An Evening at Tuckaho

A lot happens in a single evening at Tuckaho.

Time slows down. The things that so bothered you before are still present, but distant and faded. A wasp nest on the porch, a spider by your bed, it's no big deal. Move slowly. Do what you must for the day. Get up with the sunshine. Change exposed to the cool morning air. Feel the temperature move through you like you might as well not be there.

Off colour and cold bagels with peanut butter suddenly taste delicious, they taste fine.

There's a little field right outside the woods, with ivy and trees framing a glimpse of it. The grass is pale green and covered in dew, and there are several beautiful, pale gold bales of hay. When the morning mist goes through, it looks like a painting.

The trees are every colour of green. They arc above you like a Cathedral's great hall. I remember from Köln and Notre Dame, but suddenly that's long ago and far away. Suddenly I love my Missouri.

We sat at a picnic table and listened to the birds and the cicadas and crickets as the baton was slowly passed from spring unto summer. There's a glob of grape jelly on the mildewed wood. As we watch, a daddy longleg creeps towards it, watching us with shy and clustered eyes. We merely laugh as it advances towards the jelly. He's got a little sucker thing; it shoots out and sips up the jelly nanobit by nanobit. Entertainment for an hour. Roughly. However you reckon an hour.

We're sleeping in covered wagons. Four narrow bunks and an aisle in between. They're road worthy, believe it or not. Not just an oddly themed campsite. 25 years ago, a few of the older adults remember (as campers) the wagons being led in by real horses. Then they were laid out in a row for a few years, and you could run from one to another without touching the ground if you were good on your feet. Now they're traditionally placed around a campfire.

That's the closest to history we have, but wha'cha'gonna do? Antiquity isn't everything. Neither is the future. We think ten minutes ahead and ten seconds behind. I love camp.