To truly comprehend the splendor that is summer in the uncharted wilds of a Michigan Scout camp, you need to go back in time to a period when life was simpler, an era when man lived off the land, the age when dinosaurs were killed off by prehistoric mosquitoes the size of a Buick Regal.
As a fully gentrified urbanite, I only camp for two reasons:
• They’re playing “Moves Like Jagger,” because, who can resist that?
• There’s a new iPhone.
Years of the easy life have left me unprepared for the real camping, which is what Scouts do, which is why we were in Michigan, fighting off mosquitoes with baseball bats and small artillery.
When you or I or a small army of sugar-filled tweens show up in the woods, nature does not know we’re only camping. Nature witnesses the arrival of 35 plump city boys and their sweaty fathers as appetizers and a well-basted main course. When we stepped out of our minivan, 77 bajillion mosquitoes, mites, flies, spiders, ants, beetles — and whatever those things are that look like walking lint — heaved a collective sigh, licked their proboscis, and swooped in for the kill, because WE’RE NOT CAMPERS — WE’RE FOOD!
Fortunately, it’ll never happen again.
Scouting is about developing character. Scouts don’t go into the woods to merely camp: they go into the woods to survive. I have no doubt there’s some kind of “acceptable losses” percentage built into their roster.
As an example of Scouting’s idea of character building, I present you with their art installation we called “camp:” a wooden shipping pallet under a poorly repaired Vietnam War-era green canvas tarp.
It’s 342 degrees outside, and the insect buzz is so loud my son covers his ears and yells at me to turn down the forest. I think he said that; I don’t read lips.
All day we survived a canoe trip, an axe class, the port-a-potty poop saunas, an endless trudge through countless epic spider webs, and survived my son’s impressive Saint Vitus scream-dance every time he walked through one.
At dinner there was a moment of perfect peace. We were standing in a 50-foot clearing, no spider webs, no swamp-water mosquitoes, no rattlesnakes — perfectly safe. My son opens his mouth to say — I’m absolutely convinced here — “Gosh, Dad, I can just feel the character building inside of me.” But as soon as he opened his mouth, something prehistoric flew into it.
He screamed, then ran face-first into an oak.
Later that night, as we lay in the dark wondering when we’d get mauled by a bear, Junior had to pee. We opened the tent flap and shined our flashlights onto the ground.
It was writhing.
For a minute, I thought it had flooded, and we were floating down stream. That would have been better than the carpet of insects swarming under and around our tent. As far as the beam could shine there was a pulsing, roiling, ravenous ocean of bugs.
I told Junior he could pee out the back of the tent.
“I don’t have to go anymore.”
“Dude, it’s OK…”
“I DON’T HAVE TO GO, SHUT UP!”
Fortunately, Scouts had imbued us with a pioneer spirit and a powerful sense of ingenuity. For the rest of the week, we slept in the van.
