It's probably all my fault ...

The first time I took my son, Jeff, on a campout he was barely old enough to sit up. He and I went car camping at Rocky Springs on the Natchez Trace. It was just us guys ... and I know he was only barely old enough to sit up because while I was putting up our pup tent, he didn't sit up. In fact, even though I had sat him safely in the middle of the picnic table while I put up the tent and when I turned around he wasn't on the table any more. He was on the ground in the gravel and dirt. Oops!

As I remember--and it was probably 35 years ago--he didn't cry or scream or whimper; in fact, he made no sound at all. (I like to think that he landed on his hard head, so it didn't hurt him.) And I was glad his mother wasn't with us to scold me for being so careless ... So, it's probably all my fault that he's the way he is now ...

Sometime about that time, we put him in a backpack and hiked through Mammoth Cave in Kentucky. I figure when they turned out the lights and we stood there in the pitch dark, the trauma of the darkness probably worked on his young head. And in the winter we used to hike in the Smokies with him in the backpack. Maybe the cold got to him when we'd put him in the creek.

A couple of years later, his mother and I decided to take him on an overnight canoe trip on the Strong River from D'Lo to where the Strong runs into the Pearl River. We stopped at a sandbar that afternoon and scrambled up the side of the hill from the river to find a place to set up our tent. I think we cooked and ate down on the sandbar, but that night--his first campout in the woods--he "heard a bear" during the night. Of course, there weren't any bears in south-central Mississippi--probably an armadillo--but he was convinced that a bear had walked by our tent. I know he slept, because I was awake off and on during the night listening to the sounds of the woods and the river flowing below us.

The next morning we loaded the canoe and headed on down the river. We came to a section of riffles (there really aren't any navigable rapids in Mississippi) and I saw an inner-tube that had washed up on the side of the riffles. I asked Jeff if he'd like to ride the rapids on the inner-tube and he said he would, although his mother wasn't sure it was such a good idea. We got out of the canoe at the top of the riffles and got the inner-tube and read the river to see how he would float. Then I scrambled down to the bottom of the riffles so I could catch him when he came floating down to me. I signaled to my wife to turn him loose and all was going well until his inner-tube went left when I had thought it would go right. He quickly caught the current and went to the opposite side of the river from where I was standing. Did I swim after him? No! I just stood there with my mouth open wondering why I had mis-read the river. Suddenly, I thought I'd better go after him, but by that time he was past me and floating on down the river and the canoe was at the top of the riffles. By the time I got to the canoe, my wife and I had paddled through the riffles, and caught up with him, he was well down the river, just floating and watching the scenery, seemingly not worried about a thing. Maybe the trauma of that made him the way he is ... and it's probably all my fault.

I remember several car camping events after that and another trip down the Strong River, but nothing that would serve to shape him until we sent him to a summer camp in North Carolina. At that summer camp, he slept in a cabin with screens for windows  all summer, hiked on the high mountain trails, swam in cold lakes or the ice cold creeks, learned to build fires with one match and no paper, and camped in the rain and under the stars in some of the most beautiful parts of our nation.

When we lived in Colorado for a few years, he and I once skied with backpacks up to Tennessee Pass near Leadville in January and camped on six feet of snow at 13,000 feet at -15 degrees ... maybe it was the thin air, or the cold night, or something else that made him the way he is now ... and it's probably all my fault. Or maybe it was the backpacking down to Horseshoe Mesa in the grand canyon, or rock-hopping above Moraine Lake in Canada, watching for grizzlies while hiking in Glacier NP, or watching shaggy mountain sheep in the little town of Waterton Lakes. There was bound to be something we/I didn't foresee to make him like he is ...

So, several years ago, he and his new wife moved to Oregon where they can hike, backpack, raft, and bicycle at least every other week. The get to gaze on Mt. Hood everyday. They've hiked the 90 miles of the Wonderland Trail around Mt. Ranier, snow-shoed around Crater Lake in January, climbed Mt Adams in Washington (three times) and South Sister near Bend, rafted Hell's Canyon in Idaho, canoed on unimaginably beautiful lakes in Oregon, and now he wants to climb Mt. Hood. What is wrong with this guy? He even gave his wife an engagement ring at the top of Multnomah Falls, and when he gets lazy she pushes him to get out on the trails ... I know it's all my fault! 

He keeps inviting me out to Oregon to hike with him and his wife ... and we went out last summer for a short backpack up to the Green Lakes area. He remembers going with me when I could do 15 or so miles a day ... but not any more, especially at altitude ... but he can ,,, And does ... And he really loves it!

I've ruined him, haven't I? And all because I left him on the table while I was pitching the tent. Do you think I'd do it all again? In a heartbeat ... his head is a lot harder now!