I am notoriously bad at being outdoors.

As an example of how I poorly I function in a non-artificially lit environment, I submit to you following experience: when I was, oh, let’s say around nineteen years old, The Hubs (who was then just The Boyfriend) invited me to his friend’s hunting camp for the weekend, to hang out with his friend Todd and Todd’s girlfriend Tiffany.  And when I say he invited me to his hunting camp, what I mean is he said, “Huntin’ Camp” because only city people (such as myself) enunciate the “–ing.”

Anyway.

So, I distinctly remember standing in his bathroom, packing my overnight bag, and saying, “Do you think I should bring my contact lens solution?  I mean, there’s a bathroom, right?”

There was a pause.  “Uh, I haven’t been there in a long time.  But I’m sure there is.”

I stopped packing and looked at myself in the mirror.  I looked noticeably confused.  “There’s a bathroom there, isn’t there?”

“Um.  I’m sure there is.”

Fast forward to later on in the afternoon, when we’re driving in his little green pickup truck, through what looks like the wilderness of pre-colonial America, and we stumble upon a little shack.  “This is it!”  The Boyfriend/Hubs exclaimed.

Okay, so it was cute.  It had a fireplace and rustic wooden chairs.  There were two sets of bunk beds in the back and a big, sturdy wooden table in the common area.  But some there were some things noticeably missing.  Namely:

• Lights
• A sink
• A bathroom

“Um.”  I put my bag on a bottom bunk.  “Where’s the bathroom?”

“Oh, there’s no bathroom.”  Todd said.  “There’s a little shack out back we use as an outhouse.”

An outhouse.

I looked at The Boyfriend/Hubs and said, “I hate you.  I will never marry you, you big, fat, liar.  You “think” there’s a bathroom?”

We’ve been married for eleven years.  He still insists–to this day–that he didn’t lie because technically an outhouse is a bathroom.

So, I held peeing for like, ten hours.  When I could hold it no longer, Tiffany and I went out to the outhouse.  She held the flashlight and turned her back.

I was faced with the toilet.  Mentally, I had images of curtains of spiders sinking down from the ceiling and snakes, spiders, and a Sasquatch rising up from the toilet to grab me at my weakest moment.  Lets be honest.  I read a pioneer book as a child and, never more vividly in my life than at that moment, did I remember reading how the main character would swipe the inside of the outhouse toilet to check for snakes and poisonous spiders.

But, I really had to pee.  So, I cautiously sat down.  The toilet seat crunched.

Immediately my brain decided this meant it was like a rotten tree stump and it was just a matter of time before all manner of bugs, spiders, and other minute creatures would be swarming out.  This state of mind is not conducive to peeing.  I froze.  My knees locked.

And the next day I learned to pee in the woods.

As if this wasn’t entertaining enough, the other delightful moment of the weekend came right before we fell asleep in the bunk area.  The city girl that I am said, “So…you know, it really worries me that we’re this far out in the woods and there’s an ax behind the door.  I mean, I know it’s for chopping wood, but doesn’t that worry you?”

“Sure it does.”  Todd responded  “That’s why we have the shotgun back here.”

Oh.  My.  God.

So, yeah.  Camping is a like a barrel of monkeys.  A huge, explosive, barrel of monkeys set to destroy Tokyo like Godzilla.  Yippee.

With all this said, The Hubs and I have a good, long discussion about Monocacy which, is right around the corner.  Maybe a good five minutes or so.  Anyway, we mainly talked about the Pros of staying on the battlefield versus a hotel room.  Here’s the Pro that was the deciding factor:

• Staying on the battlefield is free

Despite my misgivings, it looks like I”ll be sleeping on the battlefield at Monocacy.  Because that went so well when we stayed on the battlefield at the 150th of Gettysburg last year.  My only concern about staying on the field is, that the only time I’ve been at Monocacy, I saw this little creature walking through the grass ahead of us.  I pointed it out to The Hubs.  “Is that a frog?”

He looked at it.  “Nope.  That’s a spider.”

If you guys need me, I’ll be sleeping in the car.