Not a Happy Camper

When I was about nine I went on my first camping trip with my Girl Scout Troop. We camped out in a house. I think it was raining. But it was fine. Because we were in a house.

Then when I was 12 or 13 my parents bought a camper. It was a pop-up with a bed for them and space on the cold, hard ground for my siblings and me. No privacy for anybody. No bathroom. No kitchen.

I remember taking one week-long trip in it where we went to a state park in West Virginia and took in some of the local attractions. But for the most part it was used on summer weekends to "get away". Why anyone wants to get away from indoor plumbing is outside my comprehension. My mom and dad didn't want to get so far away that we couldn't get back for church on Sunday so most times we went to a "campground" in Belden, Ohio. It was a field with a public bathroom. There was absolutely nothing to do. (Although because there was nothing to do, I was allowed to drive the car around the field so my parents wouldn't have to listen to me whine. At 13, this was enough.) By the time I was 15 I was exempt from those weekend trips and allowed to stay home or spend the night with a friend.

As more of us left home, my parents' campers became more luxurious. By the time all of us were out of the house, my parents had upgraded to a camper with a kitchen, bathroom and enough beds to accommodate six people if you converted the dining area into a bed. By this time, they'd also moved on to a different campground that featured a lake for swimming and some other amenities. I decided to take my son, who was probably four or five at the time, to visit for the weekend. I was afraid Jason would fall out of the top bunk (especially since he'd be in a sleeping bag) so I took that one. While I didn't fall out, I found it very difficult to turn over. I had to almost sit up to get turned. Just enough to bang my head on the ceiling every time I moved. Jason was welcome to spend as much time as he liked with his grandparents on weekends, but this was not going to become part of my weekend routine.

Years later after I'd moved to Texas, my then-husband decreed that we should have a camper. He had located a used Airstream that we could buy for $5K. (If memory serves, this was in the late 80s or early 90s.) I thought it might be fun. I went out and bought a TV, linens, dishes -- everything you need to be at home on the open road. And the shopping trip was the most fun I had with it because that thing never left the driveway. He sold it a year or so later for a few thousand less than what we paid for it and didn't even take the TV or anything else I bought out of it. "Not a Happy Camper" does not even come close.

So when Mark said he thought we should buy a camper, I reminded him that my idea of roughing it is a Motel 6 and that we are "city" people. I usually have to remind him of this at least once a year.