Morning all. This morning was a little less rough in the waking up department. That first day light savings workday always makes me a bit grouchy. It didn’t help that I spent much of the day yesterday in my car going through a drive through vaccination site. I received my first dose yesterday. While I had a small headache shortly after, it faded rather quickly and this morning thus far the only issue appears to be a sore muscle in my arm where I was injected. It actually took me a minute to figure out why my arm was sore. Then the coffee kicked in and memory caught up. But despite the sore arm, it is back to work. So everyone ready to kick off the day with a writing prompt? Excellent. let’s go.
I never actually got to the sight not soon forgotten but I was working my way too it.
Tuesday, March 16th: It was a sight I would not soon forget.
It was a sight I would not soon forget. There we were in the middle of nowhere. How I agreed to go on the camping trip I still can’t recall. It wasn’t a natural occurrence for me and despite my pretended enthusiasm; I was not having a good time.
I had a warm spot on my heel that I knew heralded the imminent arrival of a blister and while I could admit the trees were lovely, after a few hours, all of them more or less looked the same. I’m sure one pine tree was as individually unique as any other person but after a few hours of them their uniqueness was lost on me.
There was a path but it clearly had not been used in years. It was maintained so someone came through earlier in the spring and cut away anything growing too heavily over it, but by mid-summer much of the vegetation was creeping back.
Little plant tendrils grabbed at my feet and sweat rolled down my spine. I suspected it was heading straight to my rear end as gravity exerted it’s force and suspected when I sat down I would have a soggy bottom. I was used to associating that term with poorly baked pastry and did not appreciate applying it to myself.
It was made worse by the other seeming to have a good time. They were laughing and smiling. Occasionally someone would point into the woods and say something that sounded like Latin. I couldn’t tell if they were naming trees, plants or birds. If I looked there was the possibility that my attempts to follow their finger pointing would lead me to a tableau involving all three. As I knew nothing of Latin I could only nod and smile.
I kept my discomfort to myself as I didn’t want to dim the spirit, but I was very grateful when we stopped for the night and finally put up the tents. The lack of any actual amenities like bathrooms and showers was another item on my personal list of why I should make this camping trip my last. Once settled there was a brief respite from the overly joyful experience and I was able to let my smile slip as I settled my sleeping bag and pack in my small one person tent. I relaxed my face and allowed my smile to slip for the day. ‘I just have to get through this,’ I told myself. ‘Then I never have to go camping, or really see any of these people again.’ That had already been decided. There was more than the worn spot on my foot that was sore, but at the moment it did no good to think of it. ‘when we get back,’ I promised myself.
I steeled myself for a good time and backed out of my tent, confident that everything was ready and waiting for when I decided to call it a night. I was sent with a few of the others to gather wood while someone else set up a fire. I did my part and once enough wood was gathered gratefully sank down into a sitting position. The fire was for warmth and companionship as well as boiled water as each of us bought boil in a bag meals for the trip.
Ten til Midnight 