroying us. Packing up was brutal. I had to stop several times to put my head down between my knees and catch my breath, plus to dump water on my head and try to cool down a little. But, we kept working as a team and fought through the heat and dread, and got all packed up. Before we knew it, we were on the road, with the AC blasting on full blast, cooling us down.
I recently started reading the book, 1984, again and decided to put on the audiobook on the way home. But, for most of the trip we just drove in silence, completely exhausted, sweaty, dirty, and in poor moods. The drive was only about an hour, but instead of going straight home, I took us to a food joint to get large burritos, which we scarfed down rapidly. We were dust covered, sweaty, smelly, and probably looked odd while in the restaurant, but we didn’t care. A big-ass burrito can fix so many things, and it worked wonders for us that afternoon. Afterwards, we went home, unpacked, showered and collapsed with exhaustion.
After a couple of hours of rest and chilling, we had to go to a family gathering for the 4th. It was good to see everyone, but we were exhausted. We pigged out on lots of fruits and vegetables, and cast-iron cooked potatoes – all vegan (at least ours were – the rest of the family had plenty of kah-kah-poo-poo meats and stuff). I spent a lot of the time in the basement, where it was much cooler, sitting in my parent's deep massage chair letting that robot go to work on my back, which felt amazing.
And now it's a new week. Most people have today off for the holiday, but farmers like us don't get that perk. Plants and crops don't care what day it is.
Well, that’s about all for now. More later…
/mg