The Simple Life: Camping as a Kid

Growing up, I anxiously looked forward to the 2 annual camping trips my family would take. We joined up with family friends Arvid and Marilyn and their son, Dean. We opened up and aired out the pop-up camper, vaccuumed it, swept out spider webs, and made sure it was in tip top shape. And, of course, we had the requisite red and white metal chamber pot just in case you needed to...you know...in the middle of the night. My sister, Kierra, and I would sleep in the camper a night just to test it out. When everything was clean, we declared it ready. My parents had us pack our clothes into our "suitcases", brown paper grocery bags with our name in marker. We drove over to the Fond du Lac County Park, looped around the little curve, and set up camp.

We loved catching crayfish in the river and dared them to scoot away in a cloud of mud before we captured them. We set off firecrackers. Ate our treat of Peanut Butter Cap'n Crunch cereal in plastic orange and purple bowls. Played cards under the screened-in-tent attached to the pop-up. Packed the Tenpas clan in like sardines (there were 7 of us). Learned to ride a 2-wheel bike for the first time. (Painful post to come at a later date.) Made friends with the neighboring camp kids. Loved every single second.

One memory in particular stands out. I was about 7 or 8. My older brothers, Dean, Brad, and Eric, caught a bunch of minnows. My mom had just made sinfully amazing chocolate brownies with 2-mile-thick fudge frosting. So, the only logical thing to do was to drop one of the minnows into the sea of chocolate, cover him over, and give it to Arvid. I nearly died trying to contain my amazement when Arvid took the brownie, shoved the entire thing in his mouth, and chewed it up, minnow and all.

All I could imagine was a little minnow swimming around in his stomach. Arvid still does not believe us to this day.

And, the best part?

It wasn't until about 5 years ago that I realized we drove exactly 2.386 miles from my house to the campsite. But we loved it and didn't care how far we drove. Hey, it kept us happy...and humble.