My good friend Bill Dunn writes a weekly column for a publication in Connecticut. Nearly every week, we send each other our treatises, in hopes of eliciting mutual chuckles and gaining helpful feedback. Unfortunately (for me), his critiques of my work are usually funnier than the piece I had written (garsh darn, all to heck, his brilliant sense of humor).

Having suffered through the debacle of recent TSA instigated air travel delays, Bill wrote a couple of hysterical columns concerning his experiences with taking up communal residency within airport concourses (think: sleeping on well-trod and under-cleaned carpeting with hundreds of your less-than-closest friends).

However, he had the nerve to argue that his airport over-night housing experiences far surpassed all stories of inconvenience endured by campers — including the kind of experiences that involve torrential tent-collapsing rain, stealth skunk attack tactics, and marauding hordes of warrior mosquitos.

Bill, you may want to stop reading for the next few paragraphs, as I challenge your assertion with my most recent tale of camping — just skip down until you see, “OK Bill, you can come back now.”

This past weekend, I went camping with my 5-year old grandson. Just Papa and Kiddo — off for the adventure of a lifetime.

In the interest of honesty (since I’ll never be able to get away with lying about it), my “camping” style no longer holds the purity of roughing-it (think: eating food burnt over a campfire and sleeping in a small tent pitched over an ant colony).

I have a park model trailer (think: real toilet and hot shower), semi-permanently ensconced on a seasonal lot along the shoreline at a resort campground in Michigan’s Thumb.

It is a good thing Bill isn’t reading this part of my story. I would never be able to convince him that sleeping on a pillow top mattress in air-conditioned comfort, with food stored in a frost free refrigerator and cooked on a pilotless ignition stove compares, in any way, to his trivial airport woes (think: watching never-ending competing versions of CNN and Fox News, glowering at the arrival/departure screens, and inhaling the lingering aroma of tens of thousands of world travelers).

OK, it’s not really camping at all — it’s just hanging out in a not-very-big house for a few days (every chance I get). But, it is the 5-year old kiddo factor that makes this a story of struggle and endurance.

We arrived late on Friday evening – but not so late that we couldn’t have a fire, roast a half-bag of marshmallows, and (hopefully) build up a little desire to sleep in the next morning. However, the sleeping-in part never happened. I was awakened, within seconds of the first rays of the morning sun, with the excited query, “Grandpa, what are we going to do today?”

My still-asleep brain wanted to say, “I don’t know about you, but I’m going to have a cup of coffee and brush my teeth — and I don’t care in which order it happens.” Instead I said, “What do you want to do today?”

Ber-wa-ga-na Campground Resort, on the west side of Michigan’s Thumb, has a boatload of things for kids to do — including boats. Along with several playgrounds, a mini-golf course, a full game arcade, and arts and crafts classes on Saturday mornings, they also have bikes, kayaks, paddle boards, and pedal boats available. After seven losing rounds of tether ball (good grandpas always lose), one defeat at mini-golf (see previous statement of obligatory loss), an hour or so of frolicking at the beach (sunburn optional), and four successful blue gill snatches (catch and release fishing for us), I was finally done in by the pedal boat excursion.

I rented a two-person craft for a 30-minute “cruise” (go ahead – hum the theme song to Gilligan’s Island). It turns out that 30 minutes is exactly the amount of time it takes to peddle to the opposite shore and return — and then successfully collapse, in need of immediate medical attention. My fatigued body wanted to call out, “Someone, call 911.” Instead I asked, “Are you having a good time?”

His response was (and I am not making a word of this up), “This is the best day ever. Can we do it, again?”

It doesn’t get any better than that.

OK Bill, you can come back now. You were right. I concede. You had it much rougher than I did.

 

Larry Wilson is a mostly lifelong resident of Niles. His optimistic “glass full to overflowing” view of life shapes his writing. His essays stem from experiences, compilations and recollections from friends and family. Wilson touts himself as “a dubiously licensed teller of tall tales, sworn to uphold the precept of ‘It’s my story; that’s the way I’m telling it.’” He can be reached at wflw@hotmail.com.