Trips are never ordinary..even if they are only thirty minutes from home. Our camping along the Four-Pines Trail of the National Parks and Wildlife Recreation Area in Ratcliff, TX turned out even better, extraordinary. We set our clocks to leave at 4:30, weighed down the car with our expedition camping packs, and headed for tall Loblolly Pines and campfire stories. We made it half a mile and stopped at Krogers for some Chef-Boyardee cans, beans, hominy, tortillas, tubberware..... we truly could have survived a week in Denali with what we had. In fact we had so much weight, Eric had to eat some of the candy bars before we started to help us out. That's what your were thinking, right Eric? By 6:00 we set foot on the trail, by 6:30 it was dark and moonlight was our guide..and the 10 AA batteries for the heavy duty flashlight.

Out of all the gear we brought, there simply wasn't enough room for matches. So, Eric pulled out the magnesium block and we learned a lesson of fire starting 101. I tried my hand a dozen times to ignite the paper, but came up flameless. Eric, of course, used a fraction of the shavings and lit the entire paper on fire. You'd think he could climb a 5.10 his first day at Reimers...oh, that's another story. Once the fire moved from leaves to kindling, out came the barrage of tubberware, cans, and silverware. (I admit, the spoons were mine). Everyone feeling plump and happy, our campfire conversation started at "What's your favorite color?" and ended with deep talks of faith, God, and our life experiences. Of course, there is always the interlude of watching burning plastic drip flames of fire from the end of a stick.

By 1 am we were all five huddled in the pop-up-condominium, guys to the outer edges in case of wild animals, and added in the last bits of conversation until the silence of sleep took over. Then came the coyotes. At 4 am, their duet was more than I could muster, so a shush was in order. Then came the crickets. How do you shush a cricket? By 7am, I peeled the eyelids open to every bird song in the book and decided not to fight it any longer. After a quick trail run, I started cracking every branch, twig, and log I could find to build up the perfect boy scout tee-pee fire. How they slept through my racket, I don't know, but at least they woke up to warmth. By 8:30 it was 50 degrees and everyone was back at the fire. Eric gave his infomercial on the Fishing Solution knife (only $49.95) that he sold in high-school and we began to pack up our spreading plethera of gear, including a 7 foot twisting vine now neatly hanging from my apartment ceiling. We got back to the parking lot, resunk the car shocks with camping gear in Karen's trunk, fitted the vine into Candice's car, and headed down to Ratcliff lake for a few last moment before heading back to reality.

On our way back to the cars, Eric noticed a small bat on the step to the restroom area by the lake. Our first thought was, it's dead. Then it started shaking a bit and I noticed a small cut under it's chin. I put a small twig by it's feet and sure enough, it grabbed on and hung. We looked for some dark hole to put it in when they noticed some peeping coming out from behind the bathroom sign nailed to the beam above us. We found a hole just big enough for it to squeeze in and presto, it crawled in like it was home again. Not only did it seem good by its enthusiastic climb behind the sign, but mom, dad, and all the rest of his family let out approving squeaks of joy! We all got the warm fuzzy feeling of heroism and headed home.

Where was I? Where else would I be?