Mirror, mirror, on the wall, were you lying after all?

Who among us has not heard the story of snow white? Each day her wicked stepmother would look into the magic mirror and ask, “Mirror, mirror on the wall who’s the fairest of them all?” and the mirror, which could not lie, would tell her she was fairest, until the day Snow White, aged 7, became the fairest maiden in all the land. And as the story goes, the mirror rejects the stepmother in favor of snow white, thus sending the stepmother into a murderous rage that would ultimately lead to the poisoning of the innocent snow white till awakened by the handsome prince, blah, blah bla……

 

Aside from the obvious fact that this story and screen play for the Disney movie most certainly had to be written by a man….hello, male voice in the mirror….bitchy female stepmother……innocent little virgin living with 7 men all fawning over her…notice how all the other men couldn’t measure up to the task needed? Don’t forget the tall dark handsome prince who saves the day - no CPR or heroic measures by the local medical center needed.

How many females, both young and old have looked into a mirror, wishing that it would magically speak and tell them they are the most beautiful? Women are bombarded with images of how we should look and act and very few of us out there have a snowballs chance in hell of achieving it. When I was younger, I too longed for that magic mirror, but in my own mind, if I dared ask that question, I would hear the answer “not you!” It is the fate of adolescents to feel insignificant and inept. Blame hormones, social media, jealousy, but most of all, I blame my not enchanted, damned mirror!

As time goes by, you catch on and realize the whole magic mirror …is what it is…a fairytale. Until something happens and you start to doubt the wisdom you thought you developed with age and wonder if there really is a Santa Claus, guardian angels, or more believable still….. are there really magic mirrors out there? If you stop and look around you, one almost has to believe in their existence.  After all, why would some people walk out in public looking the way they do unless their mirrors are telling them they look good? Have you seen the e-mails of the people who walk in Walmart?....the kids who have more piercings than your grandmother’s pincushion; and the equivalent of their own weight in metal hanging from each puncture? They had to at one time or other seen their own reflection and gotten validation from some mystical voice.

Case in point, a customer we referred to as the “slab lady” who came to the wolf watch one day. We could only assume that she had lost an enormous amount of weight, perhaps as a result of by-pass surgery, and could finally wear the current fashion of low rider jeans, wide studded belt and pink cashmere sweater cropped at the waist. She was really quite attractive, until your eyes settled on something hanging over the belt like a fanny pack. My brain worked feverishly trying to make out what the flesh colored London broil sized slab was, that obstructed the continuation of silver studs adorning the belt encircling her hips. Then it hit me….it was the excess tummy skin that lost its gelatinous stuffing as a result of by-pass surgery and fell flush against her jeans by the gravitational pull of the earth ending 6 inches below the top of her belt! That’s when I knew with certainly that magic mirrors do indeed exist and I just did not possess one. I wanted to rush out and say,  Honey, tuck it in under the belt!” … but alas, that would have probably warranted the next size up in jeans, and I can empathize with the emotional high one gets when digits marked in the tag of your clothes decrease numerically.

And besides, who are we to judge? I must admit I was a little envious of her confidence and satisfaction with her body to walk out of the house that way. I wanted to ask what kind of mirror she had and where I could get one just like it. But, in that moment, I realize that we all have the ability to hear the mirror speaking back to us. The voice in the mirror is none other than our own. That’s the magic….and now, since that day when I look in the mirror and ask, “who’s the fairest of them all, the response isn’t the “not you” that I used to hear in my youth. O.K. let’s be realistic…it’s also not saying “You are the fairest of them all either!” However, if I dress nice, put my make-up on, fix the hair and put the question to the mirror, I almost definitely can hear him answer “I’ve seen worse”!

Silent Heroes

Missing the opportunity to record the stories of my parents and those of my husband’s, I made a decision to record the experience of one of my seasonal campers. Inky has been camping here for many years and although I knew he was a P.O.W. in the Korean war, I never knew the extent of what he went through. I wanted his children and grandchildren to have a written record of the man they knew.

When I am committed to something, there is no one who can get in my way. I decided one night that I would not let Inky's story go untold as I had with our parents. Therefore, against the advice of well-meaning friends I ventured alone into Walmart at 10pm. Our local Walmart does not have the best reputation for safety, especially at night, but my visit was quick and uneventful. Procuring the desired cassette recorder and some spare cassettes, I went home and wrote down a few questions to ask Inky to get him started. When he came into the office for coffee the next morning, he was a little surprised at what I had intended him to do. After a crash course in the use of a cassette recorder, I sent him back to his site with questions in hand. I suppose I never gave him the option of refusing to do this little project, but I like to think the result was enlightening for us both. He came back the next morning to tell me he’d finished. He answered the couple of questions and thought he was done. He apparently didn’t know me as well as he thought!
Over the next several weeks I prodded and pushed until I had a more complete account of his experience. It was difficult for him to remember the atrocities he had tried for so long to forget. I inserted some of the words of a fellow P.O.W. that was with him at the death camp.
As I put his words to paper, I thought of how much I disliked history class when I was in school. I learned more from him than any text book I was forced to read. I marveled at this man who should have been bitter and angry for what he and the other soldiers had to endure. But if you could meet him, you could not find a more quiet gentle man. I find his faith, tolerance and forgiveness inspiring.
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Several other seasonal campers became aware of what I was doing and were anxious to read about his time in captivity. When Inky came home, his neighbors and friends gave him a watch as an expression of appreciation for what he went through. Somehow over the years, the watch was lost. That summer we replaced his watch as a symbol of our admiration and appreciation for him as well as all those who serve in our armed forces so that we can live our lives as we do.

There are an amazing number of unsung heroes all around us that need to be kept in our prayers. Below, is a small glimpse of one man’s experience, unedited and in his own words as he spoke them into the tape recorder.

Protecting the property...

Back in the 1970’s, there were no regulations about having a certified lifeguard on duty at the swimming pond. When I first started dating my husband, I laughed when I saw that his father was the one guarding swimmers. He was at that time over 70 years old. Though he was in pretty good shape for a man that age, I would not have considered him as being capable of rescuing a drowning victim. Lucky for them, they did not have a lot of people that waded in the water deeper than 3 feet. In reality, he was a “water watcher”, although in truth, “bikini bystander” would be a more accurate description. “
As the campground grew and got busier, a new regulation went into effect that required a certified lifeguard. A pretty 16 year old girl applied for the job. She was blond with a very nice shape in her bikini. Dad felt an obligation to “help” her lifeguard since she was so young.
I do believe he just liked what he saw when she removed her cover-up and slathered herself with sunscreen. He would spend the better part of each day sitting on the beach with her. Finally, unable to keep his thoughts to himself, he imparted an observation to the young girl. You know” he said, “that bathing suit is a lot like a barbed wire fence”. When he saw the puzzled look in her face he continued, “It protects the property without obstructing the view”.
Dad had a very unusual lifestyle by today’s standards. He had been trapping since he was three years old, was a sample boy for the Edison Cement Plant, worked in hosiery and finally got a job as an animal control officer for the State of New Jersey. He was also a dowser and would find wells for many people in the area. At the young age of 14, he bought an old swaybacked horse for $30 from a local farmer and with the permission of a relative with a nearby farm, he built a log cabin out of American chestnut trees. He used the horse to drag the logs to their location. It took him two years to build his cabin and at the age of 16, he moved in and so as not to have to pay to feed the horse, he returned it to the farmer. He was active until a short time before his death at age 91. He always lamented about growing old. He’d constantly say “there’s no crime in getting old, it’s just damned unhandy”. When I think about the life he led, I realize the stories that were never written down on paper. I had at one time given them a recorder to just talk about the old days, but unfortunately I never pushed, and the recorder sat collecting dust. We celebrate his birthday now that he’s gone by having a Founders Day at the campground. We drag out the old slideshow of animals in new Jersey and show them to the campers as Joe did when he was alive. We put out many of the animal pelts and different types of traps from his days as a trapper along with the dowsing rods and sticks he used. There are photographs and many newspaper articles about him, including an old National Geographic from the 60's that referred to him as the Paul Bunyan of New Jersey. It is sad that when we are young we don’t spend time with the older persons we have around us. Their experiences and wisdom would probably have prevented some of the regrets we ourselves develop as we get old.

Where are we going??

I was surprised to see the elderly couple pass the front window of the lounge ten minutes after the wolf watch shuttle pulled away from the office. They had started the hike up to the preserve almost three hours earlier. I opened the front door and asked, “Have you seen enough of the wolves and are no longer interested in the talk?” In an exasperated tone the woman replied, “We have been walking for nearly three hours and still have not found them!” I couldn’t believe it. I hurried them into my van and told them I’d give them a ride up so they could join in the talk that had just begun. As we were on our way up through the tent section, the woman sheepishly admitted they had gotten lost. “I can’t understand it” she said, “I’m usually very good with maps, and my husband use to read maps for the Pentagon.” I nearly drew blood as I bit my tongue hard to keep from laughing. I could feel her husband’s embarrassment at her remark. I said a silent prayerof thanks that her husband was retired, as I opened my door to let them out at the preserve. Otherwise, I thought to myself, we may have been bombing Spain instead of Iraq during the Gulf war!

I’ve noticed a subtle shift in the mental capabilities of the general public in the thirty years since I married into the tourism industry. If I were to name one facet of this unfortunate change, it would be the loss of common sense and the ability to follow directions, more specifically map-reading.

The government grants thousands or even millions of dollars, for inane studies on things such as methane gas produced by flatulating cows. I wonder if I could get a grant to study the general public’s lack of ability to function when removed from their “natural habitat” in the urban jungle. Does the lung function improve when taken away from the pollutants that are inhaled day in and day out? Is it the sudden infusion of clean air that clouds their mental capabilities? Perhaps it is the absence of concrete and the exposure to large patches of sky edged by trees, rather than the slivers of sky normally seen between buildings, that disorients them after they take three paces off the sidewalk. Whatever the cause, something needs to be done before all of humanity is wandering around in a daze.

Last week it took more than a half dozen calls for a camper to find our office. They were less than eight miles away. Finally, they called when they were only two turns from the camp. Repeating the directions for the tenth time, I hung up the phone and pulled out a sign-in sheet and pen, marked a car tag and got a map ready for them. A few minutes later, the phone rang again. “We are there but can’t find the office” they complained. Confused, I looked out the window but saw no car. “We are at number 22,” they added. I was more confused now because site 22 is not along the road, and I never saw the car or headlights pass the office. Insisting they were at our campground sign, I walked out the door and scanned the road out front where the sign stood. Still no sign of them.

Finally, after questioning them further, they told me what I wanted to know. “We are at the corner of Wishing Well Road and Frog Pond Road, and are looking at your camping sign.”

I asked, “What does the sign tell you to do?”
“It says turn left.”
“Then turn left,” I replied “And at the end of Wishing Well Road, you will see another sign that tells you to turn left onto Mt. Pleasant Road, and we will be a half mile down on the left” Finally, after six phone calls, thirty minutes, and navigating four roads and four turns in six miles, they arrived.

Somehow over the years, people have lost the power of reasoning and the ability to follow even a simple map. We always highlight the route to their individual campsites in neon color, as we verbalize the instructions. Mind you, every site is numbered, both on the paper map and on the tree in front of each site. We have even gone as far as to walk them to the edge of the sidewalk, point to two bright green recycle barrels, locate the barrels on the map that they have clutched in their hands and tell them to turn right at those barrels. Yet, the moment the key is place in the ignition of their car, they go brain dead, and you watch helplessly as the car glides past the barrels and in the opposite direction from where you just pointed. You can almost see the ineffective spark of neurons in the brain trying to make a solid connection. Yet these same people can find their way through the most difficult mazes on video games, while slaying the various opponents designed to thwart their ability to reach the next challenge. Is the general public becoming incapable of following a map that isn’t electronically changing as they move forward?

The A&P food store is one destination everyone asks directions to. “Make a right out of the campground, go to the end of the road and turn left onto Rt. 94. The A&P is at the first traffic light.” Seriously? How hard is that? Yet they insist on the address so it can be programmed into their GPS. Not only can people not read maps anymore, they cannot follow verbal directions. Ladies room? “Follow the red arrows on the sidewalk around to the other side of the building for the ladies room.” Two seconds later they come back and tell me it is locked. Why? Because they followed the arrows only on the first side of the building, and did not turn the corner along with the arrows and sidewalk, and are trying to get into the maintenance closet. What is it that inhibits the ability for people to take advice or think things through? Is it the preservatives in the foods we eat? The hormones injected into meat? Maybe it’s the pesticides that are used. Although, if that is the case, perhaps we should bring back DDT when simple common sense was… well, common!

Maybe it comes down to the fact that people today feel no obligation to listen to anyone but themselves, and therefore, can’t follow verbal direction because they tuned the speaker out the moment they realized the voice was not their own. Children no longer listen to those in authority, including their parents, and parents don’t listen to their children.
Do you remember when we were young? The teacher would tell all of us to
“put on our thinking caps” when there was a problem or question we didn’t know the answer to. Our brains were always working, ciphering, finding the answers logically, and memorizing. Basic math skills have perished with the calculator. People talk on phones more now than ever, but can’t remember the number they dial multiple times per day because the phone remembers it for them. Writing skills, spelling, and grammar have gone by the wayside, replaced with internet slang and text lingo. Our brains are becoming more obsolete with each technological breakthrough. We have become reliant on machines to do our thinking and guide us to where we want to go. We no longer value the individual thinker and are enslaving ourselves and our children to the fashion and mindset of whoever is in vogue at the present moment, because we no longer think for ourselves. Someone or something is solving all of our problems for us. Are we becoming nothing more than drones? Hmm… are we still in the Milky Way? Or has Earth somehow fallen into the Delta Quadrant and we are now part of a pseudo-race of cybernetic beings referred to in Star Trek as the Borg Collective.

Then again, maybe we are just being poisoned by the gas from farting cows.

Yolanda Made Me Do It

If it is in fact true what my family claims concerning the possibility of me having multiple personality disorder, or more correctly, dissociative identity disorder, then I will admit that this recent customer met at least three of them in the past ten minutes; the last of which being the dreaded Yolanda.

I wasn’t supposed to be working and dealing with customers. I was just sitting in front of the office in pleasant conversation with a friend under the gazebo. I purposely avoided going into the office so I wouldn’t get sucked into the frenzy of wolf watchers and campers. I was recuperating from lung surgery, still in pain and not up to working, as I got winded easily. I felt I had enough staff on hand to allow me a day off. I was wrong. A wave of regret washed over me as my son came out of the office with a woman not three paces behind. I could read the forewarning in his expression as he tried a larger stride to allow a few seconds of verbiage before she was alongside of me.

The woman sat on my bench, smiled sweetly and demanded a poster hanging in the office be removed immediately because she thought it was offensive. I smiled back and answered simply “no”. The poster in question was given as a joke because of the continuous problems with spoiled undisciplined children who are allowed to run rampant in my store by their parents. The poster depicts two mischievous looking blond haired boys shaking what looks like their fists but on closer inspection reveals the slight lift of the middle finger. The print on the poster states: Notice to parents, unattended children will be captured and sold as slaves.
This poster gets humorous reactions from customers of all race and age. I have been asked if I sell copies of it so many times, that I reproduced it on letter size paper and give them away to anyone who asks. Children giggle nervously and adults laugh. This woman was devoid of humor.

She moved closer to me and again insisted the poster be removed. Again I calmly responded with a no, but suggested if she doesn’t want to look at it, she need not go into the office. Moving closer still and crossing the invisible boundary into my personal space, she would not give up on her mission. I believe that was when Francine, the business personality of my family’s D.I.D diagnosis began to drop like a curtain over my countenance. “I accept your opinion, but disagree, and the poster will remain where it is”, she was told.

The woman insisted the poster offended her children because “it” was in their DNA. Although she was white, her husband was Afro-American. I looked in disbelief and chuckled as I responded. “Lady, trust me, there is a lot of stuff in my DNA and my ancestry, and I’m over it and have dealt with it.” I suggested she take her children out of the store and leave. But she had no intention of leaving until she badgered and intimidated me into removing the poster. I replied, that my ancestors were not slave owners, neither her husband nor her children were slaves, and it was time they let go of the past. I also reminded her that it was my property, my store, my window, my poster and my choice as to what I have on my walls. She threatened not to come back again, to which I replied it was her choice and I wouldn’t lose sleep over that.

Seeing I was getting winded and stressed, my friend repeatedly told the woman I was not well and she needed to leave. Still she refused. Trying to maintain some sort of composure I again suggested she take her children home. That was when she admitted that her children were not even at the camp that day. Trying to understand, I asked how old her children were. When she told me they were in their 40s, I was incredulous. I could feel Francine was struggling to stay in the forefront, but by now, Yolanda was emerging and rising like a suffocating mist. The more I denied her wishes and told her to leave, the more she moved into my personal space and refused to go until she got what she wanted. Yolanda grew like a genie from Aladdin’s lamp and commandeered my being. I felt my blood pressure rise like the mercury on a thermometer, my heartbeat doubled and the rage I had been suppressing caused my throat to restrict. I felt myself become an observer as Yolanda took complete control, determined to finally end this stalemate.

I vaguely remember feeling my lips move, and hearing a voice that sounded familiar, but not quite my own. It was loud and strained, and the words just spilled out taking all the strength that remained. “Get the f--- out of my face and off my property now or I’ll have the police escort you off!” I was spent, but I was finally heard. My husband came out of the office and made the woman and her husband leave the premises. Yolanda retreated into the recesses of my brain as quick as she had emerged. I glanced at my friend and sheepishly stated, “Yolanda made me do it” and we laughed, relieved that it was over. As I turned toward the door, I realized a man had been close enough to have heard my explosion. I apologized to him and he made us laugh again when he shrugged, and said, “hey I’m from New Jersey, that was nothing!”

I took a slow and deliberate breath as I tried to unlock my clenched jaws. I could feel the volume of air increase as my nostrils flared and my lungs expanded until a sharp pain in my chest forced the air through my mouth as my jaw slacked. I was making a conscious effort to control my breathing and bring my blood pressure back to normal as my anger waned. I was annoyed with both the customer who I had just finished dealing with as well as myself for allowing her to bring me to the precipice of blind rage.

Hindsight is always 20/20. After the fact you review and think of different ways to respond to various situations. Unfortunately, you are not always able to call “do-over”, but if I could, I would have liked to delve further into the DNA reference. I would have liked to remind her that there were white slaves too, as well as Jewish, Roman, Egyptian, and so on. I’m not sure when “slaves” and “black” became synonymous. I almost went inside, got a copy and posted another one on the outside window, but managed that small amount of restraint. Perhaps it was her ancestors who owned slaves and she was trying to overcome some sort of ancestral guilt. I concede the past needs to be remembered so that history won’t repeat itself, but we also need to remember it is in the past and hatred and prejudice should not be perpetuated. I am just grateful that Yolanda retreated when she did or she may have suggested a lifeguard be hired for their gene pool, or perhaps they should pull the plug, drain it completely, and not procreate.

Can you say E-eeew Coli?

Every campground has a dumping station. This is where trailers can empty their waste-water holding tanks. It is also a place for a kind of entertainment called people watching. Think of it as being on a boardwalk, sitting on the bench, and watching the public pass by. It is amazing what we reveal about ourselves without intention. As an observer, it is fun to imagine a person’s occupation or character by how they look or dress, whether their hands are calloused or manicured, if they were friendly, grumpy and so on.
The gazebo and sitting area outside of the office is the equivalent to front row, middle seats, under the big top and the dump station is the center ring in our little circus. It is where our seasonal camper coffee club gathers each morning to do their people watching. When a trailer pulls up to dump, it’s as though the circus ringmaster has come to introduce the main act and draw everyone’s attention to the center ring. The anticipation is almost palpable as all eyes do a quick scan of the newest performer. Then, in almost a fever pitch, the assessments and betting begin; “Pro or newbie?” Gloves or no gloves?   Will they wash their hands when they finish?, Will they rinse the sewer hose before putting it back?  And on and on it goes, until the unit pulls away and they wait for the next unit to provide the encore.
Last week, I wished I had a video camera on the dump station so that I could have played back the unit we had mid-week. No one was around to watch, with the exception of the few of us working in the office. The ease of his approach and knowledge of how far forward he needed to be in order to line up the valves with the septic cap told us he was not a newbie. What happened after, had us naming all the occupations we prayed he wasn’t involved in, chef being at the top of the list.
As he pulled the sewer hose from the storage compartment, he simultaneously lit a cigarette. Not wearing any gloves, he proceeded to hookup to the waste water valve and dump the holding tanks, all the while handling the rinse hose, which had, just moments before, been down the sewer hose of the previous unit, and putting the cigarette in and out of his mouth. You can almost see the e-coli and other bacteria jumping from hand to cigarette to mouth. When the tanks were emptied he rinsed the area while the water splashed his sandaled feet, hung the hose and wiped his hands on his jeans, shuffled his feet twice in the gravel, so as not to put mud on the floor of the truck, hoisted himself into the driver’s seat, and pulled out. All the while the audience in the office gasped, groaned, and gagged in disbelief.
One must wonder about his personal hygiene training. Was this man an orphan? Did he not have a mother growing up? Obviously, if he didn’t wash his hands after that repulsive show, it would be a safe bet that he doesn’t wash after using the bathroom. Perhaps he worked in a sewer treatment plant, and the concentration of bacteria is all relative in his mind. We wondered if his lady was o.k. with his personal hygiene habits. I myself know that on Wednesdays, when my husband has to pump out the holding tanks of all the seasonal trailers, even though he wears gloves and washes his hands after the gloves are removed, he could not possibly exude enough pheromones for me to feel any attraction until after he has showered and scrubbed every inch of his body.
I contemplated relocating the antibacterial hand wash in the store to a more visible spot, but as he pulled away, my subconscious propelled me to the back room where I washed my own hands in a futile gesture of hygiene by proxy.

Granma needs a dryer

When you have a campground, it is important that an owner, manager or at the very least, an employee lives on the camp property. The ability to see the residence gives a feel of security, and accessibility to the customers. You do have to give consideration as to who that person will be, since they will be in a position to be observed by campers in their daily living habits. Off duty behavior can leave a big impression.

We have a cottage in the center of the camp by the swimming lake that was at one time a rental unit. After my husband’s youngest brother married, their parents turned the family home over to him and moved into the cabin by the lake. Not the wisest decision for an abundance of reasons, not the least of which was the fact that there was a full flight of steps which separated the kitchen & bathroom level from the bedroom and living room level. My in-laws being in their 70’s would have fared better in a ranch house. Dad however was set on living in the cabin, and whatever dad wanted mom granted.
Mom had a problem with blood pressure. I often wonder if high blood pressure is just another occupational hazard in owning a campground. It’s amazing how quickly your pressure can rise when dealing with the public on a daily basis. Not everyone is a pleasure to deal with and that includes the owner as well as the camper. There are situations that cause such a surge in pressure that I can imagine a simple bug bite at the right time and in the correct location could cause an arterial spurt causing you to bleed out where you stand.
One night, she went downstairs and blacked out, hitting her head on the concrete floor. The resulting brain hemmorrhage unfortunately aged her by about 10 years. For the most part they lived simply and quietly like most senior citizens. Occasionally, though, she would forget there were other people around.

One day, my son came rushing into the office to tell me to have his father stop grandma from hanging her laundry outside, now that they are living in the middle of the campground. Thinking his motive was embarrassment for his grandparents hanging on to old habits, and not always embracing the progress made in technology: i.e.: electric dryers, I tried to reason with him. I reminded him they are from a different generation and Grandma enjoys hanging her clothes outside and likes the way they smell after being in the fresh air. “No, she’s doing ALL her laundry”, he said. Still not comprehending what the problem might be, I answered with a “so what?’

That’s when my son made himself clear. He literally meant ALL the laundry. As in she’s not wearing clothes while hanging the wash! That facilitated a call to my husband to rush over to camp and get Granny inside and explain why she shouldn’t wait until there were no clean clothes before doing the wash. Later we had to laugh, my son claiming he thought he was going to go blind, and would probably have nightmares for the rest of his life. I guess seeing your 78 year old grandmother without clothes is not the image a 15 year old boy wants imprinted on the retina! Lucky for us it was a weekday and there were not many campers around.

Inhibitions were never to blame when it came to my husband's parents. They lived in a different time and place from which I was raised. Our cultural clashes were often used as fodder for stories from both perspectives. I find myself missing them now that they're gone but keep my fingers crossed tight that when I'm old, I'll remember to keep up with the laundry, and not give my kids anything to blog about!

Memorial Weekend 2010

Thursday morning of Memorial weekend and I approach the coffee pot. Coffee being my morning oracle, I pour with caution, first taking in the aroma, in the same way one tests the water by dipping their toe in the pool before jumping in. The first sip of coffee can set the mood and method in which you approach the situations that arise for the
remainder of the day.

This morning’s coffee was no elixir, but it wasn’t terrible either. Just on average cup, foretelling what could be an average day. Although weekends usually begin on Friday, holiday weekends can be the exception to the rule. Some people take off Friday and come a day early to extend the 3-day weekend into four. We were expecting only a few of them to arrive this afternoon. Thursday arrivals help reduce the mayhem created by fifty or more sites arriving at the same time to check in. There are times that our quiet country road mimics the LA freeway during rush hour.

I glanced at the clock, 7:45am. I carried my cup to the laptop that springs to life at the touch of a key. Checking the various e-mails, I discover there is nothing imperative that needs my attention in that department. Reviewing the weekend’s planned activities; I do a mental check to see if everything is at the ready. Organization not being my forte, I have to make a concerted effort when it comes to holiday weekends. There are periods of time when it becomes so hectic in the registration office that it resembles the floor of the stock exchange, with employees scrambling for registers, bodies clashing together at every turn calling out needs and demands in a frenzied commotion. It always happens that campers arrive at the same hour throngs of wolf watchers arrive to register. The day went without any serious mishaps and I closed the doors and went home at 6:30. We were invited out for dinner and I decided to go for it, knowing it might be the last good meal until Monday night. My husband, workaholic that he is, opted to stay home and finish the mowing he didn’t get to do on Wednesday. I smiled to myself when it began to rain while at dinner. I knew he wouldn’t be working into the night and might get to bed at a reasonable hour.

Being the insomniac that I am, I often claim to wonder at the ability that my husband, has when it comes to slumber. However, if one reviews his daily activities, it is a wonder that he can function for as many hours as he does. This week especially, most days he was out of bed by 6:30am and didn’t come back to the house until 9pm. Doing backhoe work, mowing and all the various other jobs, causes near coma-like sleep when he finally collapses onto the bed after his shower. His hours are not just long, but full of strenuous, physical work.

At dinner, we discussed the ability to sleep that most around the table possessed. I am always amazed that there are folks who really do get 6 to 8 hours of sleep on a regular basis. I am lucky if I sleep for an hour without waking. A sleep study revealed I wake 6 to 10 times per hour on average. It is something I’ve gotten used to over the years, and I think if I did sleep now, the brain mass which we refer to as my evil twin would be to blame. What keeps me awake most times is a jingle or song that gets stuck on replay in my brain. Of course it didn’t help when at dinner, everyone was recalling theme songs from old TV shows and commercials, trying to guess which one would replay in my head tonight.

At 5 am I couldn’t lay in bed any longer so I decided to e-mail two of my dinner companions their answer. The e-mail went like this…

"Be glad I’m not calling you!
Here we come, walkin down the street, we get the funniest looks from , everyone we meet!
hey, hey we're the monkeys , people say we monkey around, but we're too busy singing to put anybody down....................

what do you want when you gotta have something ..and it's gotta be sweet...and it's gotta be alot.. and you only have a dime??

don't forget
hotdogs, armour hotdogs, what kind of kids love amour hotdogs, big kids little kids, kids who climb on rocks, fat kids, skinny kids, even kids with chickenpox love hot dogs, armour hot dogs, the dogs kids love to bite!

need we go into oscar meyer weiners?
goin back to bed now!!!"


The sign on the door states we open for business at 9am, but I wanted to get in early so all the preliminary prep work would be complete, and I’d be able to enjoy my coffee while it was still hot and fresh. Too often, I get one or two sips before I’m interrupted and set the cup down only to find it hours later, with an uninvited insect that did a swan dive into the black abyss. This memorial day, being the first weekend filled to capacity, I was mentally gearing up for the hours I’d be spending in this building, where we spend all but the time we set aside for sleep.


The phone started ringing before 7:30 am with campers who waited until they got a favorable weather forecast. The flaw in their plan is that by the time the weather is predicted, all the sites are full and they have nowhere to go. Holidays being a 3-day minimum weekend, people expect you to reserve just for Saturday night and not only do they become indignant that you require 3 nights, but they do not believe you when you tell them there are no sites remaining.

I unlocked the door as I took my last swig of coffee, debated having breakfast, but did not follow through. Regretting that decision at about 10am, my stomach growled at the people signing in for the wolf watch. I couldn’t wait for the frenzy to subside at 10:30 when the shuttle to the wolf preserve would pull away from the front of the office with eager animal lovers. Before the dust settled, I found myself foraging for food in the kitchen. Hmm, no time to cook anything and the milk was on the verge of being chunky.
I popped a handful of dry cheerios in my mouth just as the phone rang, so I hurried back to the office garbling into the cordless phone the message I have repeated hundreds of times all week. “no, I’m sorry we are full for the weekend – no the cabins and rv rentals are full – no there are no campsites available either, we’re full. No, I do not know where you can find a campsite, holidays book a month or more in advance. No, we have nothing for just Saturday night, it’s a three night minimum. No we are completely filled until Monday…yes I am sure…. I hang up as the other line is ringing only to go through the entire dialogue again and wonder what part of “no we are full” do they not understand.

There was a steady flow of campers checking in throughout the day. It was helpful that there were no wolf watches in the afternoon. Lunch and dinner was the leftover ziti I made on Wednesday. All in all, things went pretty smoothly and everyone that we expected in was here by 10:30pm. I started to cash out the registers as my husband went to mop shower floors. We checked the bathrooms to be sure toilet tissue and hand soap was well stocked, and arrived home at 10:45 as the rain started to fall. Rain at that time is a godsend and means that my husband and my son won’t have to walk camp to be sure everyone is quiet, so others are able to sleep. Rain drives everyone into their tent and prevents the talking and drinking around the campfire. We were thankfully in bed by eleven.

The first of the three night holiday now in the past, I was trying to store up energy to face the next three days. Tomorrow would be Saturday, but I tried to trick my mind into thinking this day, hectic as it was, never happened, and it will be Friday tomorrow, leaving the normal 40 hours in three days schedule rather than the 50-52 hours put in on three night holidays.

Saturday began early, just as the previous day, with coffee, no breakfast and phone calls
Wolf watchers and campers were registered and the phone continued to ring off the hook. When the morning wolf watch returned at noon and finally finished their shopping, we were all wondering what we might eat for lunch. Luckily I had the foresight to defrost some sausages and my daughter had put them in the oven, sautéed peppers and onions and we had a quick lunch. Mid afternoon the treasure hunt had been solved and my son and his fiancée who also works here, were organizing kids for the shooting contest in the lounge. They had to knock down a pyramid of coke cans with a gun that shot ping pong balls. With that finished, we settled in for the rest of the day’s normal activities in the store. Once again, was the steady flow of customers in and out of the office and store, making purchases and asking directions to events and attractions in the area. The phone still rang with people hopeful that there might have been a cancellation, and us telling them over and over that we are full. Being a holiday weekend the amount of people for the wolf watches was astounding. Evening approached and things slowed down as people began to settle in front of their campfires. Dinner consists of a package of bright orange colored cheese crackers grabbed from under the counter. We had posted that the store would close at 9pm and it seemed we were actually going to be able to accomplish that. We cashed out and did the normal routine of closing up and went home. We looked forward to watching some TV before my husband had to go and walk camp. At 9:30pm we had our first phone complaint of noisy campers. My husband explained that quiet hours didn’t start till 11pm, but since the caller made it sound like the noise was over the top he decided to make the trek up to the tent section to ask them to tone it down and remind them that 11pm was quiet time. When he arrived, he didn’t think it was very loud, but cautioned the offenders on how far voices carry at night.
Between 10:30pm and 12:30 am we received three more calls regarding the same sites by the same callers. The last call came just as I had begun to fall asleep. I tried very hard to keep my temper when they complained about this being the fourth time they had to call with no result. I reminded them that the first calls came before quiet hours were in effect and they could barely be heard outside of their sites when the manager was up there. I did however assure them he would once again go up since it was definitely after quiet hours now, but to come out of the tent so he might speak with them also. When my husband returned, he told me that another nearby site remarked the loudest thing they heard was the complaining campers yelling obscenities to the others to be quiet. I suspect they were just annoyed with the rain and trying to find a way to get a refund. When they realized that wouldn’t work, they added a complaint that people were walking down the road at night with flashlights. My husband assured them that he was not going to prohibit people from walking to the bathroom at night and told them not to call again. We had another site that we did not rent because it needed more work, but told them they could move in the morning if they so desired. Although the phone did not ring for the rest of the night, all chances of falling back asleep were done for me. I got out of bed and read for the rest of the night until it was time to go back to the office.
Sunday was pretty much a rerun of Saturday. We moved the campers who complained the night before to another site and they were thrilled with the new location. It was hard to keep up with the rental of paddle boats, kayaks and mini golf. As I recall, breakfast and lunch was graham crackers, popcorn and an ice cream bar, but my daughter made a great salad for dinner. Once again, we closed about 10:30pm, my husband walked camp and we went to bed.

By Monday morning, my body and mind were battling over going to work. I was praying for 6pm to arrive so that I could go home. First thing in the morning as I unlocked the front door I caught the distinct odor of steak on an open fire. That sealed it – I needed to have steak for dinner and nothing else would do it. Monday the minutes seemed like hours, and I was impatient for the day to end. Feeling total exhaustion, what kept me going was the thought of a juicy steak. Being Monday, all local restaurants were closed so we had to drive to Stroudsburg. The steak was wonderful and filling. Finally at home, we sat down to unwind from the weekend. I was sure I would get at least a couple of hours of sound sleep and couldn’t wait for my head to hit the pillow. I awoke at 1am, and had difficulty falling back asleep until about 5am, but was not worried because I did not have to get out of bed till 8:45. At 6:45, the phone rang. I reluctantly answered only to find someone on the other line asking about fees for the dumping station. He was not one of my campers, but rather the type who camp for free in mall parking lots and then is looking for a place to dump and drop off garbage. What is he thinking calling at this hour? I told him to call back after 9 when the office would be open. But he continued to ask more questions. Annoyed, I dropped the phone back in the cradle mumbling, one three-day holiday weekend down, only three more to go.

It's o.k.? They're permitted to roam free?

I inserted the key into the front door lock and clenched my teeth as I twisted my wrist. My wince was audible as I grabbed at the key a second time, changing the angle of my arm as I unlocked the door. The pain caused by 20 years of untreated carpel tunnel was exacerbated by the increased barometric pressure due to the approaching storm front. It was a long day and even though I knew sleep would not come easily, I looked forward to my bed and the relaxation I planned to revel in.

Weekends are exhausting and long, and it was only Friday night. The preparation starts as the previous weekend ends. Monday morning you awake with anticipation of accomplishing all that needs to be done before the campground fills. The weather forecast will dictate the order as well as the timing in which the various jobs must be completed. Weed whacking needs to be done again as well as re-mowing the grass. Bathrooms and showers are scrubbed from the weekend that just ended, reservations need a double check to be sure all deposits are received, and no sites have been double booked. Rental trailers and cabins are cleaned and readied for the next occupants. Garbage and recycling needs to be picked up and set out so it can be hauled off the premises only to repeat the entire exercise again. Needed repairs are always multiplying faster than anyone can keep up with. Soda, ice cream and candy vendors must be called with orders so you are fully stocked for the onslaught of campers that will arrive on Friday. Stockrooms are plundered; and all the while the phone rings non-stop with people calling with last minute plans, hopeful that you will be able to pull new sites out of thin air, so that they may disprove the lesson of Aesop’s fable depicted by the ant and the grasshopper. Every year we are amazed how many people do not plan ahead on a beautiful weekend of the summer?


I walked into the foyer without the need of lights; the route to my bedroom imprinted on every cell of my being. I’m grateful that my home is a split level and has 5 less steps to navigate than a 2-story house. My movements were as fluid as a well rehearsed dance, as I shed my clothes walking toward the bathroom, and donning the nightgown hanging behind the door. I brushed my teeth, swallowed my pills and collapsed onto the bed without enough energy to pull the heavy quilt on top.
One deep breath and I exhaled just as the muscles in my body began to release their white knuckle hold which kept my bones erect. And then it happened. I am convinced there is some neurological anomaly in my brain that causes a tune to permeate my subconscious at the very moment it should be shutting down for sleep. Tonight’s torturous selection was the theme song from the “Flintstones” cartoon. I was not having a yabba dabba do time!

Tossing and turning trying to remember any other song, I kept returning to “that modern stone age family”. It was amazing how the lyrics were stored in my brain without my knowledge. Perhaps that explains the inability to retain something I wanted to remember that occurred only moments before. The recesses of the brain fills with inconsequential junk which pushed the more recent mental notes to the forefront causing them to fall off the cranial clipboard with no hope for retrieval.

I decided to put into practice something I read about insomnia. Don’t lay awake, get up and do something. I grabbed my Kindle and went downstairs to read. I read for a few hours when my eyelids began to droop. First I tested my brain by flashing a mental picture of Fred and Barney, and finding no compulsion for replaying their song in my head I walked up both sets of stairs to the bed. It was now 3 o’clock am and I held little hope for a good night’s rest not to mention sleep.

I lay in bed thinking of how to organize the day so that it unfolds without a wrinkle. Put the coffee on first, put in the register drawers, check through the restrooms to make sure they are clean and toilet paper holders are filled. Next look to see what event is on the schedule and organize the needed supplies to carry it through to completion. 9:30 until 10:30 will bring the commotion of wolf watchers signing in, getting tickets, and directing them where to park; which way to go if walking up and where to wait for the bus if they decide they need to ride. There will be a lull between 10:30 and noon where it will just be campers getting their morning coffee and firewood. Then at noon, the morning wolf watchers will descend on the store to look for gifts and souvenirs. From 1pm to 3pm we return to being a campground, 3-6pm will start another round of wolf watchers and finally at 6pm we will be back to only campers filing in and out until 11:00pm when we cash out the drawers, run the reports, walk camp to be sure everyone is quiet and stumble up the steps again.

During this mental planning, I must have fallen asleep. In my dream I imagined a phone ringing. Hearing the rhythm I started to count them, one….. two…..on the third ring, I realized I was not dreaming, but listening, and I grabbed blindly for the phone trying to see which line was ringing. It was 6:30am.

“ Camp Taylor” I answered. Hearing the caller identify herself as the 911 operator jolted me into a full alert. “What is the problem?”, I asked, not really wanting to know but running all the possible scenarios through my mind in a flash. Heart attack, stroke drowning, fire, 3rd degree burns, broken leg…..the possibilities were endless. None however were the case.

“I have a camper on the line and he said there is a bear in their campsite” she explained. As my thoughts collapsed on each other, I could only respond with a single word. “So?” I answered.
“Oh, it’s o.k.? …. Are they permitted to roam free?” she responded.
I was too tired and baffled at that implication to have asked her to send the police to arrest the bear, so instead I simply requested to speak directly to the camper himself and she patched me through.

“You did not put your cooler in your car as you were told, did you”
it was more of a statement than a question. His meek response confirmed my suspicion. “It won’t leave”, he said in a worried tone. “It keeps coming closer to the tent and I have children in here”
“I’ll be right there” I answered, put the phone on the cradle and with reluctance, pulled on my jeans and searched for the rest of my clothing and car keys. My husband joined me and now that we were awake, rehearsed witty answers for the 911 operator in the unlikely event this circumstance should repeat itself. The absurdity of the situation brought back the familiar lyrics. …”lets ride, with the family down the street, through the courtesy of Fred’s two feet….
The car coming toward him was enough to move the bear away from the ransacked cooler and we approached the camper who was peeking out from under the tent flap. We surveyed the contents strewn about the overturned cooler as the camper crawled from his igloo- like shelter.
When the gentleman apologized and explained he thought we were just kidding about the bears, I was starting to seethe. Who would joke about something like that?. The seethe however soon dissipated into a laugh when he proceeded to demonstrate how from inside the tent he was whispering “shoo” to the bear so as not to awaken the other sites around him.
I shook my head in disbelief as my husband tried to explain to him the futility of his actions. “Seriously? A little purple dome whispering “shoo” or a cooler full of bacon, cheese and hotdogs, which would you choose if you were him?” I asked, as I reached for the car door knowing full well that the opportunity for sleep would have to wait for another 17 or 18 hours. By now every corpuscle of my body was clamoring for coffee.
I dropped my husband back at the house so he could get his vehicle and went to the office to make the first pot of Folgers. I began singing to my self…”have a yabba dabba do time, a dabba do time, we’ll have a gay old time”. As the door opened and my husband walked in, I was half expecting him to call for Wilma!

I poured my first cup of coffee, walked into the lounge and sank into the large chair in front of the fireplace as I let the flow of caffeine enter my bloodstream. I glanced at the clock. One hour before we open… I closed my eyes and willed the tension from my body, mentally preparing for another day.

Love is Blind

When you are young and in love, you look at the world through rose tinted glasses. When I accepted my husband’s marriage proposal, I told him I did not care where we lived as long as we were together. I believe I even went so far as to say I’d be willing to live in a tent with him, since we needed to be close to the family owned and operated campground. I was encircled by the whirlwind of romance. Looking back, it would be more accurate to state that I was in the eye of a hurricane.
What can I say? My glasses were as thick as coke bottles, and well tinted!
In retrospect, a tent would have been an upgrade from what we had to live in. It was a 20 year old 10x50 foot mobile home that was not maintained by any stretch of the imagination. When their renters moved out, we spent a week cleaning the nicotine off the ceiling and walls. The counter that held the sink was collapsing, and had to be propped up by a pair of 2x4’s so the food did not slide off onto the floor. The sink was pink, the stove was gold, and the fridge was the original Frigidaire that my husband’s parents bought when they first married back in the early 1940’s. You know the kind--, rounded top-- tiny box in the middle of the top shelf that held one ice cube tray and one half gallon of ice cream. You had to finish the ice cream fast, otherwise the frost would develop around it, entombing the contents until you unplugged the fridge and hacked away the ice with a hammer.

The amount of nicotine on the paneled walls and ceiling was repulsive to me. The latest tenants were told to leave in February, so that we’d have time to clean and do necessary repairs. After the third scrubbing on the ceiling, we made the decision to paint. It was impossible to remove the swirls of brown on white, since the years of nicotine coating would shift with every wipe. The first coat of ceiling white served as a primer, and we left our paint rollers standing on paper towels to drain on the kitchen counter with a small sense of accomplishment. I might mention the accomplishment was not only that the ceiling was painted, but that we were able to get the rollers to remain vertical. This was due to the fact that the kitchen counter was collapsing and was tilted at about a ten degree angle.

My heart sank just a bit the next day when we entered the trailer to apply the second coat of paint on the ceiling. It wasn’t just that I was hoping the paint would have hidden the swirls of nicotine more than it had; it was because our paint rollers were standing on the paper towels and filled with dog food! That was when it hit me. We were not going to be living alone! The years of tenants with dogs, the age and level of deterioration of the unit, and the resourcefulness of the uninvited squatters had turned my home into a food shelter for mice. To this day, I hate the thought of sharing even the tiniest corner of a room with those little rodents.

Another distinguishing feature of our first home was the total lack of insulation in the walls. There was the aluminum skin of the mobile home, four inches of air space and about 1/8th inch thick paneling which was the interior wall. We realized tinsel on the Christmas tree was not an option, since it kept blowing off due to the lack of insulation. It was the only place I knew of that you can sit inside watching TV and leave with a windswept look to your hair.

A hole in the wall above the guest room bureau was repaired by the previous tenant by screwing an old framed mirror, (which no longer had any silvering on the back side) over the gaping hole in the paneling. This same flair for repair was used in the shower above the faucet. Judging by the height and placement of the shiny patch, I believe the previous male tenant thought himself quite the ladies man.


I would not have described myself as a city girl, even though I was from Trenton. My neighborhood back then still had woods, a swamp, and blocks that remained undeveloped. My father and brothers were into hunting and fishing and our yard, though not huge, had almost every kind of tree, shrub and flower that you could imagine. Hence the reason there were only patches of grass where the sun managed to slip through the boughs of overlapping trees. We were raised with bb guns and bows and arrows. No toy arrows with suction cups, they were for sissies. We ate venison, pheasant and fish quite often, since my father was either hunting or fishing every weekend that I could remember. We also had plenty of meats because that was his business. He was a butcher and owner of a wholesale meat co. It was the vegetables and fruits we yearned for on a regular basis. When we did get them, dad went to the extreme. Mom would complain she’d like to have bananas, so dad would bring home a case of bananas, not just one bunch. Everything arrived by the case, so you’d have to gorge yourself on that particular treat until it was gone or ‘til you couldn’t look at another piece of that particular fruit.

Still, I was not prepared for the culture shock that hit me when I started dating a Taylor.
I learned early on that dating a campground operator, meant I would have to come to him from April through October, which was the camping season. I tried to come up to the campground every weekend I could. I’d tag along with him while he worked. As I stated earlier, my rose tinted glasses were as thick as coke bottles. Picking up garbage at the sites and walking camp at night were our “dates”. Yet being young and in love made even the dirtiest of jobs fun.

Eating at camp was another story altogether. I realized with some trepidation that the Italian cuisine on which I was raised would not be on the menu in Columbia. I never knew what Clate’s mom would be serving. To be on the safe side, I’d make a slight detour through the drive thru McDonald’s and eat before I arrived. Venison, and chicken were totally acceptable, but each time the frog legs, rattlesnake, duck, squirrel, eel and turtle were served, I made a mental note to support Mickey D’s to ensure they’d never go out of business, and I would never starve to death in this culinary black hole I ventured into. Rodent pot pie was not something I ever cared to become accustomed to.

I was however, accepted into the family from the first day they met me. That is, until we announced our engagement. From then on, any mention of a wedding prompted an immediate change of subject. I was sure they hated me. Instead, as time passed, it became apparent to me that they worried I would not like living so far from my family Their biggest fear was if I left, their son might leave with me. Clayton was the one they depended on for running the business. Once they realized I was here to stay, I do believe they treated me as well as if I was their own daughter.

Over the years, the lenses have thinned, and the rose tint has faded, though thankfully not where my marriage is concerned. I do not need any glasses to see how lucky I am in the choice I have made.
I am now firmly rooted into the lifestyle of campground owner/operator. Well, rooted may not be the correct choice of words. More like Alfred Lloyd Tennyson’s poem “Flower in the Crannied Wall”. I’m just waiting to be plucked from the cranny!

Getting Healthy

Operating a campground is not your ordinary 9-5 forty hour work week. The days are long and your weekends are busier than the previous five week days. There is an occasional rainy day that you may escape for the afternoon and do something unrelated to work but not on a regular basis... While friends and family relax and have parties and picnics, you are working 14 hours per day after which you collapse onto the bed hoping to get a sound sleep so you can put in another long day all over again. I am not one who is able to sleep with ease, and over the years, spend more time in the office and less time walking the camp. Hence over time, I have become much more out of shape than when I first began this lifestyle. The lack of sleep, poor and irregular eating habits in addition to being tethered to the office, has long term effects that are not only unattractive but unhealthy.
After a year and a half of taking Ambien CR and still getting only 2 hours of sleep, I needed to try another approach. After all, prescription drugs are not always the safest and most beneficial way to go, and decided to try and take a healthier approach to life. Venturing into a health food store intending to take the “all natural” route, I stood in the aisle and looked around me. In my wildest imaginations, I could not have been prepared for the thousands of products that bombarded me and vied for my attention. It never occurred to me I might be lacking in so many vitamins, minerals, and supplements. I did not know I might be so full of so many toxins and parasites! Feeling guilty that I would have allowed myself to deteriorate to my present state, I came face to face with my own mortality and realized if I did not make some changes, I’d be speeding to the end of my days at an alarming rate!
Hurrying to the front of the store, I grabbed a shopping basket and began filling it with various products that promised to cleanse and extend my life - and not a moment too soon. It took two trips and a few hundred dollars, but I was confident that my life was turning around and felt invigorated. One can’t be positive, but I think there was already a spring to my step as I walked to the car. No doubt by the end of the month, I would be sure to feel the effects of the new healthy me. Next step was checking the calendar to know when I would need to restock, and with any luck it would coincide with the third Thursday of the month when everything is 20% off. Added to the purchase was a new pill box so that I might always have my various vitamins with me and start the routine of taking them with my meals. And to ease me past my self admitted forgetfulness, I grabbed a bottle of gingko biloba to improve my memory. Anxious to meet the new me when I gazed into the mirror 30 days from now, I wondered if anyone would notice the change I was already feeling.
They say the road to hell is paved with good intentions. If that is true, I believe I have secured myself the smoothest ride possible. Though I have been to the health food store several times, the greatest visible change is the amount of clutter on top of my bedroom bureau. The new pill box proved useless the first time I started to fill it.
It had room for less than 1/3 the number of pills I needed to take for the new improved healthy me. But a larger box would not have solved the problem of me forgetting to take them. I came to realize how blessed I was that there was no illness to medicate regularly to stay alive, because if so, I’d be dead in a week. The gingko biloba does absolutely nothing while still in the bottle, and until someone comes up with a dose that will jettison into my mouth at the precise moment my lips and teeth part to bite into that forbidden biscotti, I am doomed. The store is not without its redeeming properties however. They have some things like the almond crisp crackers, dried pineapple, wasabi peanuts, among other tasty snacks that seem to defy the need for the memory enhancers. Miraculously, the 30 day supply disappears in considerably less time. I have also accepted the fact that I will not live to be 100 and I’m o.k. with that. Now 54 years old if I look at the progression at which I have aged, I don’t want to think of what I’d look like at age100! I have every intention of informing my family that I would like a closed casket since I missed my opportunity at the age of 23 for anyone to kneel before my corpse and remark “she looks good”.
In addition to nutrition, there is exercise, or the lack of it. Although it took weeks of searching before and after Christmas to find the wii fit game, it baffled me why this game was all the rage. The first thing it does is insult you with an audible wince when you step on the board. In addition, it tells others who step on the board that I’ve been sloughing off! Obviously the patient privacy act doesn’t cover the wii with its patronizing trainer. Yet, I also was swept up in the self flagellating habit of stepping on the board and allowing a 15” tall avatar order me to the point of exhaustion for an hour every day for weeks. Having then had the opportunity to go away for two weeks, the Wii was left behind. On my return, I was insulted for not stepping on that board, and found my avatar asleep. Did I mention that after exercising for a minimum of an hour every day for over two weeks I gained a pound and a half? I have stood up against grown drunk men the size of gorillas, as well as some of the bitchiest women on the planet, and never felt as intimidated as with the little avatar on the wii game. I’ve been home for more than a week and haven’t mustered up the nerve to start again. I am willing to admit defeat, thankful that we do not have tails – I'm not sure the diameter of my thighs would allow for the customary retreat!

To Sleep, Perchance to Dream....

I opened one eye to look at the clock. It was 2am and I still hadn’t fallen asleep. No worries I thought to myself, I didn’t really have to rise until 7:30. At 3:30am, I dragged myself out of bed and added 2 melatonin tablets to the Ambien cr I had already ingested at 11:00pm. By 4:30am, the jingle for the old Pepsodent gum commercial had infiltrated my subconscious and I was on the brink of a total breakdown. As I lay in bed trying to think of something else, the rhythmic breathing of my husband set a new background beat. I am always amazed at his ability to sleep whenever and wherever he chooses. I tossed and turned in bed, trying to jar him awake so that he could experience just a small amount of the sleep deprivation I had to endure on a nightly basis. But the tossing of the covers combined with the rhythm of his breathing only changed the tune in my brain from “You’ll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent!” to “in the jungle, the quiet jungle, the lion sleeps tonight….”

At 5:30am I surrendered to the god of insomnia and went downstairs to the family room. As I flipped the light on, Snow, our white Shepherd was sheepishly walking across the room. She glanced back at me with a look of annoyed resentment that I had invaded her space and caused her to move from the large overstuffed leather chair to the dog bed by the sliding glass door. The reluctant wag of her tail confirmed my suspicion that she heard me coming down the steps. I didn’t have to look at the chair to know she’d broken the rule of no dogs on the furniture. I was sure I could hear the cushion refill with air and there would be a tell tale amount of white hair left behind.

I clicked on the TV remote and channel surfed for about 30 minutes trying to find something worth watching. At last--I hit the power button, satisfied that if I ever do get a good night’s sleep, I won’t be missing anything worthwhile.
Stepping into the laundry room, I threw a load of dark colored clothes in the washer and hit the start button; making a mental note to throw them in the dryer before leaving for work. Then I trudged back up the steps to take a shower, before going to the office.

There is nothing that can forecast your day as much as the first cup of coffee in the morning. No horoscope or fortuneteller can be as accurate as that first sip. If it’s satisfying and smooth, you can approach the morning chores with great expectations. A bitter taste will start the day with a foul mood, if it’s too hot and burns your tongue, it will make you mistrust everyone you come in contact with for the day. This morning the first cup was like an elixir for the gods. It held the promise of a fantastic day! I put the register drawer in and unlocked the front door as the first customers walked passed the window. They were members of our seasonal “coffee club” who gathered each morning under the gazebo in front of the office. Laura had baked a fresh coffee cake to share with anyone who joined them. Yep, satisfying and smooth……a good day in the making!

Laura’s husband Peter was a maintenance manager for an office complex. He was telling us about on office full of furniture that was destined for the dumpster. Among the doomed, there were some conference tables he thought we might be interested in for our adult lounge. Wow, good coffee, delicious cake and a dumpster dive without having to actually crawl into the dumpster! This day was getter better and better. I decided to treat myself to another cup of coffee.

The rest of the morning was pretty uneventful, and in the campground business, that’s a good thing. We were prepared with our days events and every customer seemed to be pleased with their experience. It just doesn’t get better than this I thought to myself. I envisioned myself atop a lily pad floating on a still pond. I love my job! These people make it a pleasure to come to work in the morning. Life is good!

What I forgot to mention earlier, while I was expounding on the virtues of a good
cup of coffee, was that like everything else, there is a limited shelf life. The caffeine will eventually wear off, and sooner or later you have to ingest something other than coffee and cake to survive. I believe it to be a slow process that starts with the introduction of anything other than that great cup of coffee that makes the day’s compass needle start to shift. At first it’s not discernable, but by lunchtime you realize that your lily pad is now detached from its root, and has floated out of the pond and down a raging stream getting bashed on the rocks as it is tossed and shoved toward the river.

The first impact was the report from an employee that one of the weekend tent campers, from what we call the primitive section, has cut down a tree behind their campsite. My pulse soared to new heights. I had to reassure myself that I had, in fact, taken my blood pressure pill before I went to bed last night. Lucky for the camper, I couldn’t leave the store at that time and called Clayton, my husband, on the cell phone to go up to site 89 quickly before they could cut any more. Not so lucky for anyone else who might need to cross my path for the next couple of hours until my pressure leveled out. Moments later, I saw Clayton’s green F250 pull in past the office and turn into the campsite road. The need of vengeance was tugging at my soul and, I knew Clate was too level headed and diplomatic to exact any. He is after all, of English & Irish decent. Italians are much more genetically capable of revenge. I tried to find solace in knowing at least the people would be told to pack up and leave the premises; at most he’d get a few token dollars for the damage. No amount of money could replace the tree that had taken years to grow and survive in the clay soil and rocks. It wasn’t even possible to plant a smaller one and have it survive. The best thing would be to cut it down to ground level and cover it with dirt and leaves so that it appeared there was never a tree there at all. To leave any trace would plant the idea to play Paul Bunyan to the next group of campers to pitch their tent in that area.

News however, does spread fast in a campground, and we could rest assured that no other camper would make that same mistake this weekend. I glanced at the clock and realized that it was already 3pm. If we could just hold out another 7 or 8 hours, we could go home.

At 3:45pm, my lily pad was dashed against another rock. I walked into the back room to wash my hands. As I turned on the faucet, I heard a sucking sound and not so much as a drop of water fell. Rushing down the hall with the urgency of Paul Revere, I conveyed the message that the well was off. Again I saw the F250 pull out of the office headed towards the well house. The reset button was hit and within minutes all was well. One would think no one was the wiser, until you walked into the restrooms and had to flush all twelve toilets. My morning elixir of the gods was all but a distant memory.

If there were any other mishaps that afternoon, the staff knew enough not to bring them to my attention. They have learned the hard way that I possess a rather short fuse and once lit, there was no time to put enough distance between them and me not to be affected by the concussion of the resulting explosion.
Cashing out the register and running credit card reports are the last deed of the day. I did that while Clate did a quick run through cleaning of the restrooms and showers.

Engaged women everywhere should be sure that no matter what the premarital agreement encompasses, a clause is needed that exempts them from cleaning public toilets. This has proven to be the wisest thing I have ever done. When we first talked marriage, I stated I would not work at the campground. Even before the business became ours, it was obvious that this would not be practical. However, compromising with that agreement, gave greater leverage to sticking to the toilet agreement. After 30 years of marriage, I am still quite proud of that negotiation!
We stumbled home at 11:30 pm, another day closer to the end of the camping season, and the upswing of the wolf watching season. Gone are the days when the campground and store closed the end of October and the building became our storage unit for anything that was in the way at the house.

You don’t realize how much useless stuff you shift from place to place rather than dispose of it permanently, until you have to use the space in which you “temporarily” stored the stuff you weren’t using. The month of March was devoted to clearing out and shifting everything from the office, back to the house. Scientist have not yet discovered how to do the genetic altering that would be required to change the habits of generations of shifting and stashing useless stuff. We are a species of “hunters and gatherers”. It has nothing to do with food and survival, but rather the unending search for and collection of junk, and spaces in which to put it. I suspect this was the true reason we mortgaged ourselves to the teeth, spent our grandchildren’s inheritance, and built the addition to the main building which now houses our office, gift shop, lounge, kitchen and stockroom, as well as additional shower rooms. At first we looked around and had no idea what we’d do with all the additional space. But, alas, “stuff” is like water, it will seek its own level and seems to spread very rapidly to cover any open space around it.
When I walked down the hall, I could smell the familiar smell of sour laundry. The mental note to put the clothes in the dryer apparently went unread. I turned the washer on to rewash the same clothes once again.

By midnight I was sliding under the sheets again. This time I took the two melatonin capsules at the same time as the ambient cr. I woke feeling refreshed like I slept the night through. It still seemed too dark so I glanced at the clock. It was only 1:30 in the morning. I closed my eyes hoping I’d fall back asleep before another jingle entered my head…. Too late, the 60’s CD that was playing in the car two days ago began to play in my head and soon “Who wrote the book of love” got stuck on replay. Amazing how songs hit the charts with very few words repeated over and over!

I breathed a grateful sigh of relief when daylight streamed through the window. O.K., so maybe the window and screen are a little too dirty and dusty to allow light to stream. Let’s call it more of a glow. It’s hard to worry about clean windows when you are only in the house to sleep. Back in the office I became dizzy with anticipation of the coffee forecast. Or maybe it was the lack of sleep and too much melatonin. At any rate, the first sip was like a full body massage. Mmm smooth and satisfying! A good day.

Walking Camp Solo

I stepped out of the pool of light emanating from my porch lamp and plunged head on into complete darkness. “You’ve come a long way baby” I muttered to myself and grinned. Not even moonlight to guide me, I thought, as I glanced up at the sky.

I remembered a time not so long ago when I wouldn’t venture out to the mailbox after dark. Yet, here I was walking without a flashlight.

I was doing quite well in fact – until I heard the sound of a twig snap behind me. My heart began to pound as if a switch had been thrown and the hairs on the back of my neck stood at attention. I glanced behind me only to see a black void instead of the road I had just walked on. My senses were propelled into overdrive - listening – trying to tell if the noise were a bear, or a human. What was I thinking, walking in the woods on a moonless night without a flashlight?! Straining to hear was no use. The wind blowing the leaves and snapping small branches from the trees as they swayed to and fro, forced visions of elephants stampeding toward me; or worse yet, murderous gangs looking for their next target.

I quickened my pace, adding a mental note – next time, nudge my husband and make him get up – who cares how hard he worked today or how tired he is. This is clearly a guy’s job!

As I neared the corner of the field, my pulse started to slow and my breathing returned to normal. Whatever it was that was following me did not pick up on the scent of fear. I was still alive, getting angrier with every step that this outing was even necessary in the first place.

The glow up in the distance was my intended target and I knew it was wise of my husband to store the shells separate from the guns, because at this hour, I’d have been loaded for bear and not responsible for my actions. Taking slow deliberate breaths I tried to regain control of my emotions. My family swears that I have multiple personality disorder and at that moment I couldn’t deny the possibility. The personality I was feeling emerge at this moment was the one they named Yolanda. The first instruction given to new employees is to not do anything that might awaken Yolanda, who lies dormant in the far corners of my subconscious. Going along with the free pass for behavior given with the MPD diagnosis, I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply hoping that Francine, another of the cast of characters that have been assigned to my persona would appear. Francine has been described as the business woman who takes a more diplomatic and less dangerous approach to problem solving, unlike Yolanda.

The music and voices got louder as I approached, and I could see movement through the trees. A startled scream escaped from one of the women sitting to my left as my shadow cut into the circle of light from their campfire.

“It’s long after eleven” I said. “You should know better than this.” As I watched another camper jump up to turn off the radio, I scanned the group of inebriated campers sitting around the fire, trying to maintain an air of authority. My frown became a wince as my eyes settled on the seasonal camper who was the center of entertainment. Roger weighed about 350 lbs, and was bumping and gyrating to the music, wearing nothing but a Speedo. My speech became more rapid as I reminded them of the quiet hours, and sent them all back to their individual campsites. I wanted to hurry home, back to bed before the image burned itself into my brain forever. I immediately realized it was wishful thinking – even a cheetah couldn’t move that fast! When I reached the house, I flipped off the porch light and tiptoed back upstairs.

My body shuddered as I slipped under the covers. Recalling the suety flesh highlighted by the flickering light from the campfire was a vision I’d hoped to soon forget. Pulling the covers over my head must have awakened my sleeping husband. “Is it cold outside?” he asked, sounding exhausted. I shivered as I recounted my recent experience, and told him the next time was his turn. I could see him smile as he rolled over, draped an arm over me, and whispered “welcome to the campground industry”.