A Week With Dad - or a Week Without Mom?

**NOTE** - This blog was originally written in May of 2007, I decided that it would be the first one I transfered over here as I have a friend who is attempting to do the same thing this week and though this might be inspiring - or at least he could learn from my mistakes.

A few weeks ago my wife traveled to Utah for a week to visit her mom and took our six year old daughter with her. She actually left the day before Bailey turned six so we celebrated together early. So that left me with our two boys for one whole week all alone. Just me and two boys, 9 and 3 from Wednesday May 23rd to Wednesday May 30th.No problem! Right!? Well, I am still deciding on whether it was a week with Dad or a week without mom, and I am just now recovering fully, hence the delay in posting this blog.

School ended on that Wednesday the 23rd so really I had it easy. No early morning routine to go through to get the 9 yr. old ready and no real responsibilities or activities to cover up the time. So I did what any good red-blooded-outdoor-loving-American Dad would do to make things as easy as possible - I took them camping.

Considering I had a 3 year old, this wasn't very high adventure camping. That, and our lack of general resources limits our abilities to fully experience the great outdoors in a manner suited to a more gregarious and aggressive camping regimen. In other words, I had just enough space in the trunk of our car for our food, camping gear, blankets, and fishing poles and just enough money for two nights in a campground in our little tent at Bastrop Lake State Park. (Campground camping can get a little pricey!)

We had the campground reserved for Thursday and Friday night and we could get there as early as 2PM on Thursday. It was all of my intention to leave around noon, but due to a tutoring appointment / play date in South Austin, we got a late start. By the time we pulled in to the campground, it was after 6PM. I had originally planned to take the boys fishing that evening, but by the time we got the camp set up I realized we wouldn't get the chance until morning, that is if we wanted to get dinner that night.

I am getting pretty efficient at setting up camp. The tent goes up now in about 10 minutes and thanks to the wonders of modern technology, the air mattress (an absolute necessity!) can be inflated in less than 2. (Note to self: remember to always charge the cordless 8 volt pump - worked great this time - not so good last time.) Other than that, it is just a matter of pulling out the camp stove and getting the fire started, you have to roast marshmallows of course!

For me, getting the fire started was not a problem. A guy in our ward let us have some wood lying around in his backyard from a tree he had cut down so it was good and dry. In all Texas State parks, you have to bring your own firewood or else too many people would gather all the good stuff and there wouldn't be any trees left at all. Bastrop Lake is in the Texas Piney Woods region and really has some beautiful trees so I am glad you have to bring your own wood. That and I don't have an axe or a chainsaw so it would have been difficult. Anyway, I know many methods for starting fires, campfires I mean, but the method I prefer most is "the white-man method" which consists of a can of charcoal lighter fluid and an ignition source (a match is preferred but a much more macho way is with a lighter - of course this is the way I do it). It is simple and easy and the big flames really impress the boys.

So it is not even 7PM and we now have the tent set up, our sleeping bags rolled out on the air mattress, a fire is burning and I am ready to cook dinner. I make sure the boys don't have to go up to the campground bathroom first and they say they don't so I start to cook (I learned this lesson last time too - twice warmed steak is just not that good) while they play with a Styrofoam glider that doesn't fly very well at all.

Kayson and Tyler had both decided they wanted steaks beforehand so my wife, who had graciously done our shopping, found us some cheap sirloins so I cooked them up with some fire roasted corn on the cob and a package of Fritos Honey BBQ Flavor Twists. MMM MMM MMM! A pretty good dinner, all things considered.

Up to this point the only talk about Mom was the occasional wondering whether her plane had arrived safely and if she had made it to her mom's house, which of course she had. But now, it was dinner time and I guess it was my first real test. While I tried to explain to the boys that in order for them to more fully appreciate the complete camping experience they needed to savor the taste of the corn naturally, my astute little 9 year old assured me that "Mom would have never forgotten the butter and salt because she would have been thinking of us and not just herself or the esoteric benefits of 'the outdoor experience'." (Where do 9 yr. olds learn the word 'esoteric' and how to make quotation marks with their hands anyway?)

"Yeah Dad." added my 3 year old emphatically.

Well, I assured them that the sooner they learned to eat their corn on the cob without butter or salt the sooner they would be able to roast marshmallows. This excited them a little and for a minute the 3 yr. old thought the corn tasted pretty good with ketchup, but after about three bites he said "Nope. Need butter and salt." and proceeded to wipe his tongue of with his shirt. Apparently Mom remembers napkins too, and not just that roll of paper towels from the trunk of the car either. Oh well, at least the Fritos were made of corn, sort of.

So next we roasted marshmallows. Well I roasted them, the boys just caught them on fire and tried to make monster noises with them. The 3 year old decided that the fire wasn't big enough and kept begging for me to throw more lighter fluid on it, I guess he couldn't burn his marshmallows well enough, so I did a few times, just to hear the glee in his voice and the little giggle he got when he saw the flames. After that, there wasn't much to do besides go to bed so we did, which was a good thing because it started raining soon after and we all went to sleep to the sound of rain on the tent, something I hadn't done in a long time. We slept pretty well too, warm and dry. That was Thursday.

Friday came with early rain, but then it let up and before the boys woke up I enjoyed a few minutes of peace and quiet in the woods (oh and the sounds of the nearby highway, and town – you have to go a really long way in Texas before you really "get away from it all" ). I rigged up their fishing poles and got some breakfast ready; pop tarts, honey buns and milk. Of course, being the well educated boys they are, they both thought it was gross that they had to drink the milk out of the carton. Again I tried to assure them that this is what you do when you are really camping. "Mom would have brought cups" piped in the 3 yr. old. "Yes, son, she would have, now drink your milk." was my only reply.

So we went fishing for a while, but the boys were too interested in playing Pokemon Trainer or something, so I caught a couple of small bluegill and let them reel them in, but they soon lost focus so I decided to see if they wanted to go for a hike. They both agreed that it sounded fun so we looked at the park map and decided it would be perfect if we took the Cream Trail and hiked on it until we met the main Red Trail to the scenic overlook.

It was a short hike, so there wasn't any need to take a lot of water or food, it was only going to take 30 minutes at the most. So I fed them some jerky and let them drink a Pepsi (Diet-Caffeine Free). Kayson, the 9 year old didn't finish his and wanted to take it with us so I let him, on the condition he had to carry it back out too. About 30 yards into the trees he finished, and not wanting to pass up the opportunity to teach him responsibility, I told him to put the can in his pocket. It was too big so I smashed it and zipped it in one of the cargo pockets in his shorts. He thought that was way cool because he finally had a use for those pockets. "WOW!" I thought, "if teaching responsibility were always this easy…"

We reached the Red Trail pretty easily but about two hundred yards later it started to sprinkle, then another two hundred yards it started to rain, and then pour. I wasn't sure how far we had gone but we had crossed a couple of little creeks and it was really starting to come down hard and not wanting to fight any potential flash floods with a 9 and 3 yr. old, I decided it was time to turn around. We were all soaked to the bone by now and Tyler (the 3 yr old) was holding my hand. I don't know how it happened, or whether it was me trying to pay attention to Tyler too much or my fogged up glasses, but all of a sudden we found ourselves in a place that didn't look too familiar. The trail was still good and the going was pretty easy, so I just kept pressing forward, even though I got this pressing feeling that we were off the Red Trail. Soon though, it became all too apparent and all of a sudden, we met up with the Grey Trail. Now, knowing that all the trails eventually merged back into the Red Trail, but having left the color coded map back at the car, and not being sure where exactly we were, we decided to continue heading east. So, further and further into the woods we went until finally we reached the road on the other side of the park, in exactly the opposite direction we needed to be. Well, I had figured out where we were now so I knew where we needed to go to get to the Red Trail and get back to the car.

"This was a bad idea, Mom, never would have gotten us lost" said Kayson the 9 yr. old.

"Yeah Dad, Mommy always knows the way" quipped his brother Tyler, the 3 yr. old.

"Well boys…" and I tried to explain that they were right of course but that sometimes we just get on the wrong trail but that if we don't panic, and we don't give in to the temptation to go deeper and deeper into the woods and just turn around and get back on the right path, eventually we will make it home to our destination, even through the blinding rain.

"Yeah, yeah Dad, great metaphor for life, blah, blah, blah. Why can't you admit you got us lost and it was a bad decision to go hiking in the first place" said Kayson, again the astute and pragmatic 9 yr. old.

"Yeah Dad, hiking in the rain was a bad idea!" said Ty, ending any hope at teaching them any philosophical and enduring truths. Maybe later, I guess that's what campfire talk is for.

Well we finally made it back to the car where I stripped their shirts and toweled them down, took them back to the tent and changed them and myself in to dry clothes. It was getting close to lunch and they wanted barbeque so we headed into town and ate some good Texas barbeque and then went to Wal-Mart to get some bottled water, baby wipes, hand sanitizer, chocolate and strawberry milk in individual plastic bottles, bananas and ice. Then, back across the highway to the woods. (See – really high adventure!)

We went fishing after that and all I have to say for that is that I am becoming one of the greatest bluegill fisherman the world has ever known. Using their two poles (I have long since learned the futility of even trying to rig my own pole) I caught an easy dozen fish in a little over an hour. Well, I hooked them and the boys reeled them in. Kayson was actually doing OK on his own until he found it was more fun to smash the worms with rocks and put them on ant piles.

It was getting late again so we headed back to camp for dinner. Our wood was wet so I used some lighter fluid to get the fire started again and as long as I kept plenty of fluid on the fire, it would burn just fine. We were going to cook hotdogs so I needed a good fire, but it would never really take so I showed the boys that you could cook them just as easily over the flame of the camp stove. They liked that and the hot dogs tasted great. I wanted to roast some more marshmallows but considering the boys' primary technique would make a mess of the camp stove, we just ate them out of the bag. It started to rain again so we retired a little early to bed. That was Friday.

On Saturday we got up early and saw that it was raining so I decided the boys had had enough so we broke camp after a quick breakfast of left over hotdogs, pop tarts and the strawberry and chocolate milk. Both boys decided that Mom would have left early too and that it was a good decision.

We made it home around 10 AM and I spent the rest of the day cleaning and drying out the tent, air mattress, blankets, sleeping bags, clothes, fishing equipment, and boys (I did bathe them first – a thing that I am sure my wife would have wanted). We have had a really bad mold problem in our apartment so I wasn't taking any chances. It took me the rest of the weekend to get it all cleaned, dried and squared away.

Monday was Memorial Day and since we had some worms left over, again I took the boys fishing. We had a good time and caught a lot of fish – I must repeat: I am the world's greatest bluegill/sunfish fisherman! The boys of course got completely wet and muddy from head to toe so I spent the next two days doing laundry, cleaning the cars and the house.

Deanna came home late on Wednesday evening and the boys were glad to have her back, and so was I. I missed her. And not just because she would now be able to take back all the chores and responsibilities she normally does, I don't mind that at all. I actually enjoy doing the housework, its pretty rewarding.

So no, it's not the work she does that I missed, but the quality she puts into it. And it's the little things too, like the salt and butter for the corn and the paper cups for the milk. That stuff is always there, it's a given and you can count on it.

It's like finding out before you wash them that Kayson has a smashed up Pepsi can in the zipper pocket of his cargo shorts (yep - washed them on Saturday and then remembered I had put it in there on Tuesday - talk about clean recycling) and using the hot/cold setting on the washer. (Who would ever know that she would be able to tell that I hadn't washed the jeans in warm water and rinsed them in cold? - I just thought those buttons and gadget thingys on their were just to help the salesman sell the darn things!) Well, she certainly can and that is the reason why I love her so much. That is just who she is, it just comes so natural to her and that is what I want for my kids, how I want them raised.

I have always thought that the biggest compliment I could ever give her is that she is the one I want raising my children. I can see in her all the things I want them to be and I know she will only allow the good things from me to filter down to them (I hope). She just does it all so much better, so much more efficient, and I guess I missed that most of all. I know, I know, it was only a week, but man, it was good to have her back. For the boys and for me, and for our daughter, for all of us, "She's everything I ever wanted, everything I need. She's everything to me"

Welcome!

Well this is a new blog I am creating that is more accesible to all than my previous blog I had on Myspace, and a lot less "social networky" and silly. Anyway, at first I am just going to gradually transfer some of my blog posts from there so some of you may have already read them, if not I hope they are still relevant. Mostly they are just the ramblings and musings of a father. Some may be a little personal and revealing but I hope not embarassing. I will hold off on adding any new material for a little while, but this is something I really enjoy doing so I will not abandon it completely. So, if at first my offerings are slim, it is just because I am busy with things that matter more and if you are patient, I will eventually post some new stuff. Most of it will be writing, though a few pics and links help things along. Anyway, here is my new blog.