Memorial Weekend 2010

5/28 Friday


I worked until Noon today. I left early so that we could hit the road with our camper in tow to High Falls State Park in Jackson, GA. The trip down was interesting. I spent about ¾ of the time telling Lila and Lyndi to quit going at each other. Its amazing to me how much energy children have when it comes to wanting to annoy one another. If only they had that same energy and enthusiasm when it came to cleaning their rooms or being polite to one another. Alas, it was not to be. Instead, tears were brought forth and there was gnashing of teeth…mostly from me really. My poor, frazzled last nerve has been duct taped and super glued so many times, it’s on a matter of time before that precious little thing just SNAPS!

But we made it to the state park. We had to make a couple of rounds before we were able to settle on a camp site. The park is packed. We are camping on the “river” side. The other part of the park is the “lake” side. Pete and I decided that since there IS a river somewhere in the vicinity of the park, they could refer to it as the “river” side….cause no river can be seen from where we are at…only the bath house. Speaking of the bath house, Lila informed me that there is only ONE stall in the women’s restroom. So really it can’t be called the WOMEN’S restroom…only WOMAN’s restroom. All the rest of us WOMENS will have to wait until that one WOMAN gets done!! Thankfully we have a potty in our camper. And thankfully we have multiple sanitation packets to keep our sewage from becoming too stank! AND we have PLENTY of toilet paper! We are set!

This evening, after we ate our dinner which consisted of turkey burgers and baked beans, we went for a walk around the camp ground. The girls really just wanted us to walk over to the play ground. On our way over to the play ground, a little young fellow went flying by on his bicycle. I lost sight of him quickly once he disembarked from the road and took on the field. Looking out across the field I could see one handle bar sticking up out of the ground. There was one limb belonging to this little creature waving in the air. Evidently, said creature encountered a ditch that couldn’t be seen until one as right on top of it….and he endoed right into the thing. Pete informed me that it was my nursery duty to go check on the little chap.

I headed over and observed this little guy on his back, one leg trapped under the bike, helmet all disheveled. He had smacked his head…but his glasses remained on his face. Poor little nerdy fellow. He reminded me of one of our own! So I pulled him from his crash and examined him. He was a little goofy from the smack on the head, otherwise he was fine. He got himself together and was going to take off…probably a little embarrassed. But as life would have it, his chain popped off. Then it was time for my dear Pete to rescue the little man. We got his chain back on and sent him on his way! That kid had absolutely no idea what good hands he had been in at that very moment! Its not often that a person happens upon a nurse and a bike guy at the very moment when one crashes and blows his chain!

We made it to the play ground and had a good turn at it without anyone getting hurt. While we were sitting there on the park bench watching the girls, a little girl toddled over to examine Iris. She was probably about 3 years old. She asked lots of good questions about her. She was with her sister who appeared to be about 13 years old. After having read “The Shack” and having just watched “The Lovely Bones”, I couldn’t help but be reminded of how easy it is to entice children to have them fall victim to horrible, nasty people. Thank our good Lord that we are in fact GOOD people. Both of those references will keep my eyes open and watching my own children during this camping trip. I did happen to notice a man sitting outside his camper, watching the playground. He didn’t have any children over there playing. I thought how easy it would be for someone like him to approach a child playing unsupervised. And those two girls that talked to us, held no defenses up to us. They were enamored by Iris. And who wouldn’t be really? But again, I really am thankful that we are the good guys. Those girls were precious. All children are…even the ones that like to fight with each other to the death in the back seat of the truck while heading down to High Falls State park for a little R&R on a Memorial Weekend getaway!

May 29 Saturday

Yesterday we spent checking out the campground. Because it was a holiday weekend, it was packed on the river side and the lake side of the park. All methods of camping were being utilized from pup tents to Master RV buses. Some tents were connected by tarps in hopes of keeping the impending rain storms from flooding them out like ants from an ant hill.

We then left the park and we to Dauset Trails. Dauset is a beautiful preserve that houses all manner of wild animals and farm animals found here in the US. Along with wild animals, they have owls, hawks and a Bald Eagle. The girls loved seeing all of the creatures. While walking around, we got trapped near a group of approximately 12 children with just a couple of adult women in the crowd. Those kids chanted, squawked, sang and generally tormented said wild life. I think the animals probably sighed from relief for being caged up and protected from those wild children!

All in all, the girls had the best time at Dauset. Lyndi and Lila got to see a Tom turkey parade around all puffed up and bellowing out his most impressive call for a female love. We got to see two Bobcats fight and growl at each other. Turtles and geese (with half a dozen baby goslings) came near to see if they could snag a few crumbs from the wild humans that came to visit them at the park.

From Dauset, we went to visit Indian Springs campground. Indian springs is about 10 miles from High Falls. While on one side of the camp ground was a convention of women with short hair, sporting rainbow and = sign bumper stickers, on the other side were masses of holiday campers. If at the mention of women with short hair made you think that I should have stayed to hang out…thanks, but no thanks. Short hair and camping were our only common interests at that point.

While we were exploring the park, we happened upon a very large snapping turtle in the middle of the road. The turtle was the size of a hub cap. A very vicious hubcap! I hopped out of the truck to get a closer look and to SNAP a picture. Behind us some park rangers pulled up. When they observed what I had gotten out to investigate, they decided that they needed to save said turtle from the mean streets of the park. One of the men (know that I wish I could have taped this scene), decided that he could pick the turtle up to move him out of the road. The minute he laid hands on that turtle, that turtle opened up his large jaws and SNAPPED at that man, causing the man to lurch and jump away from Mr. Snapping Turtle. Feeling that it was his civic duty to get that turtle out of harm’s way, that man attempted 3 or 4 more times to remove that turtle. Three or four more times that turtle snapped at that man and lunged at him! How that man came away from that humanitarian act with all fingers intact, I will never know. But it made for an interesting sight!

Later in the evening we went to Macon to meet up with my cousin Chad from Miami. Chad and his girl friend Wendy came. Chad is the son of my mom’s sister JoAnn who also lives in Miami. Some of Wendy’s family live in Macon. We had dinner at Sticky Finger’s restaurant. I haven’t seen Chad since his dad, Jim died 7 years ago. What a great blessing to be able to spend time with him. He took pictures of me and the girls to take home and to share with my aunt. We made promises to get together again some day soon. I sure hope its sooner than 7 years and that the visit has nothing to do with a funeral!

On that way back to camp, we HAD to stop at Dairy Queen in Forsyth, GA where the law enforcement training center is located. Pete’s GEMA office was in that building. That’s also where I used to go for training when I was an officer. But back to the ice cream! We all got a cone. Pete and I got a chocolate dipped cone. We sat outside in the nice comfortable evening air and enjoyed that ice cream. Lyndi had nothing but good to say about getting to eat ice cream…in between licks of course! It was really a treat! Well, all until Lyndi dropped her cone on the ground! She was mostly finished though. She had managed to get the ice cream all over her hands, her shirt and shorts and in her hair. It was all good!!

5/30 Sunday

This morning, I made French toast with homemade glazed Fuji apples and cinnamon. It turned out very nicely! Its rough having to camp in such a primitive manner! After breakfast we trekked down to the river. The water was higher because of the torrential down pour that finally came last night. The girls spent their time throwing rocks in the river. Then Lyndi managed to fall into the water, soaking her pants and light up Strawberry Shortcake shoes. She was not a happy camper at that point.

For lunch today we ate at a restaurant called Buckners. Their whole feeding concept revolved around the concept of a Lazy Susan. All customers were seated around large tables (together with strangers) with a Lazy Susan in the middle. Dish after dish of Southern delicacies came out. Fried chicken, roast beef, creamed sweet corn, butter peas, mashed potatoes, green beans, bread, peach cobbler…….the list goes on! Each person takes as much as they can eat and spoons that Southern goodness onto their plate. Sweet tea is available to wash down the food that feeds the soul. The girls actually ATE for a change. Butter peas and coleslaw were Lila’s favorites. Pete nearly ate 3 chickens on his own, piece by piece. I loved it all and especially the yeast rolls and peach cobbler!

After returning to camp, we noticed that our tent dwelling neighbors were packing up. The sky was threatening to unload another gusher…which it hasn’t at this point. Lyndi is lying in bed taking a nap that she said she really didn’t need. I practically had to wrestle her like an alligator just to get her to lay down. Lila, Pete and I made it to our camp chairs outside the camper. The temperature is cool enough for us not to sweat and warm enough to kick our shoes off and sit around in shorts. It’s a tough life having to sit here listening to the sounds of the campground and the water dripping off the camper from the night’s rain…..