My Night in the Tent

So in preparation of my upcoming vacation in America, I spent last night sleeping in the tent. First, Jana tutored me in how to set it up--amazingly easy!! I remember my dad laboring for hours to put up the old canvas tent that we used to camp on. This one is smaller of course, but it's a ten minute job, max, for two people.

After watching a couple of episodes of Better Call Saul with Jana, I decided to try it out. I put the sleeping bag in, got my house keys and my kindle and my phone and climbed in.

It was pitch black in the tent. By the combined light of my Kindle and my phone, I unzipped the sleeping bag and placed it on the inflatable sleeping mat. Now, I am pretty particular about my sleeping habits. One of my 'rules' is that my body must be warm but my feet must be cold. So I set about trying to find a way to have the top and the bottom of the sleeping bag open.

I sat up and grabbed the zipper, which, of course was stuck. I gave it several sharp tugs in both directions to no avail. Finally, with a Herculean effort I ripped it open...It unzipped completely, converting my sleeping bag instantly into a large blanket. OK, I thought, that will do.

Then I set about zipping and unzipping various entrances of the tent, deciding to leave one flap open for air, because I like the air, cool but not cold.

Finally I settled back with a sigh to read the book on my Kindle, Dies the Fire an entertaining book, if transparently ripped off of  Stephen King's the Stand. I was aware that the mat I was on was not really as comfortable as I thought it was going to be. But I reckoned I would still be able to sleep on it...fortunately there are no stones in our yard and I had gotten up at 5 o'clock, so at this point--it was close to 11.00 pm at this time--I was pretty bushed.

I read a paragraph or so...the dim light of my kindle was sort of strange in the otherwise pitch dark of my tent. I sat up. It sounded like something was...sniffing at the tent. A dog...or...I don't know...some kind of... wild beast. Could it have been our cat, Stripey? Had one of the kids let him out? Then the thought hit me--shit! Had I brouht my keys?

I searched with my hand around me in the dark, trying to locate my cellphone. I knew I had brought that, but I couldn't find it. Finally, using the light of my Kindle, I located it. I used the cellphone's light to search for my mising house keys. Where were they? Then I was torn between using the cell-phone's light to search or the kindle's light. The Kindle light pretty much stayed on all the time, but was dim and not very helpful; on the other hand, the cell-phone's light was blindingly bright but only lasted for about 30 seconds. Which one would be more effective in my search? I frantically searched the floor of the tent, running my hands along the vinyl(or whatever) floor. No dice.

I squatted onto my haunches, pushing the sleeping mat over to one side. Had the keys fallen under the mat? But surely I would have felt them? The ground was a bit hard but it didn't feel like keys, but maybe the mat had sort of softened the keys into feeling like hard ground? Anything was possible.

I sighed. Either I hadn't brought the keys or they were lost in the dark of the tent, which is about the size of a queen-sized bed. There was nothing else to do. I was out of options. I called my girlfriend.

She answered and I explained my predicament. She laughed. She told me she'd bring me out her keys. I waddled, duck-style, over to the tent-flaps and unzipped them. There are a lot of tent flaps. There's like a screen against bugs; and an outer layer; and over all there is this sort of tent's tent designed to keep the tent dry in case of rain. It's like trying to unzip a chastity belt!! I thought.

Finally, I got out of the tent and managed to stand. The grass was wet and freezing cold to my bare feet. I should have put my socks back on. I felt like an idiot. My girlfriend came out and gave me her keys. "Good luck!" she cheerfully said and went back up to bed.

I crept back into the tent and laid down. Having opened it and stepped out, I had let a lot of cold air in. I glanced at my phone. It  was 45°. Actually a bit nippy. It had reached 20° earlier that day. Which I guess is about 70°. I'm not exactly sure. My phone shows Faherenheit but every other gauge in my world shows Celsius, so it gets a bit conffusing. I know what both mean but I don't know how to translate them into each other. Anyway.

So now I was cold. Now I wanted to zip up the sleeping bag again. I sat up, but in the darkness of the tent, it just wasn't happening. Fuck it, I thought and laid back with the sleeping bag swaddled messily around me, which I found none to comfortable. I read for awhile but the light was irritating and I was very tired. So I set the Kindle aside and put my headphones on. I listened to music for awhile and probably started to drift off to sleep. I took my headphones off and listened to the sounds of the night which were very relaxing. I heard slight breeze and the drunken sounds of some neighbours cavorting from somwhere down the hill...In the woods near our house, i heard some sort of bird crying out...some kind of owl, I expect. A screech oul? But it didn't sound like a screech. It was really kind of hooting, but wasn't hooting like they hoot in the movies, so I guess it was not a classic Hollywood owl. But it was a nice sound--wait, what was that? Footsteps? Had someone crept into my yard? Were they standing over my tent, big Bowie knife in hand? The sound of panting again. Stripey? Some dog? A....a....warthog?
What if it was a rat or something and it tried crawling UNDER the tent...wouldnt' that be weird if I felt the shape of a rat burrowing under me? Yuck!

But that didn't happen and I fell into an uncomfortable asleep.
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I woke up. I quickly glanced at my phone. It was about 245 am. The sounds of our drunken neighbours down the hill were much more uproarious, though I daresay that had I been inside, I would'nt have heard them at all.

It wasn't them who had woken me up. It was my bladder. I really, really had to go. Friday night had been a night like any other so before watching TV with Jana I had prepared myself a big mug of steaming peppermint tea(oh, yeah: I definitely know how to party on a Friday night..)

So naturally now, there I was. Laying in the dark, with my bladder about to explode. I sort of debated to myself: should I go in the yard? I mean, it was two in the morning. The sun would shine tomorrow and I'm sure the piss would dry along with the rest of the dew. Or should I grope around for mine, or rather Jana's, keys and go inside? Torn between the civilized approach and the rugged man's man approach, I lay there. Damn, this was proving to be one uncomfortable night. Hopefully in America, I'll be so exhausted that I will sleep like a baby, I thought. But I was unconvinced.

Then it struck me. When we are in America, sleeping in Yellowstone or Grand Tetons or the Rocky Mountains, what was I going to do at night when I had to pee? I mean, you know...what about BEARS? They're nocturnal aren't they? Are they repulsed by the smell of piss? Or does it signify food for them? Should I bring a bottle to piss in? Or should I just stand right outside the tent to piss...or would I have to make my way to some nearby woods and piss? What if a raccoon or a fox attacks me mid-stream? I'd be helpless!! Questions without answers. Problems without resolutions.

With a groan I sat up. My back kind of hurt from the incredibly swift and easy job of setting up the tent. Well that would be just my luck. Incapacitated with a crippling two-week backache in America, while Jana and the kids were....you know, doing whatever we're going to do when we're camping...swimming in hot springs, cavorting with wild animals, communing with the ancient and unchanging gods of the natural world... And there I'll be. Stuck in a fucking tent, unable to move. My Kindle won't even be charged!

I stepped out of my tent. Socks off, of course. Damn was that ground cold! I tiptoed to the corner of my garden and let fly, pissing in near perfect arc, a joy a man finds only in the great outdoors and only at night. The partiers down the hill said something....I heard  Kde?'Nahoře! Tam! Divej!(Where? Up there! There, see?)

All went silent. My arc continued to merrily fly with no sign of abatement. I had consumed a LOT of peppermint tea. Normally I would have been proud of the masculine power and strength of it but it was cold!!

Suddenly the people down the hill all started laughing. Was it possible they were laughing at me? I peered in their direction. I really had(and have) no idea exactly where they were. Were they watching me piss in my own front yard and laughing at me? I comforted myself that, in the dark they wouldn't be likely to see any...details of my anatomy. I would just be some nameless neighbourhood dude to them.
Shit! Except I'm THE AMERICAN. I bet everybody knows I'm the American on the block! I'm the American! The guy who goes for his walk everyday with his huge headphones on! I bet everybody knows who I am. They see me driving that Edcentre School car! 

Awww screw it, what can you do?
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Back in the tent, I struggled to get comfortable again, zipping and unzipping zippers, shifting my body, rolling onto my side, stomach, back.

I must have eventually fallen to sleep because at about 4.25 my phone made the sharp, piercing ringing noise it makes to tell me someone's sent me a message on Messenger. It was Scott Gofta, this guy who I went to college with informing me and others that he would be attending the get together from college people along with his significant other and his toddler daughter when I was visiting New York City in June.

 I started thinking about how cool it would be to see all my old friends from my youth, now with children of their own, or at least in very serious relationships. Who knows? Maybe I will never see these friends again after next month. I felt a little sad about that, at the strange ways my life has led me, all the places I've lived, the conglomerations of friends who don't know each other, whose only common denominator is me. A man without history or roots. All the goodbyes of our lives.  How fleeting life really is.

 I thought of my son at my age, when I will almost certainly be gone...like my mother is gone.

Parting is such sweet sorrow, all that kind of crap.

The owl made it's noise.

I finally fell asleep again and woke up at the disappointingly early hour of 7.00. Aching. But only a little.