Dean,
Well said old son...and I'll take my way of life over any other I've ever had.
Wanna know foibles? Dad just dropped about 2400 cool ones into a new AC, and two
monthes ago a new water heater. Has to waste some of the days he has left in this
world cutting grass because "everyone does it" in this country. I will never do it
again unless it's helping him. Every form of living has it's price, no different for
'streams. But I've never met anyone who has a real passion for a house, especially in
those cookie cutter 'burbs. But, it is everyone's choice if they want to live that way
and I'll not put 'em down if they do live that way.
Now, as far as camping...off in the national forest this 4 day holiday weekend, the
only campground amenity being the quite and the relative cool of the Appalachian
hills. Took my toybox and had a ball with all the camping non-essentials. Seems I eat
better in the sticks than I do out of a bag on "main street". The new ARB
freezer/fridge ran all weekend off two Optima batteries (didn't even get to use the
solar panels) and I had to learn just where the "freezing" would start to keep the
darn thing from getting ice in the beverages. This thing is just incredible, been
riding around last two days cooling things in the back of the pickup...just because I
can. Wonder if I could start distributing these babies {like the AS, I've found a
great product to believe in.} Whilst in the boonies I can and do spend most of a day
putzing around the fire with the Dutch ovens and the iron skillets and the aluminum
foil, making most anything you can think off. Hope to do a Pineapple upsidedown !
!
cake in the Dutch oven this weekend. I've eaten hardtack and pemmican, C rations and
MREs, drank straight from the stream and from a expensive filter, carried everything I
needed to survive in combat and come back to America, in the 80 lb Albatross on my
back and I NEVER called it camping...adventure? sure..adrenaline dump?, you bet...fun?
not for a minute.
Camping has become, for me, almost the "bloodletting" of old, a way to rid myself of
the poisons of living in the city until my "sentence" is up (5 more years, 1 month!).
An almost spiritual return to a "simpler" time in my life, a return to innocense if
you will, a time when I give not one whit what else is going on in the world.
Folks think I am absolutly out of my tree to live in an AS during the week, then go
"camping" several weekends a month in the boonies. Yep, I can go to the store from the
boonies if I want, but, truth to tell, there isn't much that'll drag me outa the woods
for a 40 mile (one way) trip to "civilization".
Sorry folks, I did it again, all up on the soapbox... I'm really trying NOT to do
this, trying to hold down any posts and just "listen and learn" but sometimes my
passion just comes out when someone touches something I hold very dear. I need to just
save it all "for the book".
Planning tomorrow evenings escape to some short hikes on the Appalachian Trail,
Ralph
