The Adventure
So, here I am, standing on the other side of Destiny. I walked through the fire and am now stronger because of it. I camped for a weekend with my boy and survived. Whew.
I must admit that it probably wasn't as bad to get through as I originally feared. At given moments, I may have even admitted that I was having fun. But it's still not something that I'll be making a hobby of any time soon.
The next one is in August. That gives me 4 months to recover.
We left off on Friday at 5. After I picked up Robo from school that afternoon, we went gathering mini toiletries and sleeping bags, quickly packed, grabbed some drive through, and we were off. The camp was held at a National Guard Reserve training base about 45 minutes away. We were sleeping in empty barracks and would be having our events at different locations around the base.
The theme was space, so Friday night we started with classes on star watching. We had a gentleman that was a scouter and a hobbyist star gazer come out and talk about the heavens. Then we went outside to look through his telescope. Jupiter is very prominent in the sky right now and we were able to look at that. The telescope was not powerful enough to see the colors of the planet, it was just a large bright spot in the viewer, but you cold see several small, very faint dots beside it in a straight line. Those were the moons! That is certainly more than I have ever seen before.
When we finally got ready for bed, it was like taming ferrets to get all those kids in bed and quite for lights out. We were sleeping on military mattresses. They were lumpy and hard and I couldn't help feeling that any direction I lay the weight up my body pushing down into mattress kept my feet higher than my head. I took comfort that at least we weren't in tents and the cold, but after I couldn't help thinking, "I remember the ground being so much more comfortable".
I eventually fell asleep and had fitful dreams of a Scout troupe mishandling the release of OS X Tiger for the Mac that happened on Friday (I seriously did---I don't often dream of my computing addiction, but I did that night). As tired as I was, not being able to settle down to sleep till Midnight, I still woke up several times during the night, finally getting up at 6:30. I showered in a concrete cube and was finishing getting dressed just in time to hear the retired drill Sergeant coming through with a bullhorn to wake the little troopers.
On that Saturday, we started by going down to a lake front and having a demonstration of the bomb/dope sniffing patrol dogs that the military uses. There's nothing that stirs the hearts of young boys like a cool dog attacking someone. Robo had gone out without layering himself up against the morning chill, so eventually he and his long sleeve T-shirt came over and wanted me to wrap him up my coat. We stood there, both as much in the coat as we could be, watching the rest of the dogs like a two headed monster. He was pretty conscientious about his sweatshirt and other warm weather gear after that.
We spent the after noon learning about the physics of flight from by daughter's physics teacher, who was coincidentally also very active in scouting. We assembled and launched home-made Estes rockets, building them out of sheets of paper and cardboard. After launching 48 rockets, we moved the group down to the river where we used binoculars to see a bald eagles nest that was nearby, then after dinner it was off to the Strategic Air Command (SAC) museum.
I thought to myself, this is the part that I'm going to dig. I've always been kind of a "neck up" sort of person. I would enjoy it if this were a chess camp, or a science camp or something like that. Not all the running and jumping and hiking and battling the elements---but that's pure Robo. But now, here we were surrounded by science and history. We started all as a group watching a movie about the exploration of Mars. This was becoming my kind of camp.
Next we were split into 3 groups, and ours was taken first to the flight simulators. Every one under 4 ft rejoiced. Things took a severe right turn to being Robo's kind of camp again. These flight simulators are not your granddads PC game flight simulators. These babies are machines that raise up and, as you are watching the simulation on the screen in a cockpit, are able to spin you 360 degrees in any direction. In the spirit of father and son, Robo and I were loaded into this claustrophobic little capsule with no windows, just a giant flight sim computer projection right in front of your face. Right before our flight lady click the door shut, she mentions that Robo is in the seat with the controls that determine who is actually piloting our trip---him or me.
We are raised up and I'm having a quick heart to heart with the boy to form a pact about spinning. I don't do spinning very well, you see. Ever since an ill-fated ride at a county fair carnival when I was young where I first experienced nausea without illness, I havent been able to tolerate anything that spins---not even when I swing dance. My inner ear isnt what it used to be. I don't know how those ice skaters on TV do it.
After a brief slide that tells us what the controls do as I can feel us being lifted into the air, the virtual plane takes off. We aren't in the air thirty seconds when my little Tom Cruise starts the spinning. I was introduced to a concept I hadn't given much thought to, even though it's not a terribly complex concept. It's the barrel roll loop-de-loop---meaning that you go round and round in a left to right motion while at the same time flipping head over heels.
It wasn't long before I was screaming for him to stop. I don't think he could hear me over his laughing.
I reached over and found that precious button that gives me control and hit it, exercising my authority as a parent to make executive decisions. I flattened it out the flight, thanking God for every quarter I spent on a game machine in my teens that gave me the skill to do this quickly. But the boy, knowing that control was just a playstation thumb motion away, was toying with me. He waited just long enough to see the color return to my face and he took control, laughing from his belly like I haven't seen in ages, and we were back on the brain scrambler. We went through that routine several times, me taking control, him waiting like time a punch line before taking back control. For him it seemed to get funnier every time. I was hating life more and more with every turn.
He finally gave me control when I bribed him by telling him that I would let him ride a second time alone if he stopped and he could flip as much as he wanted then. I took control and kept her steady until the ride ended. After stepping off the longest 5 minutes of my year so far, I realized what a bargain that ride was. It was $5 for each of us to ride but I rationalized the cost by thinking how the $5 for Robo was to ride which he seemed to enjoy. My $5 I attributed to paying them to let me off the ride after 5 minutes----the fools, I would have paid so much more.
I bought a 7up type drink from the soda machines to try to settle my poor stomach and Robo got in line again. When it was his turn I couldn't even watch his ride as he turned the machine into some kind of psychotic blender. I shook my head at the thought that I had sired a crazy man.
When the ride finally ended and they opened the hatch, I was sure I was going to terrified shell of my child, victim of his own lunacy. But instead it opened to a beaming face, and in true Robo form, the spinning actually seemed to agree with him---his hair look great.
We finished the rest of the museum tour looking at the traveling exhibit dealing with the Mars missions, and then through the antique aircraft section, none of which I enjoyed as much I would have liked. I was too busy trying to remain standing, the only thing going through head was I can do this, I can make it through this. Each minute brought me closer to bed so I could sleep this awful feeling off.
I'll tell you what, though, when we got back to the barracks and every one got in bed, it was a whole lot quieter than the night before. The value of sleep sold itself after that day of running around in the wind.
I was up the next morning again before the megaphone came through and we were onto the packing up.
When cleaning up the barracks and mess hall and other area's we had used, something strange happened. Something deep inside of me was touched off and I found a part of me that buried under years of higher education and job hunting. This place in me that had learned to keep and take pride in a sharp campsite; to leave a place in better condition than I found it; and to rally other younger members to launch off with the same purpose as a team. We rounded up the scouts and worked shoulder to shoulder cleaning and packing up like a well oiled machine. I stood there and felt a glimmer of purpose dancing behind my eyes. There is value to this after all---we're shaping character and building leaders. I felt that maybe I was standing a little taller.
Luckily, I was completely surrounded by things that plug in to the wall less than two hours later. The feeling passed before the DVD tray had fully loaded the movie I would be finally finishing for the next couple hours.
I have too much respect for progress to throw all this technology out the window just like that. You have to honor the sacrifice of your predecessors, you know.
I must admit that it probably wasn't as bad to get through as I originally feared. At given moments, I may have even admitted that I was having fun. But it's still not something that I'll be making a hobby of any time soon.
The next one is in August. That gives me 4 months to recover.
We left off on Friday at 5. After I picked up Robo from school that afternoon, we went gathering mini toiletries and sleeping bags, quickly packed, grabbed some drive through, and we were off. The camp was held at a National Guard Reserve training base about 45 minutes away. We were sleeping in empty barracks and would be having our events at different locations around the base.
The theme was space, so Friday night we started with classes on star watching. We had a gentleman that was a scouter and a hobbyist star gazer come out and talk about the heavens. Then we went outside to look through his telescope. Jupiter is very prominent in the sky right now and we were able to look at that. The telescope was not powerful enough to see the colors of the planet, it was just a large bright spot in the viewer, but you cold see several small, very faint dots beside it in a straight line. Those were the moons! That is certainly more than I have ever seen before.
When we finally got ready for bed, it was like taming ferrets to get all those kids in bed and quite for lights out. We were sleeping on military mattresses. They were lumpy and hard and I couldn't help feeling that any direction I lay the weight up my body pushing down into mattress kept my feet higher than my head. I took comfort that at least we weren't in tents and the cold, but after I couldn't help thinking, "I remember the ground being so much more comfortable".
I eventually fell asleep and had fitful dreams of a Scout troupe mishandling the release of OS X Tiger for the Mac that happened on Friday (I seriously did---I don't often dream of my computing addiction, but I did that night). As tired as I was, not being able to settle down to sleep till Midnight, I still woke up several times during the night, finally getting up at 6:30. I showered in a concrete cube and was finishing getting dressed just in time to hear the retired drill Sergeant coming through with a bullhorn to wake the little troopers.
On that Saturday, we started by going down to a lake front and having a demonstration of the bomb/dope sniffing patrol dogs that the military uses. There's nothing that stirs the hearts of young boys like a cool dog attacking someone. Robo had gone out without layering himself up against the morning chill, so eventually he and his long sleeve T-shirt came over and wanted me to wrap him up my coat. We stood there, both as much in the coat as we could be, watching the rest of the dogs like a two headed monster. He was pretty conscientious about his sweatshirt and other warm weather gear after that.
We spent the after noon learning about the physics of flight from by daughter's physics teacher, who was coincidentally also very active in scouting. We assembled and launched home-made Estes rockets, building them out of sheets of paper and cardboard. After launching 48 rockets, we moved the group down to the river where we used binoculars to see a bald eagles nest that was nearby, then after dinner it was off to the Strategic Air Command (SAC) museum.
I thought to myself, this is the part that I'm going to dig. I've always been kind of a "neck up" sort of person. I would enjoy it if this were a chess camp, or a science camp or something like that. Not all the running and jumping and hiking and battling the elements---but that's pure Robo. But now, here we were surrounded by science and history. We started all as a group watching a movie about the exploration of Mars. This was becoming my kind of camp.
Next we were split into 3 groups, and ours was taken first to the flight simulators. Every one under 4 ft rejoiced. Things took a severe right turn to being Robo's kind of camp again. These flight simulators are not your granddads PC game flight simulators. These babies are machines that raise up and, as you are watching the simulation on the screen in a cockpit, are able to spin you 360 degrees in any direction. In the spirit of father and son, Robo and I were loaded into this claustrophobic little capsule with no windows, just a giant flight sim computer projection right in front of your face. Right before our flight lady click the door shut, she mentions that Robo is in the seat with the controls that determine who is actually piloting our trip---him or me.
We are raised up and I'm having a quick heart to heart with the boy to form a pact about spinning. I don't do spinning very well, you see. Ever since an ill-fated ride at a county fair carnival when I was young where I first experienced nausea without illness, I havent been able to tolerate anything that spins---not even when I swing dance. My inner ear isnt what it used to be. I don't know how those ice skaters on TV do it.
After a brief slide that tells us what the controls do as I can feel us being lifted into the air, the virtual plane takes off. We aren't in the air thirty seconds when my little Tom Cruise starts the spinning. I was introduced to a concept I hadn't given much thought to, even though it's not a terribly complex concept. It's the barrel roll loop-de-loop---meaning that you go round and round in a left to right motion while at the same time flipping head over heels.
It wasn't long before I was screaming for him to stop. I don't think he could hear me over his laughing.
I reached over and found that precious button that gives me control and hit it, exercising my authority as a parent to make executive decisions. I flattened it out the flight, thanking God for every quarter I spent on a game machine in my teens that gave me the skill to do this quickly. But the boy, knowing that control was just a playstation thumb motion away, was toying with me. He waited just long enough to see the color return to my face and he took control, laughing from his belly like I haven't seen in ages, and we were back on the brain scrambler. We went through that routine several times, me taking control, him waiting like time a punch line before taking back control. For him it seemed to get funnier every time. I was hating life more and more with every turn.
He finally gave me control when I bribed him by telling him that I would let him ride a second time alone if he stopped and he could flip as much as he wanted then. I took control and kept her steady until the ride ended. After stepping off the longest 5 minutes of my year so far, I realized what a bargain that ride was. It was $5 for each of us to ride but I rationalized the cost by thinking how the $5 for Robo was to ride which he seemed to enjoy. My $5 I attributed to paying them to let me off the ride after 5 minutes----the fools, I would have paid so much more.
I bought a 7up type drink from the soda machines to try to settle my poor stomach and Robo got in line again. When it was his turn I couldn't even watch his ride as he turned the machine into some kind of psychotic blender. I shook my head at the thought that I had sired a crazy man.
When the ride finally ended and they opened the hatch, I was sure I was going to terrified shell of my child, victim of his own lunacy. But instead it opened to a beaming face, and in true Robo form, the spinning actually seemed to agree with him---his hair look great.
We finished the rest of the museum tour looking at the traveling exhibit dealing with the Mars missions, and then through the antique aircraft section, none of which I enjoyed as much I would have liked. I was too busy trying to remain standing, the only thing going through head was I can do this, I can make it through this. Each minute brought me closer to bed so I could sleep this awful feeling off.
I'll tell you what, though, when we got back to the barracks and every one got in bed, it was a whole lot quieter than the night before. The value of sleep sold itself after that day of running around in the wind.
I was up the next morning again before the megaphone came through and we were onto the packing up.
When cleaning up the barracks and mess hall and other area's we had used, something strange happened. Something deep inside of me was touched off and I found a part of me that buried under years of higher education and job hunting. This place in me that had learned to keep and take pride in a sharp campsite; to leave a place in better condition than I found it; and to rally other younger members to launch off with the same purpose as a team. We rounded up the scouts and worked shoulder to shoulder cleaning and packing up like a well oiled machine. I stood there and felt a glimmer of purpose dancing behind my eyes. There is value to this after all---we're shaping character and building leaders. I felt that maybe I was standing a little taller.
Luckily, I was completely surrounded by things that plug in to the wall less than two hours later. The feeling passed before the DVD tray had fully loaded the movie I would be finally finishing for the next couple hours.
I have too much respect for progress to throw all this technology out the window just like that. You have to honor the sacrifice of your predecessors, you know.
posted by Will at 2:17 PM
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