THANKFUL FRIDAY

This is the time of year when all the weather reporters around here start talking about the heat dome sitting on top of the city. It’s pretty hot and muggy. This is not a problem for me. I kind of love it, but Michael does not. At all. I picked out new ceiling fans last week and Michael spent two days getting them installed. First of all, the new fans work on all the speed settings. They are the right size for the space and they don’t make any noise. Most importantly, the new fans actually move cool air around. Michael can often be found standing under one of these ceiling fans, eyes closed, and face turned up towards the ceiling. He has stopped measure the temperature in degrees but in the number of shirts he’s worn that day. Four shirt days are pretty hot, but four shirt and two pairs of shorts days are unbearably hot.

We never want to take the camper anywhere during this time of year. Then, we get to the end of the camping season and I have regrets about not using the camper enough. This year I anticipated this weather and camping ennui and found us a campground up north. Turns out that we can travel about six hours north and reach more comfortable temperatures. Last night Michael was looking at the high and low temperatures for the area we will be in and he got very excited. He booked us some kayaks for one day and said “This is going to be so nice. The weather is going to be BEAUTIFUL! You picked a good spot!” I’m currently patting myself on the back for my forethought.

I am surrounded by people who have moved to KCMO from far more glamorous places, but also people who have lived here all of their lives. It seems that they all have mixed feelings about living in the middle of the country. Kansas City Missouri was definitely not my first choice for a place to settle down. It wasn’t even on the list and yeah, it isn’t perfect. I could make a list of things I don’t like about this city, but the list of things I do like about it far exceeds the don’t likes. One those things on the ‘like’ list is the convenience of leaving the city and not having to travel far to get to some interesting places. I don’t have to travel a great distance to get away from the heat. So, by the time you are reading this, that is exactly what Michael and I will be doing. Traveling north to slightly cooler temperatures.

This week I am thankful for air conditioning, new ceiling fans, and the promise of cooler temps to come.

THINGS I DID AND DIDN'T DO

Nine days is a long time. Over those nine days, I did not check email. I looked at Facebook for a minute while we were in Bryce Canyon City and had a moment with Wifi. I did not exercise. I did not do yoga, even though I took my mat. I did not stress about the amount of green things I was not eating or the amount of junk food I was eating. I did not read the news. I did not write in my journal. I did not take as many pictures as I thought I would, but the ones I did take are good ones. I still need to process the pictures I took with my Nikon. I do not have words for describing any of the landscape that I saw. I do have a list of animals that we saw. We collected forty seven license tags; this includes Hawaii.

I cried the first time I used my Gold Star Family National Park Pass.

Michael told the Park Ranger that this was the first time using the pass and we had questions. The Park Ranger went from business to empathetic in a snap. She said all of the things I didn’t want to hear. Then she warned us that some people may not know what a Gold Star Family member is and that we will have to explain it to them. After that first time, nothing was ever said about it again. At one National Park, the Park Ranger mistook the pass for the Fifth Grader pass and we did not correct her. But that first time….that first time took the breath from my lungs and I sobbed all the way to the visitor’s center.

I had a vision of pictures of me standing at the Grand Canyon in my pink tulle skirt and J’s combat boots at sunset. I changed in the parking lot and crammed my right foot into a boot and laced it up. Then I reached for the left boot and discovered that it was a different boot. It was also a righty. When Katrina sent me the boots, I barely looked at them before shoving them into my closet because that is what I do with things that poke at my heart. I thought for a second that maybe I could just put the right boot on my left foot and no one would notice and then Michael suggested an alternative plan. It was a good plan and I am more than pleased with the images that came from all of that.

I left Chris with canyon views in both Arizona and Utah. I did not take any of Dad, but he was with us in spirit on our second day of travel when the tire blew on the truck and then Michael ran over tire debri that ripped out our shower drain pipe and water line. We never use the shower any way and the water line is an easy fix. For the first time in my life, I camped in Colorado without a fishing pole. I sat on the banks of the Colorado River without ever casting a line. I ate my trout in restaurants. On the last day, I soaked in pools of hot springs and floated on my back in the mineral water. I thought about what I would write about this trip and I came up with very little. There were parts of this trip that stung me in unexpected ways. There were moments when I was so awestruck with the landscape, I could not hold a camera. I have not known what day it is since June 9th, when I left for Camp Wildling. I never had time to adjust before heading out on this trip and now that I am home, I am resisting an adjustment to days of the week and times of day.

In fact, I am not even supposed to be at work today. I put the wrong dates in the work calendar and no one expected me back until Wednesday. So, I’m sitting here with my second cup of coffee, scrolling through thousands of emails and getting myself halfway organized for the rest of the week. And that is all I have planned for today.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Camping season has begun. The weekend before last, I had Michael help me open up the camper in our driveway. While he mowed the yard, I proceeded to clean out the camper and pack in clean blankets. I got rid of some things we never really used and cleaned all surfaces. When I was finished inside, Michael came around and lubricated the bed rails and the stabilizers. We pushed the beds back in with no issues and closed the camper back up. I looked at Michael and said “let’s go right now!” He agreed that he was also ready to get the camper out.

We have an epic trip planned for June, but we will officially kick off our camping season with a trip to meet Chad and Jess this weekend. We have all been watching the weather like crazy and all reports predict rain, but we don’t care. We’ve been planning this trip for at least a month now. Jess called me the other day to talk about food and meal plans. Both of us were so excited. I said “I can’t wait to squeeze you!” Jess replied “Oh my god, I can’t wait to hug someone other than Chad.” and we both laughed and laughed. I knew right then that rain or shine, this weekend is going to be filled with hugs and laughter. AND I CANNOT WAIT! Life has been real hard for these two in the last few years. There have been at least two phone calls in the last year where I sat in a conference room crying with Chad on the other end of the line. To top it all off, last week they had to say goodbye to their dog, Moses. I am in desperate need of looking into both of their faces and making sure that they are still okay and being a shoulder to cry on if need be.

I would be in desperate need of looking into both of their faces under normal circumstances.

Today, I am thankful that camping season is here and that our first trip out will be with my framily.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

This happens maybe once a year. One of us will buy the wrong dish soap. We will forget that it is the wrong dish soap and bring it home. It is not the wrong dish soap because I’m allergic to it or that it doesn’t clean. It is wrong because it smells like Chris during the last two days of his life. Sunday afternoon, I opened the new bottle of soap and squeezed a dollop onto the sponge . I frowned, but continued washing dishes. Michael walked into the kitchen and I said that we bought the wrong soap again. It’s Ivory. Ivory dish soap smells like dying Chris. You know, just for future reference.

Michael asked if he needed to go get new soap and said 'no’. It just seemed so wasteful. I could get through this bottle of soap, but then Michael sent a text to his ex-wife, Erin. She was picking the Cabbage up later and he asked her if she wanted to swap dish soap. I don’t know what he told her, but I can image that it sounds like a pretty weird request. “Hey, you wanna swap dish soap with us because ours smells like a dying husband?” Erin handed over two bottles of dish soap, a Meyer lemon one and a small bottle of extra strength Dawn. I honestly don’t know if she brought both bottles over because Michael had said the why for swapping or if she didn’t want to give us a half empty bottle of soap. I don’t really care. I’m just grateful they have the kind of relationship where they are still friends enough to request such a thing as swapping dish soap.

I’m also grateful that I do not have to wash dishes while seeing Chris’s face on his last days.

This has been a good but very weird kind of week. Work was crazy with little fires popping up all over the place. Then Michael sent me a text about a truck he was interested in. We’ve been talking about upgrading his truck for years now. The three of us with the dog just don’t fit in his tiny single cab Tacoma. Long camping trips are out of the question because in order for me to drive the truck, we have to move the bench seat. Then people really don’t fit in the cab. Michael has been crunching numbers and looking at our budget. He thinks between now and December are the best times to buy, but he’s always had his heart set on another Tacoma. I think our last camping trip really sold him on the idea of just getting a truck that works for us. He called me Wednesday evening but I missed the call. He was at a dealership, had test driven a truck and was about to walk out with it. If I had returned his call, he would have. Instead, he came home and we talked about it. Then Thursday, I went with him to look at the truck.

Thursday night we came home with a new truck.

It’s probably the fanciest thing either one of has ever driven. My favorite part is the sunroof that opens all the way. I have visions of standing on the seat with my torso sticking out the window and my camera in my hands. Michael says not at highway speeds. I’m all “whatever. I just need goggles.” We did not use the camper as much as we should have this last year, but we have plans to make up for that next year. We have big camping goals. I think the Cabbage qualifies for the Every Kid in a Park pass and we want to take advantage of it. It’s time for the Grand Canyon. I can’t believe I have never been to the Grand Canyon. I haven’t left Chris’s ashes anywhere since D.C. in 2019. I’m desperate to remedy that.

This is has been the strangest, hardest, and at times spectacular, kind of year.

THEY MAY HAVE BEEN POTATOES

Let the season begin!

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Last Friday, Michael drove the trailer over to Longview Lake campground which is about twenty minutes from our house. By the time I loaded up some dry goods and the dog and fought my way through traffic to meet him at the campground, he had already set everything up and was even lounging in his camp chair with a beer. All I had to do was hang up the camp lights. This is monumental because Michael and I have been discussing some things about traveling and the camper. We’ve been talking about Michael and the Cabbage driving out to where ever, California, the Grand Canyon, the East Coast, and then I would fly out to meet them. We spend a lot of time getting to the place where we really want to be. Then we don’t get to spend as much time as we would like in that place before we have to start back home. I have less vacation days. Michael and the Cabbage can take their time. Now we know that Michael can set the camper up all by himself. So…next year it looks like we’re headed to Washington!

We also discovered that potatoes do not last a year sealed up inside a plastic bin.

At least I think they were potatoes.

I got the utensil bin out so we could make ourselves some sandwiches that evening and everything inside that bin was covered in stinky mold. I threw the whole bin away. Do not worry. All of the titanium sporks are in the kitchen utensil drawer at home. Probably because I feared something like this would happen some day. No one knows how those potatoes got into that bin, especially since we don’t even store our food in that bin. But this is why we chose the closest campground to the house to set the camper up for the first time this season. This was the trip where we de-winterized the camper and took stock of the things we need and the things we need to replace and the things we’d like to have. Like a cooking prep table to set up next to the camp stove or some bus bins for washing dishes with the outside shower head. This was also our trip to discuss future trips.

We are not doing a big trip this year. Michael’s going to come with me when I go to a conference in Boston in July, but we do not have an epic camping family vacation planned for this summer. Instead, the plan is to take the camper to nearby state parks and have travel distances of no more than four hours. We had talked about taking the Cabbage to Omaha for a weekend, but the roads between here and there are under water. We are trading the Omaha Zoo for Silver Dollar City. Apparently teachers get in free and can purchase half-price tickets through the month of June. I have not been to that place since maybe 1998 and the more I think about it, the more excited I get about revisiting this particular childhood haunt. We were there so often that I had all the lines from the Saloon show memorized. I could play any part. I also knew the exact spot on the train ride when we’d get ‘robbed’ by the Bolins and where to stand or not stand during the Rainmaker show. If you were peckish, you could always grab a hot cracklin’ from the sample bowl at the craklin’ booth and giving Mom dipped candles that you made all by yourself was just like handing her a bouquet of wildflowers. We dipped so many candles.

Sure, the place is hokey. But it’s good ole family fun hokey. Maybe I can talk Michael and the Cabbage into getting an old timey family portrait made. Maybe that can be our Christmas card for this year!

Last summer we took the Cabbage on a tour of my childhood stomping grounds. She got to do all of the things that I got to do at her age. Except catch a fish. She did not catch a fish. She did get to run around various campgrounds with other kids in wild packs.. She did get to play in the dirt and climb up (and fall off) giant rocks. She got to see the stars and go for days without taking a bath. It seems almost fitting that we should be taking her to Silver Dollar City this year. I wonder if she’ll let me tie her hair up in pigtails like Mom used to do to me.

And then I can buy her bonnet to wear.

And dress her up like Laura Ingalls.

I’m probably going to have more fun than she will.

WHAT DAY IS IT?

Long shadows

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We're back and I have vacation hangover in that confusing discombobulated (spelled that right on the first try) way where you don't know where you are or what day it is or what the hell am I supposed to be doing right now. We traveled in total, somewhere around 1,743 miles over 10 days. Is that right? Yeah...I think that's right. During most of that time, we had very sketchy cell service. While we were in the mountains, we had zero cell service. I spent part of this morning skimming through emails because I had just as many unread emails in my inbox as miles we travelled. That did not include my inbox for work emails. 

Sorry...I just fell asleep for about ten minutes.

Any way. I have thoughts and stories to tell from our trip. I just need some time to organize it all. I can tell you that being without electricity and cell service for three days was the best part of our trip. I actually spent time journalling and drawing pictures to illustrate our daily activities. I did a lot of practicing the art of being still. There was a nice family from Edmond, OK in our campground with kids near the Cabbage's age. We handed her a walkie-talkie and set her free. At one point, she was actually playing in the dirt, scooping it up into a mound and decorating it with sticks and stones. We sat around the only campfire we were allowed to have during the whole trip because of fire bans. We gazed at stars. And the whole time, I had no idea what was happening in the world outside of our campground. Sometimes, a little oblivion is blissful.

The world came back to us when we came down the mountain and into Pueblo, CO. Anthony Bourdain was found dead in his hotel room. Harvey Weinstein pleaded 'not guilty' to sexual assault charges. Becky DeVos said that the Federal Commission on School Safety would not focus on the role guns play in school violence. A dead whale was found to be full of 18 pounds of plastic. Donald Trump continued to use Twitter to show how gross and ignorant he really is. Same old, same old. Of all the news, it is the death of Anthony Bourdain that hit us the hardest. He made me want to visit and explore places that I would have never even thought to visit and explore. His show educated us about our connections to cultures and each other through food. His voice and his way of telling stories will be missed. 

I have stories to write down. Some are tinted with sadness. Some are laced with joy. But they need some time to brew before they make it here. 

AMELIA

We stumbled across Amelia's birth place by accident

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When Michael booked us into the Lewis and Clarke State Park, I never really looked at a map. He said "It's about fifteen minutes north of Weston." and I just shrugged and said okay. Weston Missouri is this little town north of Kansas City where everyone goes on weekends for wine and distillery tours and antiquing. Fall is crazy pants there. One year we took the Cabbage to a pumpkin patch and orchard near Weston. We thought we'd have lunch in town, but when we drove into the town, Michael just continued on driving through because there was no place to park. Anywhere. Weston Bend State Park was number two on the list of best state parks in Missouri last year. It is nearly impossible to book a campsite in this park. So, Lewis and Clarke seemed like our best option. 

We arrived Friday afternoon and set up the camper and Michael ran water through the lines to clear out the antifreeze. Things went surprisingly well with our first setup of the year. I noticed that we were missing some food items, so Michael suggested we find a nearby grocery store. He looked up grocery stores and found that we were ten minutes from a Walmart. He entered everything into his navigation system, who we call Hazel and then proceeded to follow Hazel's instructions. Along the way, we passed a billboard for Atchison Kansas and the birthplace of Amelia Earhart. I said to something to Michael about it and he said "That's weird because, we are no where close to Kansas." Which I should have known better, because Michael is the type of person who, when facing north, will say he's facing any other direction than north. So, yeah, that Walmart we were headed to was the Atchison Kansas Walmart. What this really meant was that we were ten minutes from the birthplace of Amelia Earhart. 

This completely changed our itinerary for Saturday. 

Saturday morning, we found ourselves back in Atchison and wandering around Amelia Earhart's old stomping ground. We did not go inside her house. It is now a museum and was not open at the time of our visit, but we peeked in the windows and walked all around the outside. The brick path around the house is dotted with memorial bricks where loved ones and friends have donated money to the museum to get a brick in memory of someone. So many of the bricks are memorials for women pilots and members of The 99s and so many of those bricks shared words of gratitude for Amelia Earhart. My eyesight blurred as I became overwhelmed with tears. Amelia Earhart broke the rules that conventional society had established for women during a time in history when it was so much more difficult to break those rules. She did not just inspire women to be pilots. She inspired us to defy convention, to be true to ourselves no matter what, to take risks and seek out adventures. When I wasn't playing Little House on the Prairie, I was sitting in my tree flying an airplane and being stranded on a deserted island. I was Amelia Earhart. She was one of the first to teach me that women can do anything, be anything. We make our own rules. 

Michael and I eventually made it to Weston and out to a creamery where we ate so much cheese, but Amelia Earhart took over this trip. Later on, when we were reminiscing about our day as we sat around our campfire, Michael said "My partner is basically Amelia Earhart reincarnate. How could we not visit Atchison." Atchison had not been part of our plans, but it turned out to be the best part of the adventure.

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Michael and I are planning a big camping trip to Colorado with the Cabbage this summer. I have told him stories of the family campground resorts that we would sometimes stay in when I was a kid. I talked about kids running around in packs and the movie nights and the potlucks with Bingo. All of those places seemed to be stuck in the 50s and had this nostalgic Amercana feel. Dad and I would joke about how cheesy some of it all seemed at times, but we all enjoyed ourselves. I want that for the Cabbage. I want her to be able to just run off with another pack of kids and hang out around the big bonfire making s'mores. I would also like to leave some of Dad's ashes in Colorado since it was his most favorite place to visit. 

Earlier this week I had a dream that Michael and I were setting up our camper in this tiny camp spot that we were sharing with Mom and Dad. They're camper was already set up and Dad was puttering around the campsite, asking us questions about our setup process. I remember that everything was wet, like it had just rained. Dad asked me if everything was okay. I nodded. Then he said "let's get the campfire going" and we all sat around the campfire. The sun had just dropped down. Yet when I looked up at the sky, it had already filled up with stars. I stared up in amazement and I urgently tugged at Michael's sleeve. "Do you see this?!?! Do you see this sky?!" I said to him while sweeping my arms wide. It was so beautiful it brought tears to my eyes and I woke up with my pillow and cheeks damp from the tears. 

I remember on that very last trip, waking up around two in the morning and stumbling to the bathroom. When I came out of the bathroom, I glanced up at the sky and what I saw in that first brief glance nearly knocked me flat to the ground. It was as if the sky was only inches from my face. I could feel the weight of space pressing down on me and I felt dizzy as I looked up at the wonder of all of it. In all of our many many trips to Colorado, I don't remember ever seeing the sky look so breathtaking as I did on that last trip. I imagine that it is always just as remarkable but that this time was the first time I was actually paying attention. I want Michael to see this sky. The truth, though, is that my memories might just be all memories. We might end up at Fun Valley Campground to discover that they've traded in Bingo night for how to pin stuff to Pinterest. Those packs of roving children will no longer be roving, but sitting around the Wifi router. The Cabbage is already disappointed that our pop-up does not have a TV.

The one thing I can be sure about is that dang sky. 

I am thankful for all of those memories. I am thankful for those times that Dad visits me in my dreams. I am thankful that there is a sleeve of someone that I urgently want to tug so that I can show them something amazing. 

I am thankful for you.

CAMPING

Leaf portrait of Dad

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Michael and I hosted a camping get-away this weekend at Watkins Mill State park. It's a nice state park, tucked just far enough off into the country and woods to make you think you've gone off the grid, but it's really only an hour's drive from our house. You're like twenty minutes from the encroaching sprawl of Kansas City. We invited a couple (the Willards) that Michael has known forever who have two girls around the same age as the Cabbage. So the weekend was full of little girls running off to play, learning to ride bikes, glow sticks and hide and go seek. There was lots of Play-Doh and slime. Many many s'mores were consumed. 

This was a first time camping trip for the Willards. They had borrowed an eight man tent from another friend. Michael and I took turns with helping them figure out how to set the tent up while simultaneously trying to set our camper up. Michael would work on leveling and stabilizing while I showed them how to thread the poles in the tent. I pushed the beds out and popped them up on the camper while Michael helped assemble tent poles. Finally the tent was up and the camper was popped out and we were only left with the task of installing the door on our camper. The door on our camper is a two man job that usually takes us about twenty minutes of sweaty cursing to get in place, but this time we popped it into place right on the first try. No sweaty cursing required. 

It seems to me that there needs to be a proper initiation process for first time tent campers. It sort of makes or breaks you as a camper. It is the defining moment that determines whether or not camping is going to be something you do more than this one time. Mine involved a rabid raccoon attack. It was a terrifying experience that ruined our tent and almost a relationship, but we survived. A new tent was purchased and the relationship prevailed. We learned that we were made of strong camping stock. The Willards' initiation came in the form of a storm that included lightening and high winds and a torrential downpour. One corner of the tent collapsed but was easily set right. The rain fly, the whole tent really, flapped so hard in the wind that it seemed that the only thing keeping the tent on the ground was the weight of their bodies. Yet, they emerged the next morning with minimal damages and they were mostly dry. 

Despite the storm and being plagued by yellow jackets (I looked them up, they're Western Yellow Jackets, mostly harmless unless provoked; three out of seven of us managed to not provoke), the Willards declared this trip to be a success, so much so that they said things like "the next time we do this we'll...."

I'm glad that they enjoyed the experience.

LABORING

Halloween decorations. I've named the doll Suzanne

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It has started to become a Labor Day Weekend tradition to meet my brother (Randy) and sister-in-law (Katrina) at their place near Rockaway Beach. They have some land there that holds a small cabin and a storage shed, with room to park their camper. There's electricity and water hookups. All the things you need to camp comfortably. Before we got our camper, we'd go and stay in the cabin. The Cabbage would end up sleeping in the camper with Randy and Katrina. Part of this tradition also included the Cabbage. We always had her for Labor Day Weekend, which is also the weekend before her birthday. So Katrina would have a cake and a birthday present. We would have a moment in the afternoon where the Cabbage would blow out some candles and we'd eat cake. Then she'd take her new Barbie or whatever into Randy and Katrina's camper to play and watch TV. 

The Cabbage is slightly disappointed in our choice of campers. We do not have a TV.

Any way, the calendar worked out weird so that this year we did not have the Cabbage for Labor Day. This was the first time we've made the trip without her. It was also the first time we made the trip with our own camper. There were a few days of planning before we got there and Katrina and I were kind of at a loss for things to do. We were so used to planning our weekend around kid friendly things that now we were all "what do adults do?" Turns out that adults do a lot of things. We went to a distillery. We went to a few thrifty antique shops. I found a sack of Howdy Doody heads of various sizes. I also found Suzanne. I decided that she could take the place of all the baby doll heads I had planned to fill the lantern with. She is spectacularly creepy and Michael can't even stand for me to mention her name. He's already that disturbed by her presence. I can't wait to set her up that lantern with a butcher knife. I'm so in love with her creepiness that I am even considering using her in this year's Christmas card. 

On Sunday, we made a last minute decision to drive over to Eureka Springs. It was only an hour away and Micheal had never been there. I hadn't been there in years. There was a time when Eureka Springs was the weekend getaway place. We camped there regularly when I was kid. I remember one trip where J and I rode the trolley car all day long while our parents roamed the shops. Later on, Chris and I would make trips there together. The Mud Street Cafe was our favorite place to eat and when Katrina suggested we go to Eureka Springs, I declared that this is where we'd eat lunch. Some things have changed in the little town since the last time I visited. There are new shops and some even empty shop spaces. My favorite jewelry store where Chris bought my pearl earrings so long ago is still there but the jewelry has changed styles. Mud Street Cafe has not changed a bit. It is still one of the busiest places. They still have the coffee mug of Trivia cards on the table. The food is still delicious and, dear Lord, the desserts are still the best, most decadently wonderful desserts. I ate cheesy grits with vegetables and slice of coconut cream pie. I left with a goal to learn how to make that pie and go on a coconut cream pie diet. 

The best part was that Michael also loved Mud Street. He usually is disappointed in most places. There's always something that he complains about. It could be the service or it could be some aspect of the food he ordered. But everything at Mud Street made him happy. In fact, he even told our waitress that he had never worked or been in a restaurant where everything was done so well. He also really enjoyed the town of Eureka Springs and we talked about visiting again some day soon. It was a good trip. It was a good weekend, so good that I have struggled to get back into my normal routine this morning. 

I'm still dreaming of coconut cream pie. 

TWEEDLE DEE AND TWEEDLE DUMB GO CAMPING

Camping

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We took the Cabbage to Hannibal MO over the weekend and the first thing she said as we pulled into the campground was "Do we get a house like all those other people?" She was referring to the giant travel trailers that surrounded us in the campground. I think she still harbors some disappointment that we didn't swing for the four bedroom camper with a fireplace and wifi, the kind of camper that costs more than my house. We set up camp reasonably well considering we had arrived after dark and opted to only hook up the electricity for the night. We'd hook up the rest of the things in the morning when we could see what we were doing. 

The next morning started out with pee all over the camper floor because the waste container had shifted during the drive. Then Josephine got in trouble for barking. One of the neighbors complained to the camp host. These were the same neighbors who's dog barked constantly inside their camper all day. Next, we drove out to the Mark Twain birthplace, which is on Mark Twain Lake. We realized very quickly that we should have stayed at this state park instead of the over priced tourist trap campground we were staying in. After learning all about Mark Twain, we loaded up to head back to Hannibal for lunch, but Michael wanted to take a different way back so we could see the lake dam. We did not find the dam and ended up lost on gravel roads and dead ends. Finally we made it back to Hannibal, found a dog friendly place for lunch, and waited for over an hour for a grilled cheese sandwich. 

Michael and I just watched the slow meltdown of the Cabbage. At one point, she got so fed up and said "I'm going to go see what's taking so long." She got up and marched herself inside, but came out soon enough because she lost her nerve. It was now almost 4 o'clock. The kid was starving. After telling the Cabbage all day long that we would not go to McDonald's, we walked out of the restaurant and went to McDonald's. Everything was great after that. We had campfires and smores. Josephine learned to curb her barking. The Cabbage made some camping friends to play with. I ate the biggest ball of cotton candy I have ever seen in my whole life. The Cabbage ordered a grilled cheese sandwich with baked beans, the same thing she ordered the day before, at a new place and she got it within ten minutes. She told our waitress "This is the same thing I ordered yesterday at the other place and I NEVER GOT IT!" We climbed two hundred and forty something steps to see a fake lighthouse that had been built as a Mark Twain memorial. I conned the Cabbage into "whitewashing" a fence and Michael and I were momentarily mesmerized by what turned out to be a christmas light. 

We are getting the hang of setting up and breaking down the camper. We have learned something new on both camping experiences. I suspect that by the end of the summer, we'll be old hats at all of it and may even find that missing set of camper keys in the process. Oh yeah...we've misplaced some keys, but at least we remembered to actually latch the trailer to the hitch this time!

JAYCO-PEECOTRAIN

First trip came with many unknowns and mishaps. No heat on the first night. No sleep on the first night. But tonight we have heat and full bellies and full hearts. Tonight we sleep.

15 Likes, 4 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "First trip came with many unknowns and mishaps. No heat on the first night. No sleep on the first..."

We've been trying to come up with a name for our popup. The day we drove it home, Michael asked me what we should name it. I couldn't come up with anything off the top of my head. As I looked at the side mirror of the truck, watching the reflection of the trailer bouncing along behind us, I said "Jayco Peecotrain." Micheal said "What?" and I replied "Jayco Peecotrain." We both found this funny, but did not agree that this would be the permanent name for the trailer. Except we haven't come up with anything else, so I'm calling it Jayco Peecotrain for now and here is an account of it's maiden voyage to exotic Joplin MO.

Most state campgrounds are still closed to full hook-up campers, which is why we ended up at the Joplin KOA. It was a fine campground for what it was. It sits right off the interstate and is more of a stop for the night kind of place than it is a hang out for a few days and enjoy nature kind of place. Our camper ended up parked right next to a privacy fence for a big-rig truck repair place and on the other side of that was the interstate. There was an area of woods with a walking trail that Josephine and I would walk in the mornings that was nice, but we did not have a campfire ring. The Cabbage made herself a cold smore on the first night, which would not be the only cold thing about that night because Michael could not get our furnace to kick on. Sometime around three o'clock in the morning, I piled all of the blankets onto one bed and convinced Michael to crawl in. The Cabbage was fine as long she remained wrapped in her blankets like a burrito, but Michael and I did not get very much sleep. 

He spent the the next morning on the phone with technical support, troubleshooting the furnace. We had almost reached the decision that we would have to pack everything up and go home when I pressed a small piece of metal inside the thermostat and the blower for the furnace kicked on. The on/off switch was faulty, but we were able to repair it on our own. This was great because my Mom had driven in to spend time with us and I would have hated for her to come all that way for nothing. We all went had a nice lunch before visiting the George Washington Carver National Monument (which I have so much more to say about later). We had a nice day and then everyone slept (mostly everyone) warm and snug. I say everyone mostly slept because the wind kept blowing stuff outside our camper like the door and the awning, making a banging sound. I would wake up thinking that either someone was trying to come into the camper or the camper was collapsing. Neither of those things were true. 

Despite the freezing time and the lack of sleep, I think we all had a nice time. It was the Cabbage's first camping trip and she said that her favorite thing about the trip was eating a cold smore. So there ya go. Michael and I learned a whole lot of things about the camper. We determined that cooking outside is the way to go because of counter space and how there isn't any inside. Once the camper is closed up, there is no way to get inside to the tiny fridge. We will always need to carry a small ice chest. Our setup time was pretty good. Michael ran into a snag with turning on the gas, but that was easily figured out. I learned the sweaty hard way that installing the door is a two person job. It took us a lot longer to break camp then we thought it should. The new rule is that breakfast on the last day should be something cold that doesn't require dishes. This way we can pack up kitchen stuff the night before and water and gas can be disconnected first thing in the morning. We are also amazed that we didn't lose the camper on the way home seeing how neither one of us actually latched the trailer hitch down onto the ball on the truck hitch. One good bump and it would have been bye bye trailer. 

On the second day, after getting the heat to work and eating dinner, Michael asked "So, are we keeping it?" I looked at our little camper with the sky turning purple and pink behind it and said "I think so. I think so." We've already booked a campground for Memorial Day weekend in Hannibal MO. It will be the kickoff for our summer of camping. 

THANKFUL FRIDAY

Sunshiny day

3 Likes, 1 Comments - Cindy Maddera (@elephant_soap) on Instagram: "Sunshiny day"

I wrote this whole entry about how we set the camper up on Sunday to get it ready for the camper's first adventure this weekend. Then I had to delete it because we canceled the trip due to freezing temperatures and snow that is supposed to hit here on Saturday. I tried really hard to be stubborn about it and say that I could totally camp in the snow, but we all know that I can only grumble when it snows. I'm not good at being cold. I thought it was something I could get used to, but I notice that the older I get, the more intolerable the cold becomes. So, after checking the weather twenty times last night, I looked at Michael and held up a white flag. The good news is that the camper is ready to go for next weekend when we plan to take the Cabbage out for her first KOA experience. 

We have the wanderlust real bad right now and the camper exasperates it. On the weekends that the weather has been perfect for camping, we've had other obligations. The month of April has something on the calendar every Saturday except Easter. Which is great because that means we can be part of the big gay Easter egg hunt at Terry's. I was looking forward to a weekend away with just the two of us, one that wasn't centered around errands and chores. So you know what? I'm still going to treat this weekend like we are out of town. I'll go to yoga in the morning and then come home and drag Michael out of bed. We'll go the Nelson and maybe find an arcade. I'll dig out the Uno cards and make some queso dip or guacamole and challenge Michael to a game of strip Uno. We'll drink hot spiced cider while watching the snow fall. I am thankful for a weekend that has left us with no plans. I am thankful for giving myself permission to say no to camping this weekend in the snow. 

I am thankful for all the wonderful donations that have been made to my AIDS Walk Fundraising page. You guys are awesome! I am thankful for the random email from someone I don't know all that well asking me how I was doing because they know the winter is hard for me. I am thankful for free donuts. I feel like I've done some good work this week and I'm thankful for this. I am thankful for Buddha bowls with BBQ roasted tempeh. I am always thankful for you.

Here's to a weekend without chores and a truly Thankful Friday.

PRONOUNS

Camper

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Michael and I spent pretty much the whole day on Saturday at the RV dealership in camp trailer boot camp. We learned all the things about our camper. We helped winterize it and fold it up. They gave us a $50 gift card and shopping cart with our names on it so we could buy camper things like those wedges you put behind the tires to keep your trailer from rolling away and decorative camper lights. Then we signed a bunch of papers, hooked the truck to the trailer and ever so slowely creeped our way out onto the open road. We headed straight over to the closest Thai restaurant because we had skipped lunch. I ordered shrimp Pad Thai and Michael ordered a mushroom stir-fry. While we waited, he leaned across the table with a wide grin and stage whispered "We got a camper! Somebody up there must like us." 

I grinned back, but the somebody up there part of his words kind of punched me in the chest. We talked more about the camper and I said "we need to name it!" Michael said we should name it something Chris related. Our waitress set our steaming plates of Thai food down in front us and I shoveled in a fork full of noodles. Michael asked if he could steal a bite while I slowely chewed and I nodded my head as the lump of noodles in my mouth seemed to grow. I put my head in my hands as I concentrated on swallowing the lump of growing noodles and then I started crying. Of course this left Michael stammering and asking what was going on. "Can you talk to me?" He asked and I just shook my head 'no' while my throat closed up around Pad Thai noodles and tears streamed down my face. I finally had to excuse myself to the restroom and clean myself up. When I came back to the table, I said "It was something about the somebody up there statement and the fact that this Pad Thai tastes just like Chris's Mom's that set me off." Which is all true.

The idea of naming the camp trailer something Chris related makes me want to stomp my foot and yell "NO!" In fact, right now I can imagine the satisfaction of throwing something in a rage at a wall and watching it shatter, something heavy and made of glass. I can see myself shoving all of the things off a counter top or tossing a table, Hulk style. The whole thing makes me mad and want to wail. I miss him without wanting to miss him. I am frustrated that my identity was so much Chris and Cindy and so very little just Cindy and that more than half the stories I tell Micheal start with "One time, Chris and I..." I've finally gotten a grasp on my own identity and I've maintained that individuality even in my relationship with Michael. We have our own separate things, though we've been moving closer to a merging. There is Cindy. There is Michael and there is Cindy and Michael. I don't want to name the camper after Chris. The camper is our thing, Michael's and mine. Chris and I never talked about getting a camper. I talked about it. Chris was all high tech tent gadget camping. This camper is OURS! Fuck Chris. Fuck all of this. I can hear the words in the back of my brain, but I will never say them out loud. "It's not fair." It isn't, you know, not to any of us, but I don't say it out loud because the response to every child's whine of 'it's not fair' is always 'life isn't fair.' Buck up, Buttercup. 

I haven't figured out yet if Michael thinks that buying this camper is part of making me happy sort of like when he built the chicken coop. As if building a chicken coop and buying a camper will exorcise the ghost. I feel guilty about it, the way he goes above and beyond to take out that sadness that has settled in. I'm not sure I am entirely worthy of all of that effort. Michael just wants to make me happy, which at times I really don't understand. I admit to being emotionally numb for the last few weeks. Things that I should be happy about just make me shrug my shoulders with meh. I've plastered a smile on in hopes that no one really notices, but I'm no actress. When we left the dealership with our camper on Saturday, I felt a flutter of joy that I haven't felt in a bit. It had nothing and everything to do with buying the camper. I could imagine the future of riding along back roads with the dog in my lap and Michael singing along to some country song on the radio as we headed off to sights unseen. 

I could imagine a future.

THE CICADAS ARE SO LOUD

Our hotel on Lake Superior

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We're back! I thought by adding an exclamation mark on the end of that sentence that it would give me some enthusiasm for getting back to the regular routine. I've spent my morning sorting emails and gathering protocols for clearing tissue samples for imaging and listlessly staring out the window. I'm not really ready to be back. I'm not ready for the things that are coming up on the calendar like a wedding and an unexpected trip to Boston for work and packing up my desk to move into the new space. I'm not ready to be up-to-date on current events. We came home to a police barricade because the man suspected of killing three police officers in Baton Rouge lives or lived in a house one street over. They arrested the man's brother who is now out on bail. Our neighborhood is a crime scene. I haven't had time to get facts or to form coherent thoughts on any of this. All I can say is that the deaths that have occurred in the last few days are horrible and that sounds trite. 

Can I have just three more days of vacation, please? 

Michael and I learned a whole lot of stuff in the last five days. Lake Superior is called Lake Superior for a reason and that reason is because that lake is HUGE. I mean, I knew it was big because in geography, our teacher told us it is the largest lake (by surface area) in the world, but being told this does not prepare you for actually seeing it. We were thinking that we were going to see a bunch of little islands but what we actually saw was maybe four of the islands from way off in the distance surrounded by an ocean. For about fifty bucks a person, you can do a boat ride that takes you around five of the twenty one islands without stops. A hundred dollars will get you to two of the islands with stops and tours. Getting to the islands is not easy. We watched a tour guide pack up a tandem kayak for a couple he was taking out to an island for camping. He told them it would take about three hours to get to their campsite. So, yeah, we didn't make it to any of the islands on this trip but we did kayak around the sea caves and from our kayak, we could see Eagle Island and Sand Island. We also spotted a bald eagle. 

We learned that summer temperatures in Northern Wisconsin are somewhere in the mid to low seventies and that the biggest threat while kayaking is if you fall out of your boat. It takes about ten minutes of being in the water for hypothermia to set in even on a nice warm, sunny day. I wore wool socks while kayaking and should have packed at least one more heavy blanket. We learned that our air mattress leaks air and I'd wake up in the middle of the night with a rock jabbing into my hip. We learned under these circumstances that I didn't mind Michael's snoring or how he took up most of the mattress because I was only warm when he was present in the bed. We learned that we could joke and laugh about all of these things. We learned that even though we could handle a tandem kayak without too much arguing, we both want our own kayak. We learned that we'd rather spend the four thousand dollars we were going to spend on purchasing central air on things like kayaks and trailers. 

The biggest lesson we learned was that it doesn't take a whole lot of effort to get away. Our camp gear was already well packed and organized with only a few minor things that needed replacing. Of course, we have to replace the air mattress now since we left the old leaky one in a bear proof dumpster in our campsite. But for the most part we're good. We did discover that we over pack on food. The amount of food we packed would have worked if we had been completely isolated, but we were not. We ended up in a camp ground just outside of Bayfield WI and had access to local foods like trout and white fish, pulled from Lake Superior the very day we bought them. We decided that we should take advantage of local foods and produce. We learned that this trip was like adding kerosene to a camp fire. We've done nothing but discuss how we are going to cart scooters and kayaks and camp gear. When we're not trying to figure out how transport these things, we're looking at maps, trying to figure out our next destination.  

I think we should put a map on the wall and just throw a dart at it and wherever it hits, that's where we'll go. 

RACCOONS ARE ASSHOLES

The first time I ever went tent camping, Chris and I were attacked by an unidentified animal. It rushed the tent in the middle of the night and managed to tear a sizable hole in the fabric before Chris could grab his boot to use as a boxing glove to beat at the snarling bulge coming at us. We decided that it had to have been a rabid raccoon even though we never actually saw what it was. A few years later, we'd be camping in Osage Hills State park and have our second raccoon encounter. This time the raccoon was small and cute and just kept sneaking into our campsite to scrounge food. The moment we'd turn our flashlight on him, he'd run off. 

The raccoons at Watkins Mill are neither rabid or cute. They are thugs. Bold, run in packs, thugs. They have taken lessons from the Honey Badger. They. Do. Not. Give. A. Shit. At one point we looked over and a large raccoon was sitting in the middle of the picnic table and when Michael yelled at him "Dude! We're right here!", the raccoon growled at him. After the first raccoon sighting, we put all of the food including the ice chest into the truck cab. We put the lid on the camp box (pots and pans, utensils, cups, aluminum foil, stuff like that) and shoved the box under the table bench. The camp box is old and has seen better days. It's got a large crack in the side where I bumped into with the scooter, but it still holds stuff. Or it used to. 

That night, as we laid in the tent trying to sleep, we listened to the raccoon pack picking through our campsite. We could hear them chattering and knocking over a few empty beer cans. Then we heard the sounds of them trying to break into the camp box. Michael and I just laughed. Boy where those raccoons going to be disappointed once they realized the most edible thing in that box was Ziplock baggy of caffeine free green tea bags. Finally we heard one of the raccoons emit a loud shriek and they all scampered off, moving off to the next campsite. The next morning showed signs of a broken camp box and muddy prints all over a roll of toilet paper. We spent the day joking about how the loud shriek was probably a shriek of frustration after working to get a box open that contained only pots and pans. 

That evening the campground played a movie for the kids and had free popcorn. We sat around the campfire, eating our popcorn, not a raccoon in site. We'd put all of our stuff away earlier in the evening any way. I decided that I wanted one last s'more, thinking that this time I'd make it with Thinmints. Michael got up to get all the things out to make these and ended up tearing the truck apart looking for the bag of marshmallows. A clear image of that bag of marshmallows resting in the camp box entered my brain and I said "I think they may have been in the camp box". The one food item that just on accident got tossed into that box. The marshmallows had vanished without a trace. We were not the only victims. Determined that I would make a Thinmint s'more, Michael went off into the campground to bum one marshmallow from someone. He went to three campsites before winning a giant marshmallow. The first two campsites had also been robbed of their marshmallows. That shriek we'd heard the night before was not a shriek of frustration. Oh no. It was a shriek of victory. 

We didn't hear or see the raccoons that last night. They either knew that they'd gleaned all the food from our area they would get their hands on or they were passed out in sugar induced comas somewhere in the woods. My bet is on the later.