I don't even have to close my eyes to remember it. I
was out camping with a friend and being typical me, I never bothered to pay
attention to my surroundings when it was daylight.
Fast-forward to 2:30 am (a guess). I'm quietly climbing out of my sleeping bag and making my way out of the tent to head for the bathroom, trying hard to not wake up Dave in the process.
I was smart enough to bring my flashlight and good thing, as there was zero moonlight. As they say, it was pitch black, so the only illumination I had was the small circle of light on the ground in front of me, produced by my trusty, boy scout approved flashlight.
Not too far from our tent I came to the edge of the clearing. From that point on it was woods and if you can believe it, even more darkness. I mean darker than what I had originally thought to be dark. Okay, you get the picture.
I travel in a short way, what I consider to be a safe distance and find what looked to be an appropriate place to answer nature's call.
Now all I had to do was to find my way back to the clearing and the tent. Not an easy task for someone with my negative sense of direction. I was taking short, quiet steps to avoid tripping while waving one arm about in order to keep branches out of my face. It was during this awkward struggle to get back to the tent when I bumped into a large bolder. I went to shine my light on it and nothing happened. Either my batteries had died or the little light bulb had burnt out.
The only thing I could hope for at this point was to ease myself up onto this bolder and sit there until sunrise when I could once again see enough to find my way back. So I carefully perched myself on this rock and I waited.
Not really having a warm, fuzzy feeling about being there, my nerves and frustration caused me to fuss about with the flashlight, maybe switching around the batteries might help. Just as I started to unscrew the cap on the light I heard something coming through the trees. It didn't sound like it was trying to be quiet. It did, however, sound like it had four feet and was large.
I immediately stopped fussing. I sat perfectly still and tried to breathe as quietly as possible. Whatever it was had gotten to me now and was obviously sniffing at me. I remembered I had not put on any aftershave in the morning, knowing I would be out with nature and didn't wish to attract any insects by smelling sweet. There was nothing I could do about smelling like a tasty human.
My heart was pounding and now I was trying hard to just hold my breath. Apparently I didn't smell tasty at all. Whatever it was grew weary of me and wandered off.
I waited for what I considered an appropriate time for the animal to be a good distance away before I abandoned all politeness and started yelling for my pal back at the tent to wake-up.
He finally did and when he awoke he snapped on the light in the tent, which I could see just fine from my rock. I quickly but carefully scooted back to our campsite.
When the sun finally did come up I saw the bathrooms just across the clearing, in the opposite direction from where I had gone.
Fast-forward to 2:30 am (a guess). I'm quietly climbing out of my sleeping bag and making my way out of the tent to head for the bathroom, trying hard to not wake up Dave in the process.
I was smart enough to bring my flashlight and good thing, as there was zero moonlight. As they say, it was pitch black, so the only illumination I had was the small circle of light on the ground in front of me, produced by my trusty, boy scout approved flashlight.
Not too far from our tent I came to the edge of the clearing. From that point on it was woods and if you can believe it, even more darkness. I mean darker than what I had originally thought to be dark. Okay, you get the picture.
I travel in a short way, what I consider to be a safe distance and find what looked to be an appropriate place to answer nature's call.
Now all I had to do was to find my way back to the clearing and the tent. Not an easy task for someone with my negative sense of direction. I was taking short, quiet steps to avoid tripping while waving one arm about in order to keep branches out of my face. It was during this awkward struggle to get back to the tent when I bumped into a large bolder. I went to shine my light on it and nothing happened. Either my batteries had died or the little light bulb had burnt out.
The only thing I could hope for at this point was to ease myself up onto this bolder and sit there until sunrise when I could once again see enough to find my way back. So I carefully perched myself on this rock and I waited.
Not really having a warm, fuzzy feeling about being there, my nerves and frustration caused me to fuss about with the flashlight, maybe switching around the batteries might help. Just as I started to unscrew the cap on the light I heard something coming through the trees. It didn't sound like it was trying to be quiet. It did, however, sound like it had four feet and was large.
I immediately stopped fussing. I sat perfectly still and tried to breathe as quietly as possible. Whatever it was had gotten to me now and was obviously sniffing at me. I remembered I had not put on any aftershave in the morning, knowing I would be out with nature and didn't wish to attract any insects by smelling sweet. There was nothing I could do about smelling like a tasty human.
My heart was pounding and now I was trying hard to just hold my breath. Apparently I didn't smell tasty at all. Whatever it was grew weary of me and wandered off.
I waited for what I considered an appropriate time for the animal to be a good distance away before I abandoned all politeness and started yelling for my pal back at the tent to wake-up.
He finally did and when he awoke he snapped on the light in the tent, which I could see just fine from my rock. I quickly but carefully scooted back to our campsite.
When the sun finally did come up I saw the bathrooms just across the clearing, in the opposite direction from where I had gone.
I’ll never know what it was – and that’s probably a good
thing.
No comments:
Post a Comment