That's me, pretending to be part of the Canadian Shield
(if you can find me)
Lift your hands up to your ears, cover them in full and prepare yourself to hear a very loud toot. By "toot" I don't mean the kind my nephew swears comes out of his penis, I mean the loud resonating tooting of my own horn. Toot Toot! Side note: my nephew who is just under three farted on me this week, and when I told him he tooted at his Aunt because his bum was facing me, he giggled and said "No Aunt L, I toot out my penis!" (Either I need to call Family and Children's Services on my sister or this kid is full talent and may just change the world). Anyhow - here's my loud toot (which incredibly enough is coming out of my fingers at this moment)
I can be a bucket of fun, did I tell you that? Well, I can, and when I was a summer camp canoe trip leader in my early twenties and the early 00's - I was KNOWN for my fun. Children I had never met would be in glee when they found out that I was to be their canoe trip leader; they celebrated and danced around to have ME because dang-it - I'm fun stuff. Those that had gone on trips with me would run back to their fellow campers upon return and regale tales of laughter and silliness. I was famous the two summers I devoted to that place. The canoe trip leader all the kids wanted to camp with...and there's the toot.
Here's the echo of that giant toot; I may be looking at reality in a different sense. By that, I mean I may at times (and maybe even this time) exaggerate or perhaps rephrase a tiny bit of truth here and there (and everywhere). It's true, I mean children around camp did mention me, but it may not have been because I was exactly the most "fun" leader in the camp. You could maybe say that it was because on my trips "funny" things always happened. By "funny" I mean hilariously disastrous. You know, LB's law of absolute ridiculousness, also known as reverse horseshoe up my ass (which in todays world would be #horseshoesthewrongway or some such).
The kids weren't wrong at all either, it was true, any trip I took out from the three-nighters to the week-longs, mania occurred. If it could south, it did. There was the usual fuck ups you would expect. The time or two I forgot the poles for the tent; the few times a canoe tipped or leaked; the times I got lost and made up stories of complete bullshit as to why we paddled or hiked how ever many hours or kilometers off track. Usually it was some "legend" I made up and then would show the campers the magical or special fill in the blank (rock, creek, tree, dead end etc) before announcing we were now going to turn around and head in a completely different direction (after checking the map again for no reason....)
The remaining events, perhaps less average but sadly true.
BARREL OF LAUGHS
It was somewhere in Algonquin Park, day one of a seven day trip. I was the luckiest leader on staff, as the week long trips in Algonquin were a big deal to lead and only happened twice a summer. I was looking forward to the trip and excited to try out new equipment the camp had purchased: a barrel pack. It's an interesting piece of camping equipment if you have ever used one and basically is exactly what it's called: a barrel that is indeed a backpack.
On day one of the trip, it was packed to the brim with seven days worth of food. This is not normal practice for the barrel, it is not a fair or even distribution of weight among the camping party. The smart camp leader separates the food per camper and puts all the food in the barrel at night, but no, on my trips you just skip that fuss and pack it all in that fucker.
The upside of being a trip leader is being outside all summer and getting paid (not much but enough) to have fun and camp. The downside, being responsible for the lives of other people and being the sucker that gets stuck carrying really heavy shit because you can't force campers to do it - that's abuse.
The first portage that day was tolerable, a mere kilometer. I ended up with the barrel heavy on my shoulders and attached to me at chest and waist. It was heavy and I told the group I would lead since I needed to get moving.
I could feel my spine curving and crushing with every step of the journey to the other side, and my muscles tightened and twitched as the landscape rolled from downhill to uphill. By the end of the kilometer I was red, sweaty and muttering to myself.
I hauled over one last hill and up ahead the trees parted and there was the lake, it was heaven.
"You got this Anderson." I gasped, "this is all you."
I pushed with everything I had left and made it to the waters edge where I could finally get what now felt like twenty cinder blocks off my back. Seeing the campers slowly following behind as I turned, tired but proud look on my face I let out a huge sigh, clicked the chest strap off and tossed that barrel right off my shoulders.
It would have been nothing short of the best release of my life, had I only remembered to remove the waist strap. Not being directly next to a natural ditch would have been ideal as well.
With the toss of the barrel and an audience of young teens, I flung back violently, smacked against the ground and rolled with that thing all the way to the bottom of the ditch. It rolled over me. I somehow managed enough momentum to run over myself.
I shutter to think trusting parents allowed me to take their precious children into the deep wilderness, there has to be a law against that shit somewhere. I'd like to say that was the last time I used that barrel, it wasn't.
I had six more blissful days with that thing. Six days and the rest of the summer.
Coming next: Canoe Trippin' with LB: Bear Safety
No comments:
Post a Comment