Camping Trip

Day One.

We have been members of the Vineyard Church of Conroe for exactly two years now. I am very thankful that we found this particular church, as it consists of a very relaxed atmosphere. This, of course, does not mean that we are not expected to mature as individuals, but there is no condemnation from any of the members or the leaders. This does mean though that almost all of the people there enjoy having a good time wherever they are.

Because of this we decided that this year we wanted to join in on the annual church-wide camping trip at Fort Parker State Park. I myself had never been camping, because when I was a kid I lived in Mexico, which was sort of like camping every day. Then when I was older I lived with my mom and stepfather, who is from Pakistan, and so tended to avoid any kind of activity that meant he would have to interact with nature. Thankfully, my wife, Kelsey, had gone camping many times with her family and knew exactly what to bring on the trip.

So we packed everything up on Friday, the 5th of November, and made the two or so hour drive north to the camp site. The drive up there was quite uneventful, and we arrived at the park just after sunset. Other than having a bit of trouble finding the camp site we were staying at, the park itself was easy to navigate around. We decided to go camping at the last possible moment and so we ended up sharing a camp site with an older couple and their grandkids. Since they were staying in their camper, it seemed like a good idea.

When we walked up to the site, there was an overabundance of food laid out on the picnic table as everyone had pooled their food together for a massive camp meal. This worked out quite nicely for us as we had no food prepared and were quite hungry by that point.

That night we set up the tent without any trouble and turned in to sleep. Everything was fine until some time around three in the morning, when we were awoken by Ezekiel (my 1 1/2 year old) screaming bloody murder. We could not figure out what was going on until I noticed that his inflatable mattress was almost completely deflated. After what seemed an eternity of yelling on his part, I was saved by the wonder of technology in the form of my droid phone. I pulled up an episode of Blue's Clues on my phone and instantly Ezekiel calmed down. Of course since it was thirty degrees in the tent, we ended up watching the same episode about thirty times before he was comfortable enough under the blankets to fall back asleep. Wearily, I let myself fall asleep along with him.