The Camping Clause

So my darling fiancé confides he can’t possibly commit to a lifetime of harmonious matrimony until we have officially camped together. Dirt. Tent. Sleeping bags. Pork & Beans. Spiders with legs like Heidi Klum. Peeing over poison oak in the pitch black with mosquitoes feasting on my ass. Camping. Did I mention I work for Hyatt? We are actually entitled to free room nights. Free. That is usually something he can get behind.

Historically the only aspect of camping I enjoyed in my naïve youth was the cornucopia of jumbo marshmallows. They always seemed to taste better around a bonfire, but that was before I realized how many calories were in an entire bag and before I wore contacts. The way I see it, contacts are my crutch. An evolutionary signal, if you will, that if I were primed for the outdoors – I would’ve inherited perfect version. As it stands, I would have been mauled long ago by some saber-toothed cheetah or fanged wild boar while I stood by, squinting, and wondering what the heck was tearing off my arm. The truth is, it’s just not in my blood.

I confess the notion of zipping up in a cozy nylon tent with my honey in the middle of nowhere with the crickets chirping and the wind howling sounds rustically romantic. But, I am not some savage pioneer woman who chops wood, churns her own butter, and gives birth on the floor of a wagon train. I hate to set a precedent that camping will be alive and well in our future. In my defense, I don’t think Brad would classify me as high-maintenance. I still don’t know how to apply eye shadow, I refuse to buy jeans that cost more than $60, and most of my shoes are flat with rubber soles. (The ones that do have heels more closely resemble toddler’s building blocks than deadly instruments that could be used to impale an intruder). But, I do like hairdryers, arugula on my salad, and the clever names on nail polish bottles.

Weeks later, the invite comes: A 40th birthday / high school reunion celebration with Brad’s hometown friends. Our camping site is four hours north in Little Bear, Wisconsin. (I think I will be the judge of their size – thank you very much) The torturous part being that the rest of the crew will be rationally slumbering in the well-appointed farmhouse while we will be bear bait on the back lawn. But, these are the sacrifices we make for love.

We opt to start our drive from Chicago in Brad’s CRV – incidentally, the car without air conditioning instead of my effeminate Smurf-blue PT Cruiser with air conditioning that reeks of mold.

“It will get us in an outdoorsy mood. We are roughing it this weekend,” Brad declares while playfully punching me in the arm.

I pack the car with toilet paper, pillows, towels, diet coke, and enough Wet Ones to change an entire nursery. The temperature reads 91. About ten minutes into the drive we acknowledge in mutual defeated silence that we have made a colossal mistake. The regret pulsates through the car as exhaust fumes and damp heat plow into our pink cheeks. I focus on a tiny droplet of sweat on Brad’s earlobe. Somehow the idea of retreating and repacking the PT Cruiser seems more barbaric than driving four long hours through Hades. But, we probably had heat stroke.

The Gods smile upon me as we approach a pee stop near Lake Geneva. As the Cubs’ radio announcer alerts us to a nasty storm system brewing due West, the clouds roll in – big boorish cumulonimbus threats that promise to wreak havoc. I have horrific flashes of sinking into a muddy sleeping-bag soup later that evening as buzzing mosquitoes lay their larvae in my belly button. But, as the first droplets smatter onto the windshield and smear the insect guts, it dawns on me... this could be my out. Only a crazy person would pitch a tent in a thunderstorm. Tent poles and lightning - not exactly soup and sandwich. I am fairly confident Brad did not intend to martyr us in effort to fulfill this wedded-bliss camping clause. Sensibility will prevail and I begin to do a nonchalant rain dance with my toes.

The storm is torrential. Hailstones, strobes of lightning, trees snapping like toothpicks. We drive on through the countryside and my mood brightens as the sky darkens. We arrive just before sundown to a house with one convenient extra bedroom and puddles in the back yard.

Before we lie down in a creaky attic bedroom on two twin beds, I inspect the mattresses for bedbugs. After all, it is the country. Satisfied that I won’t be devoured by microscopic Pac-mans, I coo my remorse to Brad with as much sincerity as I can muster.

“I am so sorry the camping didn’t work out tonight. I was really looking forward to a night in the great outdoors with you. If it wasn’t for that darn storm.”

“That’s okay, honey,” he pats my hand softly and rolls over on his side. “We’ll just have to postpone the wedding.”