Back to Nature…Sorta

This weekend the Collins clan (Mr. C, Moi, Chatter Child and Dancing Daughter) went camping. Okay, it’s not really CAMPING per se. It is, in my book, but since there were people there in TENTS, I guess for some I don’t camp. I RECREATE.

I am one of the dreaded RV people.

Our trailer has a furnace, an air conditioner, a shower, a bathroom, and EVEN a MICROWAVE. Now, may I please just explain a few things. The microwave does not get used very much. Many of the places we go do not have hookups. And the generator will not run the microwave. So we don’t use it much. But it’s nice to know it’s there. It’s a great place to store bread products. Sort of like a super sealed bread box.

But the rest of the stuff? It gets used. I am waaaaaayyyy too old to be thinking that sleeping in a tent, in a sleeping bag, possibly on an air mattress, is fun. Air mattresses are notoriously unreliable. I know this to be fact. I have heard countless “air mattress poops out” stories. I have a few of my own. When the air deflates, you are inevitably left sleeping on six rocks. Very comfy. The next day, you find you have become Neanderthal Man. Walking like a Neanderthal is not cool. Walking that way because of an air mattress that malfunctioned is SOOO not cool. Thinking that something made up of plastic and AIR is going to support you–and paying for that something? REALLY not cool.

Speaking of not cool, tents are not cool. The person who came UP with the idea of tents should be… Oh. Er. Well, never mind. But my point is, I have a trailer, and I am sleeping in it. I love nature. I also love being sheltered from nature. Up close, but not quite so personal. I figure I’ve earned it. Four straight years of dirty diapers will do that to a girl.

We did the tent thing, with babies, oh so many years ago. Big mistake. Hate tents. Get hives just seeing one. Yes, yes, I know tents build moral fibre and create wonderful memories for children. We have one of those damned tents. We just don’t use it much.

So, we went to Flaming Gorge, and the weather was pretty good. In fact, for the first time in a long time, the regular afternoon thunderstorms did not roll in, any of the three days we were there.

In the site ACROSS from us, we had tenters. Directly east of them were more tenters. The rest of the campground was filled with RVers. I like to imagine Tenters coming in all arrogant and filled with a zest for nature and sleeping under the stars. Never mind they drove up in their pollution-spewing DODGE RAM with a HEMI, complete with DVD player. They were getting back to the basics.

In my mind, back to the basics means you are HIKING 400 miles and setting up your tent at the end of that long, eventful and tragic journey. It makes it easier to say, “HELL NO, I am NOT doing that. Are you smoking crack?” It does not involve driving up in the DODGE with the DVD PLAYER and the HEMI. You people are no better than me! Get over yourselves.

This weekend, as we discussed the tent people, Mr. C said that he missed sleeping in a tent. I told him to go for it. “More power to you. Next time bring the tent. I’ll be in the trailer, watching LEGALLY BLONDE.”

Tent people get up early. Mostly because they have LIVED THROUGH THE NIGHTMARE of the night in a tent, and they want to escape it and beat their chests and pretend they are BACK to nature. Of course, the truth is, THEY are BACK troubled, because they slept on an air mattress that deflated in the middle of the night. Or it rained, and everything they OWN is wet. No one slept. The kids are cranky. The dog is cranky. They are in a tent. The dog is looking around, thinking, “What is UP with you people? Where is the fucking hot tub?”

The last night we were there, around 4 a.m. (Mr. C says it was precisely 4:25 a.m., since he checked his watch) a lightning storm rolled through. We know this because, even in a trailer, there are still vulnerabilities. It woke us up. Can you imagine how the tent people felt? Not only that, but TWO of those tent people were “under the stars” people. No tent. Just a tarp. Two sleeping bags. What is UP with that? Do they think the pioneers had TARPS? Advance people! What is so cool about regression? Anyway, back to the story.

An awning out, during a rain and windstorm, is one of those vulnerabilities that trailers have.

I have been PHYSICALLY lifted, holding the awning, during one such storm at the Gorge. It was like flying. The children still tell stories about Mom being lifted by the awning. They also tell that horrible “rolling the four-wheeler” story, but we won’t go there today. Storms at the Gorge move in quick, and fast, and they can be rather wicked. So, when the wind whipped up, and the lightning started, Mr. C and I went out and pulled the awning up, then retired back into our trailer.

And then he started to chuckle. I said, “What?”

He said, “Those two guys out there, sleeping under the stars. Getting back to nature. Bet they are in their tents now.”

So here’s to the Granola people who chuckle at those of us in RVs. While YOU are sleeping in your tent, I am on a bed. I get up and walk to my BATHROOM and do not worry that a SNAKE is going to rear up (he he) and bite my ass as I pee in the woods. And if I got a hankering for microwave popcorn? I could HAVE IT. I could so have it…. If my generator was just a little bit bigger….