beetiger | (no subject)

I’m not really the rugged wilderness type, overall. I can’t carry very much, and my fingers are clumsy, and my sense of direction leaves something to be desired. But I am notably heliotropic, and sleeping outside with trees and rocks and birds and natural light waking me up in the morning are some of the things that keep my soul going, now and again.

lediva is definitely an indoor cat, but is also notably flexible and brave, so she accompanied me to the wilds of an open field near a riverystream outside Northhampton for a few days of sleeping in a tent and hanging out with bisexual people. I’m not quite sure what bisexuality has to do with camping, but hey, it’s a theme.

Despite my arrangements to make things as cushy and cozy as possible, and despite the fact that this was the style of camping where you drive to a convenient place and then set up your tent next to it, fate was not kind to us. We somehow managed to snap one of the three elastic-loaded poles for the tent, and had to arrange the assistance of an EMT with duct tape and splints to salvage it for the weekend. The airbed, which I’d specifically tested earlier in the week to make sure it was functioning okay, had both some trouble with the initial inflate and some sort of looseness about the air valve that meant we needed to reinflate it every few hours. Our next-site-over neighbors somehow lost their cat on Friday night, and so my quiet evenings were somewhat spoiled by the sound of hours and hours of "here kitty kitty" alternating with sobbing. We set one of my campchairs on fire with the citronella candle, and I still have uncountably many bites.

The highlight of the weekend, for me, was getting to go nude swimming/sunbathing in a calm section of riverlet, across a stream and a short hike through woods and field. My Tevas served me pretty well in the water, and although I did flop on my butt once on the stream fording, right after claiming I was "just fine", the skills I learned in the Grand Canyon a few years ago seemed to do fairly well for me, despite the new center of balance. Poor

lediva also managed to fall, and in her only pair of jeans, too. I think maybe I didn’t convince her how great this whole outdoor thing was. At the swimming hole, soaking my ankles in cold cold water while sitting on a rock, mermaid-like, was a good thing. Hanging out with the sun on my skin with a few dozen other very average looking naked people felt great, and managed to kick the body image issue I was having right out on its ass, even if I was the only one with my abdomen looking like a small continent. A small Martian continent, now, as I got a bit too much sun and it’s very, very red.

We ate guacamole and poptarts and parmalat milk and hard-boiled eggs and hotdogs roasted on someone else’s fire. I got to hang out a bit with two old friends from college whom I haven’t seen in years, and they still seemed more or less like the people I remembered, which pleased me. I was somewhat disappointed by the lack of scheduled stuff to do; it made the whole scene feel a little more cliquish than it really had to be.

By Sunday morning, I’d decided that

lediva deserved a break, and I took her home to her warm bed in Arlington, the one you don’t need to blow up every three hours, with the bathroom which isn’t a wet cold walk across a field away. If I can’t have a lover who will take me out dancing waltzes and sleeping under the stars as if it were a natural thing to do, at least I’ve got one or two who are willing to indulge me now and again.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Eep! Sounds painful, especially the sunburned bellah!

*facepalms* What sort of people actually *take* their *cat* camping with them? I hope they found their cat, though.

It sounds... like camping (Yes, lediva, you and I are definitely indoor sorts). But it sounds like you had fun, which is the important part.

They hadn't found the cat by time we left on Sunday, alas. I feel bad for the cat, whom I suspect was either caught by a bear or owl (both of which are known to be around that area), or has made its way through the woods and is currently getting picked up as a dorm cat over in Northhampton or something.

But the people involved were stupid. Apparently, this cat escaped at last year's BiCamp as well, though that time she ws found quickly, and they brought her back for an encore.

She was found OK; her leash had gotten wrapped around a tree. (So she may have been without food and water for far too long, but I gather she didn't seem seriously injured.)

The cat was blessedly found alive Sunday afternoon, and cat-mama promises not to bring her next year. I can not say whether the services of a cat psychic which cat-mama procured were helpful in the rescue, but that circumstance might go a certain distance towards answering your question.

(This cat had escaped at a previous BiCamp, too.)

Oh, good! Glad to hear that had a happy ending.

oh good, happy ending.

Yea for the heliotropic!
Doncha love the flush of light that happens 15 minutes before dawn? I don't manage to wake up for that indoors but always catch it outside. Then I want to nap in a sun puddle about the same time everyone else gets moving (8-10 ish).

we'll do the chocolate another time :)

z=leigh-ann=me

~me

It was so fabulous to see you there! I'm really psyched you came.

I'm sorry I had to bail. Dratted work work work work...

We need to make some other arrangement to hang out sometime! I won't be at TBC this year, too close to baby ETA.

Let me see if I can line up a ride/driver to come south for one of my free weekends.

It would be great to see you before Mothra arrives to send you and Bard into sleep-deprived new-parent bliss.

Additionally, you're not too far from one small cluster of relatives whom I have not seen in a long time, and it would be good to see them. They moved to Eastchester a year after my folks moved us to Tuckahoe (but all of us kids went to Eastchester schools, ah, the joys of gerry-mandering). The two cousins whose time in Eastchester High School most overlapped my incarceration defended me from the vicious hordes, both verbally and physically. I'm not sure I would have gotten through high school without them.

A happy visit would spread all kinds of good karma points around. :)

Our next-site-over neighbors somehow lost their cat on Friday night, and so my quiet evenings were somewhat spoiled by the sound of hours and hours of "here kitty kitty" alternating with sobbing.

This is the saddest thing I've heard in a long time. A college friend of mine taught her cat to walk on a leash and took it everywhere with her, so I can see someone thinking that a camping trip would be a great thing for a cat--but cats aren't dogs, and it's still a stupid idea.

I'm glad to hear that the cat was found.