Part Three by Adam Kibbe

Den Mothers

Instant incandescence. Backlighting tent fabric, even the seams almost too bright to see. One Mississippi, two Mississippi……….. 5 was the shortest I counted, thankfully, but the ensuing thunder seemed to drive in the insubstantial nylon with its forceful, rumbling roar of sheer violence, as if it were right outside. Long wait for the next flash, but it always came. If one were cowering under one’s sleeping bag with eyes screwed tightly shut, maybe the lightning would’ve had the glow of a bug light Michael describes. I wouldn’t know — beside him in the intervals of dark, I lay awake with eyes wide open, almost unblinking, awaiting the next. Atomic explosions, is what occurred to me.

My mind flirted with the status of the boys out on the point, as I lay still, waiting to count. There was no sleeping through that. I figured Mike was awake – had to be. But much as I liked the idea of all-night chats in the darkness, the few time we shared tents, he seemed pretty committed to sleep, and it’s never happened. I respect his space and quiet, and knowing I probably wouldn’t sleep much anyway, I usually on these trips will let him crawl in first and myself hang out by the fire enough time to give him a head start on slumber before I crawl in after him. Aware that I snore, I wouldn’t dream of dreaming until I hear his own, softer snores.

The boys had to be terrified — adolescent insouciance must’ve long since evaporated in the face of that fury, I imagined (though I hadn’t even thought of how much more exposed they were out on the point, as we ourselves were mostly untroubled by wind where we were). I could just imagine Robby facing down the storm, machete in hand, Matt and Daryl’s pellet guns trained on the ceiling.

Earlier that night, when I’d first noticed the flashes, but before the rumbles started sounding impressive, I’d gone outside to get a better look — I love thunderstorms. Even when it seems they might at any instant kill me. I can be afraid, when it gets that close, but it still feels like a truth about our existence is being discussed, and I want to bear witness. And it’s not about our human insignificance – that’s too insignificant for such a dialogue. More, it’s just that the processes that have shaped our planet — indeed, the universe – operate on scales so vast as to be inaccessible until these modicums of power, mere hints of the scope, offer glimpses of the ever vaster powers of which they are but ripples. Besides, it’s beautiful.

I’d gone out in my socks, partially to rescue anything that might need rescuing, as it was occasionally raining. This included my camera, left in presumed shelter on the picnic table; shelter I no longer trusted as the storm picked up momentum. It also turned out to include Michael’s camera, left for some reason on the ground just outside the vestibule of our tent. Within seconds, though, my feet were soaked, even though I’d quickly ducked under the tarp. So I threw two plate holders down on the ground and stood on those to watch the show.

Across Spencer Bay, the lightning was periodically backlighting the distant hills. Wide, sweeping glows of light would cover much of the horizon, followed many, many seconds later by muffled, almost subsonic grumbles. And they also silhouetted what from my vantage appeared as one very small, isolated tent. But it looked to be in good shape, and I gave it no more thought than wondering after the mental states of its occupants. After awhile the cold plates and chill breeze drove me back to our own tent, where I sought sleep, assuming (surprisingly correctly) that my socks would dry on my feet.

Why had we not examined more the job the boys had done of situating the tent on the point? We saw them carry it out there fully assembled, like a six-legged mobile home, and it wouldn’t have taken Sherlock Holmes (or even Watson) to deduce they had not adequately secured the fly with cords & stakes, much less the tent itself (the latter a step I often skip myself). Partly it is that they exude such confidence in themselves. Indeed, their fire out on the point was a raging bonfire, while the more needed and purposeful one lamely guttering within the partial shelter of our tarped base camp had never hit its own stride. You’d think we were by mistake trying to burn a gas fire, concrete fake log insert for all the enthusiasm our fire seemed for being a fire. Much smoke, no heat, and without constant and vigorous fanning and blowing, no flame. The boys had just gotten it done.

So it wasn’t mere complacency. And the false security of truck and tarps let us drift a bit, knowing that alternatives were near at hand. But the question still bears pondering. Post facto, we’d reasoned (rationalized?) that some lessons are only learned through doing or not doing oneself. Had we cautioned them against camping on the point, in the calm of the first night, we would’ve seemed merely feeble old farts, our “advice” but the timidness of age. And had we offered tips on proper tentcraft, we’d have been met with protestations to not treat them like kids. Or so we assumed. Even after the collapse of their tent, when they re-established “home” the next day, we just watched to see what they would do. (This is, I might add, after Mike and I had re-erected it, after recovering it and laying it and all their gear out to dry while they sought in naps the sleep they’d failed to find the night before).

He’d have to say, but I think that besides just attempting to share the locale and approximate experience of our yearly camping ritual — something his son only knows intellectually — Mike also hoped to teach, if only indirectly, some of the generous, cooperative interactions of the adult group. I know I did.

Mostly we were all together. The boys only disappeared to be just by themselves a few times each day. But we were not necessarily always interacting. And they contributed mightily to setting up camp and hacking apart firewood. But their domestic habits were otherwise nonexistent — Pepsi bottles with three sips in them left scattered everywhere one looked, dishes from meals abandoned, random gear four sheets to the wind. Lecturing and cajoling, though, were not personas Mike or I wanted to adopt, so we left things until we ourselves could no longer bear the chaos, and cleaned up.

The boys handled their allotted meal responsibilities with aplomb (except for dishes) and were attentive on our daily treks (okay, drives). No complaints. But we did feel a bit like den mothers, something on which we actually commented as the two of us sat about the table one evening (probably cleaning up).

And den mothers don’t teach tentcraft, or double-check tent rigging. Den mothers don’t exude backwoods lore and lead memorable expeditions. We played barely passable Frisbee, went on walks, chauffeured bumper-riding youth about logging roads, and shopped. Perhaps had the canoeing trip model prevailed, we might have been other than den mothers, and that might have altered something. What, exactly, I’m not sure. It was an odd trip. Good, but not, perhaps, what we set out to share with them.

None of this coursed through my brain as I lay in the dark counting down to thunder. I should have been thinking about the tent’s condition, and thus that of the boys inside. Instead, I was projecting/empathizing, assuming they were as snug as I was, with only a few milligrams of adrenaline difference in appreciation of the storm. I also assumed Michael was asleep, and was equally wrong on that count, too. And outside, the storm assumed nothing. FLASH!!! One denmother, two denmothers, three…………………


The working fire, before the storm.

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