Written by The last two summers of my high school career, I practically lived in a tent on the shore of the Harlan County Reservoir. Most weekends I spent camping with my friends (more like my second family) Scott and Tammy and their daughter Katie, and I wouldn’t trade the fun we had or the memories we made together for the world. Other weekends, I sequestered myself in my campsite alone, soaking up the solitude near the campfire and writing, writing, writing.
Always writing.
Funny, I don’t have much desire for camping anymore. Looking back at all those weekends at the lake, I see them now too with a much sharper perspective, and I realize they were a bit of a band-aid on the loneliness and depression that defined my adolescence. And while I still enjoy the occasional late night campfire, that’s about as far as it goes these days. I have no interest in trying to sleep with only a thin sleeping bag between my body and the cold, hard ground. I enjoy hot showers and running water and clean toilets too much to spend more than a day away from them.
Plus, I married myself a city boy whose idea of “roughing it” is going more than 4 hours without a satellite or wi-fi signal.
Cosette and Leo decided it might be fun to give it a go when they found Cadence’s little toy camping set in the basement but, like Stevie, they stayed close enough to home to make sure they were warm and comfortable and within a few steps of a well-stocked refrigerator.
Cadence wasn’t quite sure what to make of the elves this morning, but giggled madly at how Cosette and Leo were trying to squeeze themselves into a tent and onto a little 4-wheeler that are way too small.
Silly elves.
Lori Romano 