THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 26, 1994 TAG: 9406240201
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Tony Stein
DATELINE: 940626 LENGTH: Medium
Actually, I am, maybe, one-half with nature. I love to sit on my back porch and watch the squirrels and the birds and the trees. But I do not particularly enjoy getting out there and living among them.
{REST} I have tried, starting with the summer I became a Boy Scout. I went to a Boy Scout camp named Wauwepex. Accurately translated, Wauwepex was an Indian word meaning bad food, itchy straw mattresses and cold showers in the morning. The camp song started out, ``Hail thee, oh, loyal campers, the best of camps we come to praise.'' They lied.
Of course, I am bitter. I experienced a moment of mortification that still stings 53 years later. There was a famous national Boy Scout leader named Dan Beard. He was the 90-year-old patron saint of Scouting. And he came to visit Wauwepex one day.
There he was, standing behind me in the workshop. Men, this was like Mickey Mantle looking over your shoulder at a baseball game. Women, this was like Gloria Steinem or Phyllis Schafly (check your choice) visiting your home.
It was mortally hot, and sweat dripped in my eyes. Innocently, I asked if anyone had a rag. Dan Beard spoke. With a sneer in his voice that made me feel like a world-class sissy-baby, he said ``Young man, we don't give out hankies.''
I still squirm.
Then there was the Scout camping competition where I was to represent my troop in the semaphore signal competition. I was a hot-shot with the signal flags, a wig-wagging wonder. But just as the competition started, I had to go to the bathroom. Desperate. Dancing desperate, if you know what I mean.
In the contest between me and my bladder, I won. But it so destroyed my concentration that my assigned message came out verbal chop suey. I finished last.
My final camping trip as a Scout ended in a medical disaster. It rained during the night. I say ``rained.'' I mean it deluged. It inundated. It Johnstown flooded. I thought we would have to earn ark-building merit badge. However, being skillful Scouts, my comrades and I had prepared our tent site so well that we stayed dry.
Thus, I was quadruply mortified when my father came on what he thought was a dawn rescue mission. My mother had insisted he fetch me, and I reluctantly started to dress. I couldn't. I had slept on my right arm and it was somehow totally numb. I ended up with a doctor in attendance. Half an anxious day passed before I recovered.
When I was 17, three friends persuaded me to go camping with them in Maine. Our first night there, two friendly strangers directed us to an open field where we could bed down for the night.
About 1 a.m., here came the two ``friendly strangers'' walking stealthily toward us. Ha, I thought, I will finally realize my ambition to have my name in the newspaper. ``Camper Tony Stein slaughtered in robbery.'' I gripped a knife and vowed, should I survive, never again to sleep any place that did not have a locked front door.
The strangers turned out to be semi-drunk and very apologetic. They had parked their car and were walking home.
I broke my vow about locked doors when my son was a Cub Scout. Good daddy Stein went on a camping trip with the pack. The trip was pleasant - until my car got stuck in a mud patch, and I tore the muffler off getting out. The camping curse strikes again!
One of the last times I went camping was on a journey with a band of cave explorers. I was doing a feature story, and found the group to be mellow company. The first day went well. The first night went well. Was the camping curse receding?
On the morning of the second day, I was feeling so cocky that I volunteered to cook the breakfast eggs. Neatly, I cracked our egg supply into the pan. Expertly, I stirred and shifted. Then, intending to spread the last liquid trace evenly, I shook the pan.
It had a two-piece handle. One part of the handle I still held in my hand. The other part, pan and eggs attached, spilled on the ground. The other people ate potatoes for breakfast. I ate crow.
So now you understand. I have heard all that stuff about the great canopy of stars above the sweet sounds of the night.
You want to tell me about them, I'll listen. You want me to come along, and I will firmly refuse. Every time I try to embrace Mother Nature, she kicks me in the shins.
by CNB