Why We Went Camping Only Once

I watched as we packed our van in preparation for my family’s camping trip.

My parents had decided that we were “roughing” it and that we would bring only what we absolutely needed. Among the supplies we were bringing, there wasn’t a computer, a cell phone, a video game or a television; nothing first world.

It was a long way to the camping grounds and the drive took forever. As I sat in my seat, my muscles fell asleep.

All of my vital organs began to shut down and I slowly died of boredom.

When we arrived, the first thing we did was try to set up our tent. The box the tent came in said “anyone can do it.” And we did; on its side.

After righting the tent, we sat down to have lunch. Those were some good sandwiches. Lunch was the best thing that had happened all day so things were starting to look up.

After lunch, everyone went hiking. After about an hour, my dad finally admitted that we were lost. Thankfully, we ran into some other hikers who actually knew where they were going. They had wisely brought a map.

Once we got back, we sat down for dinner. There was one big problem. No one had remembered to pack the pots and pans. We had tons of delicious looking meat and no way to cook it.

Having decided not to die of food poisoning from uncooked meat, I died of hunger.

I found it difficult to sleep that night. It wasn’t because of the hunger but the cold. My parents were convinced that it would be warm the whole trip and had told me not to pack a coat or blanket.

Since I had only a thin sleeping bag, I eventually froze to death.

The next morning we still had nothing decent to eat, only some fruit.

Due to the total lack of food (meat) in my diet, I re-starved to death.

My dad then decided that we should fish for our food. I wasn’t too excited though, since we still wouldn’t be able to cook the fish we caught. As we sat by a stream, trying to catch some fish, I was viciously attacked by a dark cloud of mosquitoes.

So many bit me, I probably lost a good 10 percent of my body mass and bled to death as a result.

To escape the evil blood suckers, I tried to cross the stream on a log bridge. That was a bad idea. I was woozy from losing so much blood and fell into the stream.

Not knowing how to swim, I quickly drowned to death.

I returned to the campsite soaking wet. Feeling sorry for me, my mom seconded my vote to cut the originally planned three days to one-and-a-half and go home early.

We never went camping again.