Today when he fussed I just got out of bed , used the head, then dressed and took him for a walk. Quiet 8 am morning RV tenting activities. There was a young woman, shorts and t shirt, climbing out of her tent, balancing to stand. Another young woman stood by in a grey tube dress looking at her iPhone. A hairy man bare chested in shorts and boots carrying his shirt, fresh from the group shower, said ‘hi’ as he passed. Gilbert pooped. I pick it up in a blue doggie bag. The green mountains and wide green blue stream full of whirlpools rushing by was a lovely view.
Now I’m waiting for coffee to boil. I’ve ground the Kona nuts. Pacific canned milk. Squeeze container of golden honey. God that tastes good.
A crow outside is talking crow. St. Francis knew the language of birds. Dr. Philip Ney speaks to the birds. I can only guess what they’re saying.It’s an educated guess, not linguistically sound, but I expect the guy outside is calling to his friends, “Caught any fish? Found any good garbage.?”
I love my little home. I love this ipad and keyboard. I love blogging. Journaling. I’ve done it all my life. Since I was a child, my first diary as a 6 year old.
Only a day in the country by a stream and the negatives are gone. I wake here and now. The zen master says you are you and that enlightenment is to ‘shit when you are shitting’. Here and now. I love the shape of the green cedar leaves outside my window. There’s a breeze coming through the screened door.
Aliens in space craft are circling somewhere above planning anal probes. Unsuspecting experimental humans are going about their business.
I love Diana Davison’s Utube series, how she starts, ‘it’s another 2 minutes and I haven’t been raped yet.’ Mocking the falsifying of statistics by the gender studies folk. This is the decade of media deceit and mis and dis information.
Behind me furthest from the river is a camp of a dozen different coloured tents, young people, I think Filipino, families, some organization, likely church based. The church does so much and so little is credited them. Growing up I went camping with church groups and with the Boy Scouts. But the Boy Scouts met in the basement of the church. Men and women of the church volunteering to supervise a gaggle of children or teens . Every year we’d be camping with family but also there would be a camping weekend with the church and also with the scouts. Campfires, marshmallows, hikes, swimming, canoeing, group meals, sharing tents, flashlights at night, so much laughter and giggling.
Church attendance is down and instead the kids have game boys. Isolation and alienation abounds. So little belonging. I’m thankful for the memories of those times.
Laura and I are planning this year on going to the Salt Spring Island Rally 2018. We’ve gone about a dozen times over the years, sometimes motorcycle camping in tents, sometimes sailing over and staying on the sailboat, other times renting bed and breakfasts. Camping out in the field has been best. Looking forward to bringing this Maverick camper, hoping Brian is there. So often he’s come in his big and beautiful camper. Maybe meet up with Murray who rides his Harley there. Great meetings. Evening dance. It’s spiritual, not a ‘church’ but the folks are all volunteering to make it work each year. I love the Kiwanis breakfast.
Not everyone is looking at their game boy. Yesterday I rode the electric bike through Princeton and saw people before a stage listening to folk music. Camp outs and music festivals are the new variation on the old gospel revival weekends. Somewhere those continue on too. The tribe coming together. Opportunities for romance and sharing.
Our neighbours, grandparents have the children for the summer and are RV’ing around the province. The kids stay in a tent beside the RV. More community. Good humor. Happy times. My face is red from all the sun yesterday.
I saw a woman sitting in her car this morning, beside her tent. She’d been barbecuing last night when Gilbert and I walked by. I remember getting up in the morning and sitting in the car with a coffee rather than sitting outside. Tenting days. I’ve done all the variations around us and have arrived near the apex camper ‘predator’ position.
I’ve slept on the ground in just a bed roll, under the stars in the Sierras, climbing with a back pack. That was so beautiful, the endless Milky Way swath of sky and stars. I did worry all night snakes would crawl into the sleeping bag for warmth. I’ve been in Quincy and Igoos, making them myself in the arctic. Loving the fires in the morning, cherishing the coffee drunk with gloves and parka, made the old way with percolator kettle. I’m still motorcycle camping with a pup tent beside the road. Then I like just throwing the tent and sleeping bag into a pack so I can ride on down to a diner for a coffee and hearty breakfast.
With Dad and mom we camped in early days with a brown canvas tent with a wood Center pole and four metal poles for the ceiling. We graduated to a 6 man tent with a screened in front where Mom had a picnic table and we could eat meals without being bothered by flies or mosquitoes. Then we moved up to the tent that erected from the trailer. After we left home Mom and Dad moved onto the motorhomes.
We had the trailer and we left it at Boston Bar. Laura would hang out in it while I’d take the quad and roamed the back woods all day with a rifle, not getting anything but so enjoying the riding about and target practicing. Moose hunting the guys enjoyed that trailer too, slept 4, great for communal meals. I loved setting up the sump pump connected to the generator, the hose running between the lake and the trailer to refill the water tank with ease. I had a solar panel along with the generator to keep the batteries up. I even had a satellite phone which made me feel like the explorers in the Creighton Congo book. No electric fence to keep critters out but lots of guns.
Here I’ve got my own refrigerator, toilet, shower, stove and running water and had the air conditioning on last night. In the RV park we connect up to water and electricity. Last time out I had the heater on. There’s a tv and DVD but I didn’t use those this trip. Too busy riding about on the electric bike. It’s all so compact and dense with useful consideration of space. NASA intense. Microwave. Slide. Home a way from home. Elegant, blond wood, I really feel like I’ve arrived but know that it’s been years of acquiring skills and experiences. Steep learning curves. It’s one thing to have these things but a whole other matter of maintenance and trouble shooting. I finally figured out the fridge wasn’t working yesterday because the main power had been tripped which I only figured out because the lights were dim suggesting they were running on batteries and not shore power. I learned from Ron yersterday where the ignition was on this model of refrigerator. Years of sailing and living on a sail boat taught me a lot of these systems. At least the truck with it’s engine is a whole other generator.
In time I’ll take it for granted and it will just be a base camp for activities. Those today are resting eating and walking the dog. In the fall I’m looking forward to bow hunting. And now we’ll be enjoying Salt Spring Island in luxury.
When I think of Social Justice Warriors and man hating feminists I don’t think they’ve camped. Here I see a whole evolution of living that it’s so easy to take for granted in the city because there you can forget about all the engineering and trades that go into making and maintaining the apartments that the vast majority of angry entitled people live in here. Camping is humbling. I’m so grateful for all those who’ve gone before to create this little camper trailer that fits on the back of a truck and lets me go anywhere. I’m so thankful for all the lessons of my parents. I’m loving seeing Kevin and Anna with the god kids on Facebook, not rich by any means, a regular family, just like we were growing up, but Dad and Mom got it together to take us out into the woods camping and fishing like they’re doing. I joke often saying I go camping just to appreciate how much I have in the city. Mostly there I have people who specialize in these systems and can fix things if they break down. Out here I’m mostly on my own though not uncommonly the men band together to come up with a jury rig of some kind. I used duct tape to fix a breech in our anti mosquitos screen.
Derek and Naomi with their new baby Faith will definitely be out camping when she’s older. So many of those I love, love to do just this. Having camping in common bonds me with so many of my friends. Love of the Canadian outdoors is central. Cities are increasingly interchangeable but this great river out here with the crows landing in the cedar tree, that’s special. I’m blessed to be alive and enjoying this. I’ll like having a shower later. There was a time I’d have to dive in the river with a bar of soap if I wanted to be clean.
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1 comment:
My dad used to say “we will be roughing it” Roughing it was so much fun!!
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