I am sitting in a log cabin in the woods, soaking up the peace and quiet. We've just finished a family game of ladderball, and my husband is taking a nap while the kids play a board game with my sister at the picnic table outside.
It is Day Four of the longest camping vacation I've ever taken. We camp every summer, but usually only for two or three nights. No matter how organized we are, going camping always seems to require a ridiculous amount of planning, packing, loading, unloading and setting up. Then, just when I'm starting to really relax, it's time to pack up and go home.
This time will be different: eight days with my family in a small, enclosed space, away from all the comforts and distractions of our regular lives.
For me, disconnecting from technology is part of the appeal of camping, yet I spent the first two days of the trip scouting out a wireless Internet connection to submit this column. I wrote it the old-fashioned way, with ballpoint pen and spiral notebook, then finished it on a laptop. To turn it in, we drove six miles to a bookstore that my husband had discovered on an expedition for affordable firewood.
I had planned to write the column a week early, so I wouldn't have to work on my vacation, but other deadlines and demands got in the way.
That's another thing I like about camping: There are no distractions from the task at hand, unless, of course it's a challenge that pops up and forces you to improvise, and that's part of the fun. Whether it's a sudden rain shower, a wrong turn in the woods, a forgotten pancake flipper or a middle-of-the night mosquito attack, every trip has its share of unexpected adventures.
Not that I go camping seeking drama or adversity. There's enough of that in regular life.
I go for the simplicity.
There is no multitasking on a camping trip. There's nowhere to be and nothing that has to get done, beyond the day's dishes. There are no lists or schedules or calendars. Kids get to be the way kids should: outdoors and active, swimming and hiking, chopping vegetables for foil dinners, collecting tinder and searching for marshmallow sticks, playing Tic Tac Toe or Hangman or reading a book on the porch.
I get to slow down and be in the moment _ no plans, no regrets.
In between camping trips, I forget how much I like to be outdoors. There is something so peaceful about being surrounded by tall trees; listening to the birds or the crickets or the rustling of the wind in the leaves; watching the glow of the embers in the campfire and seeing the stars appear, one by one, as day turns to night.
We have never been the kind of campers who carry everything on their backs and set up camp in the middle of nowhere. In younger years, we prided ourselves on our ability to put up tents in the rain, sleep on lumpy ground and cook everything on the fire or camp stove. We used to scoff at the cabin campers, with their coffee makers and cushy beds.
Now, we are those campers, spending a week in relative luxury, in a bright and airy cabin with two bedrooms and a spacious kitchen-dining room complete with a full-sized stove and refrigerator.
Yet, even cabin camping makes me appreciate the conveniences I take for granted every day: a roof when it's raining, hot water, electricity!
It is also makes me appreciate my family. There's a special kind of bonding that comes with being outside of your comfort zone and working together to solve problems or get things done. There's also the bonding that comes with slowing down and paying more attention to one another. Halfway through the trip, I've already learned new things about my kids (Abby can do chin-ups; Allie likes slicing mushrooms).
It is good to reaffirm that, outside of the stresses and demands of daily life, my family can work well as a team and have fun together.
Of course, it's only Day Four. By the end of the week, we may be on each others' last nerves.
And that's all the more reason to savor the moment. Quiet time is over. Ladderball, anyone?
Lisa Miller is a freelance writer who lives in Oneonta. She can be reached at lisamiller44@
hotmail.com.
Columns
Related Photos
-
Lisa Miller
Discussion
Welcome to our story comments feature. We welcome your thoughts and your opinions, including the unpopular ones. We only ask that you keep your conversations clean, civil and on the topic of the story you are commenting on.
Coinciding with our websites redesign, we launched our new story comments feature through Disqus.
Disqus gives users the ability to log into our story comments feature so that they may be able to track their conversations, receive emails when their comments get a reply or to even have your comments update onto your Facebook or Twitter accounts.
For the time being, our story comments feature will continue to have the ability to post comments anonymously. We reserve the right to require registration in the future using your name and verified email address.
Not all comments are deemed printable. Some are disqualified at the newspaper’s discretion for a number of different reasons. Please follow our Online Rules of Conduct at all times.
RULES OF CONDUCT:
We reserve the right to remove comments that are unacceptable, to wit:
1. False and inacurate statements.
2. Personal attacks. Explicit name-calling.
3. Harassing, harmful, vulgar, obscene and defamatory language.
4. Threatening statements or statements that suggest violence.
5. Hate speech of any kind.
6. Intolerant comments on religion, race, age, gender, sexual preference or disabilities.
7. Accusations of criminal activity.
8. Content that is harmful to children and minors in any way.
9. References to any type of sexual activity and other private matters.
10. Random and inflammatory statements that are off topic.
11. Advertising of any kind.
12. Typing in all caps.
WE ENCOURAGE REASONABLE AND COURTEOUS COMMENTS THAT:
1. Create conversation on issues of interest and concern to fellow readers and local community members.
2. Express opinions and contrarian views.
3. Stimulate debate with respectful language.
4. Stay within the boundaries of these rules.
WE RESERVE THE RIGHT TO SUSPEND OR TERMINATE ACCESS FOR:
1. Violating any of these Online Rules of Conduct.
2. Deliberately disrupting discussions with repetitive messages, meaningless messages or spam.
3. Misrepresentation of identity or impersonating another user.
WE WELCOME:
1. Flagging violations of these rules that you observe to our attention.
MONITORING:
We monitor comments regularly Monday - Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Approval of comments outside of this time (including weekends) will be sporadic.
There's no multitasking while camping
- Big Chuck D'Imperio
-
-
My pal Brucie, savior of Sidney's hospital
Ask any hospital administrators if they've ever heard of a closed hospital in New York state that has ever been re-opened. They will say, "Impossible." In a half century of going through records you can't find any.
Continued ... - Catching a whiff of 'Vermont Vapor'
- Selections from the virtual mailbag
- Recalling days of 'Doughnut King'
- Opera great's visit still a thrilling memory
-
My pal Brucie, savior of Sidney's hospital
- Cary Brunswick
-
-
We've become our own worst enemies
The past month has been marked by a seeming unprecedented number of man-made tragedies, as distinct from those caused by violent outbursts of the natural world, such as earthquakes, hurricanes and tsunamis.
Continued ... - Plenty of blame to go around for Bangladesh horror
- Obama is going against his word on Social Security
- Reflecting on a Florida trip
- Those magnificent spies in their flying machines
-
We've become our own worst enemies
- Chuck Pinkey
- Guest Column
-
-
Records seizure is an insult to free press
Distrust of government secrecy has been elevated to an exceptional level with the disclosure the Justice Department covertly examined two months of Associated Press phone records to determine who leaked details to the AP about a foiled terrorist plot.
Continued ... - The evangelical view of same-sex marriage
- Manor's fate will be Otsego board's legacy
- A closer look at our economy - Part II
- Use fracking to fill budget gaps
-
Records seizure is an insult to free press
- Lisa Miller
-
-
A view from above
Fire towers in the Catskill Mountains have always been destination points, built to capture some of the region’s best views. These sentinel stations served an important role for the earliest possible sightings of forest fires in the remote mountain ranges. But the fire towers and those who manned them fulfilled a multitude of other roles as well.
Continued ... - Being a parent is a constant learning process
- Healthy doesn't have to mean expensive
- A family era ends with close of Potter series
- Independent stores make up for loss of Borders
-
- Mark Simonson
-
-
Sunday movies in Oneonta finally shown in 1934
You know an issue is divisive when a vote to resolve it is quite close. In Oneonta during the early 1930s there were probably plenty of discussions or arguments at the family dinner table or sermons from the pulpits on Sunday mornings, regarding whether or should be able to see a movie in Oneonta on Sunday.
Continued ... - Politics, fitness and landmarks dominated local news in May 1968
- Local people sought income in many ways in 1933
- Local windstorm in 1983 caused tense moments
- Disaster, expansions put people to work in May 1913
-
- Rick Brockway
-
-
Kids have sparkle in their eyes
When I was in my teens, old Bill Naatz told me about a stream north of Lake George where a man had panned out enough gold to make his wife a wedding band. It was all rumors, but to his grandson and myself, it sounded like the makings of a great adventure.
- People make the outdoors even better
- Turkey season has ups and downs
- Spring air isn't always the freshest
- Adriondacks keep growing and growing
-
Kids have sparkle in their eyes
- Sam Pollak
-
-
Using time off in the worst way possible
"You don't mean it," I pleaded. "You simply can't mean it!"
Continued ... - Terror lives on, and there's no end in sight
- Remembering the glory of their times
- Column on guns led to a barrage of (mostly) jeers
- No one is coming to take your guns
-
Using time off in the worst way possible
- William Masters
-
-
Schreibman tops Chris Gibson on women's issues
As the time to vote draws near, we need to remember how money can run politics more than we can. Raising funds is a prominent (if not the dominant) task of getting elected. Raising issues is also crucial, but those efforts are subject to distortion and fear-mongering.
- Republicans feelentitled to allthey can garner An entitlement is a legal benefit available from the government to individuals who are within a defined category of recipients, such as needing insurance for unemployment or health services.
-
Romney focuses on self; Obama emphasizes unity
Mitt Romney criticizes President Obama for saying a person's success is rooted in his community, and is not all his alone. Romney belittles this with his belief in individual initiative. He is better at the put-down than the push-up.
-
Romney shows little regard for common man
The Republicans in Congress have voted over and over, 33 times, redundantly and uselessly, to rescind what they call Obamacare.
-
Scouts' gay ban creates problem where none exists
The Boy Scouts of America's "emphatic reaffirmation" of its vow to exclude any and all homosexuals from its hallowed ranks is ill-considered and pathetic, especially in view of its having reviewed the matter for two years.
-
Schreibman tops Chris Gibson on women's issues
