The (Only) Time I Went Camping
“Camping was a tradition in everyone’s family…until we invented the house!”
-Jim Gaffigan
Most of my stories are innocent and family friendly. This one, not quite so much. You’ve been warned. If you have serious opposition to people drinking alcohol or smoking the wacky tobacky, this isn’t the tale for you. Also, names were changed to protect the not-so-innocent.
I’ll need to start this one out with some backstory.
I am not one to sleep in places other than my own bed. When I went to sleepovers as a kid, my parents never even bothered to go to bed while I was gone. They knew that I’d call them around bedtime and ask them to come get me and take me home. When I planned a sleepover at my friend Whitney’s house, they did not protest. Whitney lived a few houses down and around the corner, so coming to retrieve their needy progeny was not a huge deal. It was significantly less fun for them when, in 8th grade, I decided to go on a week-long trip with a friend to Canyon Lake, a two hour drive from our house. A two hour drive that my parents grudgingly made about 8 hours after my initial departure.
During college, it became slightly easier for me to sleep in places that weren’t my home once I’d had a few cocktails. I still didn’t really like spending the night places and only did it if I couldn’t safely drive myself home.
If you’ve followed my blog up until this point, you have probably gleaned that the person I envision myself to be in my mind and the person that I actually am are not always the same individual. At the time this story takes place, I fancied myself a free spirited wanderer, ready to say yes to any adventure on which I was invited. So when my hippie friends invited me to go on a canoe trip, I accepted without hesitation.
There were a number of reasons I should have immediately known this was a terrible idea. I will tell you the top four reasons and then we will move on because if I listed all the reasons I should not have gone on a camping/canoeing trip, this story would end up rivaling the Fountainhead in length.
1. At this time (my sophomore year in college, I believe) I worked at a hippie bar. Marijuana was a pretty accepted part of the whole “scene,” though I, myself did not partake. One of my customers once told me I was “a real cool chick” and then asked if he could tip me with a giant joint. I told him as soon as the electric company would take that in lieu of payment, I would gladly accept.
I also said, “I don’t smoke.”
To which he replied, “What a shame, maaaaaaan.”
And come to think of it, I don’t think I got a tip from him at all. Maybe I should have taken the joint. But I digress.
Most of the people I interacted with at this establishment were your pretty typical hippie stoners who had probably slept in the woods on a number of occasions, either intentionally or not. And these were the people who had invited me camping.
2. Until this point in my life, the total number of times I had been camping was 1. I went to Girl Scout camp once when I was about 10. I agreed to it only because my fellow scouts (who had camped there previously) assured me the tents contained actual beds and I would not have to sleep on the ground. My mom chose to chaperone, because she was pretty sure she’d end up having to drive me home in the middle of the night anyway and decided she’d rather it be a one way trip.
We live in Southeast Texas and went camping during the winter. Even the worst winter day in our part of the world is not really that cold. It’s far better than trying to camp during the summer when it feels like your skin will melt right off at any moment.
Well. The first night of our camping trip, I guess Texas decided to flip the script and it got COLD. I’m talking, sleep-in-all-the-clothes-you-brought-and-your-hiking-boots-cold. It was miserable and my mom and I left early in the morning, both vowing that our camping days were behind us.
3. This was going to be a two-day canoe trip. The closest I’d ever come to canoeing was operating a pedal boat (paddle boat? Idk, the one that’s like a bike) in Galveston Bay. I knew next to nothing about canoeing and was not the least bit athletic.
4. We were slated to leave at 8am on Saturday. I had worked the closing shift at the bar the night before. For the uninitiated, the bartender doesn’t get to leave as soon as the bar closes. There’s generally one and a half to two hours of cleanup that has to be done before the final clock out. The bar closed at 2am on Friday nights. I’m pretty sure I don’t have to spell out for you why this was included on the “list of reasons Courtney should not have gone camping.”
I obviously didn’t own camping gear at this point in my life, nor had I ever pitched a tent. Undeterred by these facts, I decided to confront this adventure head-on and purchased a brand new tent and air mattress from Academy. I was ready and outfitted to become the type of person who goes camping, but I was never going to be the type of person willing to sleep directly on the ground.
I invited my friend Melissa, who was not from the bar, to accompany me so I’d have a canoe partner. Can one canoe alone? I would imagine so, but I’m not sure. Unsurprisingly, this trip did not ignite in me a previous dormant passion for canoeing.
Mel asked if the trip was going to be “420 friendly,” and I laughed and assured her that yes, that would definitely be something that probably every other member of our ragtag group of adventurers would be doing.
The morning of our trip came quick. I was still exhausted from closing the bar the previous night, but I grabbed some Starbucks on the way to meet my friends and bravely soldiered on, Mel in tow.
We arrived at Alan’s house that morning. Alan was our unofficial “canoe captain” and was well above twice the age of the next oldest member of our young, starry-eyed posse.
“Who are you going to be partners with?” He asked Meln and me.
“Uhhh, we figured we’d go together…” assuming that was a given.
“Have either of you ever canoed before?” Alan asked.
“Well, no,” I said.
“Mel, you’ll be with me. Courtney, you’re going to share a canoe with John.” Alan declared with finality.
John was a serious-looking fellow I hadn’t met before. In the interest of full transparency, I don’t actually remember the real name of my canoe partner. I’m just calling him John so we can move along here.
We get to the campsite and toss our canoes in the river. John gave me some basic canoe instructions and we were off. Well, to be more precise, John was OFF. I was barely paddling at all. He started paddling like we were being chased down the river in Deliverance. I can only assume the reason I hadn’t yet met John is that he’s been too busy trying to make the US olympic canoe team to hang out at the bar.
Within minutes, John and I were so far ahead of everyone that no one else was even in our line of sight. So much for a fun time socializing with my friends. There is only the river and John. I am the type of person who can socialize with just about anyone. Just about. John was not about socializing, or having fun, he was about winning the canoe trip.
After a while, I got tired of futilely attempting to talk to John.
“Maybe we should stop and wait for everyone else,” I finally said.
About half an hour later, Alan and Megan float into view. Alan was paddling leisurely and Megan was sprawled out at the other end of their canoe, smoking a joint. They were both laughing, clearly having a much better time than I was with Captain Canoe. Or maybe Brigadier General Canoe. That seems more apt.
I kept myself busy in the canoe by talking at Brigadier General John Canoe and drinking, if I remember correctly, Malibu and root beer. There is certainly a distinct chance that my memories from this point forward are not entirely accurate, but nonetheless, we shall press on.
Finally, we got to our designated campsite and pitched our tents. Or more accurately, someone saw Meg’s and my inexperienced drunk asses trying unsuccessfully to pitch our tent and just did it for us. Then I inflated the air mattress. I did have the presence of mind when I purchased it to buy a self-inflating one, thankfully.
We sat around the fire drinking and eating beans until it was time to go to bed. Mel and I crawled into our tent and went to sleep on the soft air mattress.
An hour or two later, I woke up on the rocky ground. The air mattress had completely deflated and left Mel and me sleeping on a piece of thin plastic atop the incredibly rocky ground on which the tent was pitched. I woke Mel up, she groggily rolled off the mattress and I reinflated it. We both went back to sleep. An hour later, I found myself in a “lather, rinse, repeat” situation because I was again sleeping on the very rocky ground. I’m not sure how many more times during the night I rolled Mel off the mattress and attempted to re-inflate it, but it was more than a few. Mel barely stirred during all these, sleeping the peaceful sleep of the drunk and stoned.
When I finally awoke for good the next morning, I was miserable. The previous two nights’ sleep total was only about 5 hours, I was hungover, sore from paddling and completely sunburnt. Meanwhile, Brigadier General John Canoe was ready and rarin’ to go at o-eight-hundred.
That day, I was thankful for BGJC. I put a sheet over my head (and sunburnt body) and slept in the canoe while he paddled us back to our cars. I think I may have finally learned my lesson because I never went canoeing or camping again.
