This Should Work

Funny how memories come back. A friends recent post and a conversation with my wife about kids and guns reminded me of Boy Scout summer camp. One memory in particular involving star gazing, sleeping bags, ghost stories, and running faster than Michael Johnson.

As part of earning an Astronomy merit badge, the Astronmy teachers took us on a night hike to the different stars and constellations. There were probably about 15 of us this “night hike” in which we were supposed to bring a sleeping bag, a flash light, and our Astronomy merit badge book. When we reached a site far enough away from camp that we could clearly see the stars, we setup camp for the night.

We tried to pay attention as the leaders, but it was hard- we spent more times cracking jokes and trying not to laugh too loud- and the leaders didn’t do a good job of pointing things out( it was kinda like ’see that star. No not that one, that one. No over a little more, too far…).

ANYWAYS, at some point I/we fell asleep in our sleeping bags. Sometime in the early morning, I awoke needing to go to the bathroom and realized that I had somehow slid down a hill into a shallow valley. I said “Hey guys, I think I slid down the this hill and… Guys?…Guys?” There was no one in sight.

It’s at this moment that all those stupid ghost stories we told each other over campfire stopped being stupid and started to feel real. The madman who broke out of the asylum, I felt his presence; the dude who was looking to replace his right hand by cutting off someone elses, I was sure he was out there with me. And what’s that…are those howling wolves?!

I threw everything I brought with me into my sleeping bag, slung it over my shoulder and ran as fast as I’ve ran in my life. I’m pretty sure that I would have beat Carl Lewis had we been racing back to camp, even with the sleeping bag.

As I approaching our campsite I suddenly remembered why I got up in the first place- to go to the bathroom! But I couldn’ stop running, not until I felt safe. So I held it until I got close enough to camp to feel like the wolves, the madman, and the dude with one hand were not going to get me (or if they did, my troops would hear my screams). As I’m stood behind a tree taking care of business, I noticed that there was still a fire burning in our camp. Soon two of my fellow scouts (one of whom was KOM) emerged from near the fire. “Hey guys” I said.

“Carter?” They replied.

“Hey, I guess I fell asleep and slid into a ditch” I said, now heading into my tent to go back to sleep.

“Holy Crap, we thought you were came back with the rest of us.”

Once I awoke, I got the rest of the story: Apparently the Scout leaders woke everyone (except me) and lined up all the scouts to hike back to camp at 3am. My friends look around for me, but figured I was just somewhere else in the line scouts.

In the end, I got away with little emotional scarring and returned to camp the next year-mainly because my parnets forced me to go.

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