7.9.12

occasionally ugly





We've been going camping for eight years now. Six sites together, about twenty people (all family), the last week of the summer.

We books sites months before so we can get them all together, where we want them. Which is right across from the comfort station: showers and flush toilets. When we started the kids were all young enough to require chaperones for the trip to the toilet. (now it's the older ones - the generation ahead of me - who need to be close in the middle of the night) >smirk<

I like camping. Grew up on it, did some back woods canoe trips as a teen and 20something. This week of car camping isn't really my idea of what camping is... it's more like living like you do at home but with a dirt floor. Especially since now you can buy just about anything for your campsite... even an propane oven.

But the rest of the gang that I hang with for this week... well, let's just say that most feel the need to have a daily shower. The idea of not having one and all the gels and smells that go with it everyday is enough to make some shudder. Me? ... not so much. As a matter of fact, I didn't trek over and queue for a shower the entire week! We were in the water every day, and two evenings it was so hot that the very last thing I did was lie back, floating in the lake while admiring all the stars. How often do you get a chance to do that?

Now, I really did appreciate that first shower back home. Mere hours after we'd pulled into the driveway. But there was something about staying 'dirty' while camping. I'm cringing, but at the risk of sounded too crunchy granola... it somehow felt more organic to clean up by soaking in a lake and not sudsing with smells.

Then I read this post today and I think I figured out why I chose to stay organic. I was appreciating my version of being ugly.






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