The Dark Side of Camping
I woke up in a daze in my cavern-like room, feeling the Sandman’s crust coating my eyelashes on this perfect Saturday morning. I usually hate the dark and its cold, life-sucking feeling; I love the comfort of my invitingly warm bed more than anything. How could someone love and hate waking up in the morning so much? My inner consciousness battled with me and won, making me decide, with a sigh, that I should just get it over with. As I began to rise from my bed, my little sister ran into my room, frantically tugged my blinds open, and ran out at mach speed. “MY EYES,” I yelled in my mind, as I squinted and covered my burning face with my hands. Stunned, I turned away from my window and the attacking sunlight, and was relieved I did not actually yell these words, for I was afraid of my mother’s wrath. She grumbles about how little she can stand being awakened at such an “early hour.” Of course, early for her is ten o'clock, and the clock in my room read eight.
I hurriedly dressed and raced towards the kitchen, in hopes that I could enjoy a calm meal before I spent a majority of my day in my little cave, acting like the heat and sun-fearing gremlin my family knew and loved. Of course, as my luck would have it, my plans were foiled; my mom appeared at her computer in the kitchen, clutching a cup of coffee. “Thank God,” I thought, “At least she has her coffee.”
The sun bled through the windows of our house and shadows coated the walls. After pouring myself a bowl of Captain Crunch, to my sister’s obvious dismay, I grabbed the last chocolate muffin and plopped into my seat to begin eating. After finishing my meal, I flicked my sister's arm, and narrowly escaped her vicious slap. I exited the kitchen and walked by my parent’s bedroom, giving my dad a wave, before entering my room and shutting the door. Before I got the chance to power up my laptop, I heard a buzz emit from my phone; I had gotten a text from my friend. He asked, “Are you free to go camping with Alex and me this weekend?” I responded with, “Let me check,” and left my room to ask my mom. I “hate” the sun, but this sounded like fun. I slid down the hallway in my socks and waltzed back into the kitchen. I playfully grabbed my mother by her shoulders and asked her if I could go camping. I was positive she was going to decline my request, but crossed my fingers with hope. “Sure,” she responded. “Really . . . that’s it” I thought. That went better than expected. I thanked her with a wide grin and turned, running once again down the hallway to my dimly lit room. I replied to my friends text with an “I can go. What time are we leaving?” He answered a few minutes later with, “We are heading out at 5:00.”
“What am I supposed to do until then” I muttered to myself? I decided that my best option was to continue with my earlier plans and resume my role as the gremlin. I powered up my game and stared at the screen, which gently illuminated my room, before looking at my clock which read 12:00. I decided to do something more productive with my time. I picked up Harry Potter from my nightstand and began reading. After an hour of reading, I aimlessly walked around the house, thinking about the long walk that awaited me. Instead of driving to the site, which would take twenty to thirty minutes, my friends wanted our walk to be an authentic hike. This was not my favorite thing to hear. I did not know if I would be able to survive the long journey, accompanied by the shining and dangerously bright sunlight.
Finally, after a few hours of mixed emotions, I headed over to my friend’s house with my duffle bag, which was filled with: a t-shirt, shorts, a baseball, a flashlight, some water, and granola bars. When I had reached his house, we awaited my other friend’s arrival. We talked for a little while before he came, and said goodbye to my friend’s parents as we departed. The trail my friend wanted to follow began near his house, and in five minutes, we proceeded into the darkening woods.
We spent an hour and a half trekking through the dirt, the heat of the sun making me sweat bullets. I opened my bag for some water and took a long, refreshing gulp. Thankfully, the blazing heat soon began to recede, and it even began to feel slightly cool. Fifteen minutes later, we had arrived at the camp site. It was completely empty, except for a few lively chipmunks and squirrels scurrying around. My friend had brought a large tent, which could easily fit five people. We began to set it up, giving us one less thing to cope with when the sun was completely down. I retrieved my baseball from my bag, and we tossed it around while we talked about school and video games. My friend had also brought a soccer ball, and we kicked it around for almost an hour. We got so caught up in our playing and conversation that we had barely noticed that the sun was setting. Alex had suggested that we make a fire, which was fairly easy to do since the rangers occasionally secured the fire pits. After gathering the supplies for the fire, the sun was completely down, and we were immersed in darkness, We began to eat the food we had brought, and continued talking about our summer plans. After another half hour, my friends had had enough, and entered the tent. I announced that I would join them later, and continued sitting by the radiating fire.
As I felt the chill of the night upon me, I began to get nervous about my surroundings. “How, if I knew I was safe, and knew that there was no terrible thing that could possibly happen, was I still afraid.” I could practically hear the squeaking bats above me, but all else was silent. I held my hand up to the dim fire in front of me, but it barely emitted any heat. “If I was in such a popular camping ground, why was my imagination of a bear attack so vivid?” At least the fire provided a bit of comfort, in all of its minimal warming and glowing glory. As long as I had it, I felt safe from the “impending” attacks. Of course, the almost nonexistent wind suddenly extinguished my almost nonexistent fire. Perfect . . . Just perfect. I decided that I had finally had enough; shivering, I crawled into the protective tent. Fortunately, I was embraced by the tent’s darkness, which felt like my dark room at home. I was comforted by this thought, wishing to sleep until morning when the bright sun would rise again.