And Then Camping Was Awesome Because of Course It Was

 Aside from missing Eve, this might have been the best camp near-week yet. Weather was really good, nobody got injured or sick, we only got one noise complaint warning (and the people in the next site were even louder, so we were okay). I actually slept the first night, which made it bearable when I couldn't sleep the second night. Angus's air mattress deflated the first night but we had a spare.

We were down three girls plus one girl's girlfriend, but we were up Meghan's boyfriend, who acquitted himself quite well considering he is very much not a camper (same bro, same). It was kind of funny to me realizing how well we all know each other, because in a group of twenty-two I would hear his voice now and then and immediately think "who is that? why don't I know that voice?"

It is fairly hilarious to me that at age thirty I was a confirmed non-camper who swore she would never sleep in a tent again, and at 54 I did five nights on an air mattress quite happily (not that I didn't embrace my bed and my clean toilet passionately when I got home. Metaphorically - I didn't actually physically hug my toilet. That you know of.)

Angus made me wear his bandanna to look more outdoorsy.

Oh, there was one hitch that was unexpected. There are two comfort stations in the campground we were all in. Each one has a men's and women's bathroom with three stalls each and three sinks. There are five showers in the middle. The showers at the comfort station farthest from us were closed until further noticed. Eeek. THEN, two of the showers in the one nearest to us stopped working. So we were down to three showers for an entire very large campground. It was kind of funny how this played out. Sometimes there were lineups at midnight and none at three o'clock because everyone assumed people would be going in the afternoon (Matt says there's a mathematical term for this, I can't find it). Once I showered at two a.m. because we went to the beach after the campfire and laid on our backs looking for shooting stars and my hair was full of sand. There was no lineup but the shower was so gross I almost took out my contacts and committed to walking back to my site blind just so I didn't have to look at the grossness.) I don't shower every day at camp anyway, so it wasn't a huge deal. Eve wouldn't have been thrilled.

As usual, I relished the beautiful simplicity of waking up, washing up, making sandwiches and packing the beach bag, spending the day reading and talking and swimming, going to dinner, sitting around the campfire talking and listening to music and laughing, washing up clumsily in the dark, and lying in the tent listening to the night. Last year was the first time we made it past four nights, and this time I felt like I could have done one or two more (I have the double-height air mattress now - total game-changer. I used to feel like getting off my air mattress and out of the tent cost me years' worth of dignity.)

I am generally considered the group photo journalist, which used to mean that some people would pretend to be annoyed at being photographed and then everyone would ask for the pictures. Now everyone just knows to either pose or go about their business fake candidly, and then everyone gets all the pictures. Last year I felt like I lagged in  my duties a bit, so this year I went hard. Once I tagged everyone in all the Facebook posts, other people's friends got involved in the comments and it was quite entertaining. An old school friend of Matt's asked if we were at a family reunion. Which, no, but also yes, you know? 

I will now describe our week in a series of tediously detailed posts because I want to and you can't stop me. 

Tell me about your weeks back in the real world with functioning plumbing and electric lights and ovens. Was it glorious? Did you feel a little TOO clean?