thoughts on the small and mighty

although i am not a native, i grew up in the sticky swamps of southern and central florida. admission of the land of my youth is always met with surprise and a detectable note of revulsion. considering that i live in minneapolis, i guess i can understand why people are so shocked that i moved from florida (orlando to be precise, which is a double whammy.) over the years that i have resided here, i've found that minnesotans LOVE to camp, and they really have good reason to, especially regarding the northern borders. this is one activity that i haven't been able to relate to, since my family was decidedly not wilderness-bound while in florida. who in their right mind would want to throw their sleeping bag down in a sandy, red ant infested, flat, mosquito ridden forest; a landscape with no promise of glittering lakes or charming wildlife or rocky cliffs? i do remember taking some lovely canoe trips as a child, but it seemed kinder to just sleep in the boat rather than try to camp. alligators, anyone?

anyhow, this weekend, i think i passed my final induction as a certified minnesotan of sorts (after all, my parents are from here!) rob and i drove up to lutsen to camp with his sister and her best friend. rob's family is the sort that camp regularly every year, are NOT intimidated by yellowstone (nor do they confuse it for jellystone...) and are perfectly capable of cooking amazing meals on an tiny propane grill in the middle of the dark. this goes against everything i knew growing up. really, my parents and i even went out to eat on christmas eve. it's kind of sad in a way, because i never cultivated that humble sense of hearth and home. i think we ate out so much because we had no other family in florida, and my parents didn't socialize much, so to go out for meals was one way we integrated ourselves with the rest of the world. i think that rob was really excited to bring me into his environment, to show me the tents, lanterns, the rituals.




maybe it is because i have such limited experience in the wilderness, but there is something about being in the fresh air and surrounded only be trees and stars that rekindles a little bit of the fanciful dreamer that i was as a girl. i was the type of child who would stare into forests looking for telltale signs of unicorns and who would interpret unfamiliar markings in the backyard as evidence of a cavalcade or fantastic creatures. i did have two small experiences during my trip that satisfied my more romantic self. one was on the first day, when we were horseback riding in the hills. i saw a buck leaping into the grove of bushes just as i rode past. i know it doesn't sound that wonderful, but for a split second the willowy legs and white tufty tail of the deer looked like something more special. the second instance happened as we were packing up our site. i was scanning the ground for litter, and i saw what i first thought was a broken branch, but later turned out to be an antler. it hadn't been there the day before, so either something dragged it into our site, or a deer just pulled up to shed the horns and vanished. even though you aren't supposed to take anything from the campgrounds, i did bring it home since i didn't remove it from the animal myself. i have no idea what this object will be used for, and i really hope this doesn't signal a weird prediliction in me for tons of animal relic house decorations. yeah, if you come over, and you notice that i have a chandelier made out of horns or something, please pull me aside discreetly and punch me in the face.