Memories of Scout Camp

Scout Camp is one of those events that ranks highly on the list of male bonding moments and not only because you spend a whole week with a bunch of other guys. Although I guess you could argue that the mere proximity of so many adolescent boys has a significant impact on the
dumb stuff that could go on.

I'm standing at the bus stop, listening to the rain on the canvas cover, listening to music, and wondering how it's cold and rainy in May in the freaking desert.

It rained almost every year I went to Scout Camp. And it rained for the whole week each time. So we'd sit in our tents between classes, rain hitting the canvas of the old square framed tents, shoes covered in mud, and write things for the requirements of the merit badge classes. To keep from going completely batty having to deal with the paradox of staying inside while we were outside, we came up with some pretty typical 'boy' activities, most of which either involved the threat of physical injury or making a huge mess. Not the threat of making a huge mess, we actually made them. I remember one year, we got ourselves so scared about alien abduction (we weren't too far from Roswell) that none of us could sleep for hours. In retrospect, it was completely ridiculous, especially considering an actual bear showed up in the camp a couple of years later and tore some kid's tent apart looking for some popcorn he had stashed away.

But we invented games that involved throwing sharp sticks at each other's feet, wrestled each other into the mud, stuff like that. I wasn't a huge fan of that second one, considering I'm not on the big side of the size spectrum. But we did all kinds of stupid things and had fun doing it.

Funny how that sound of rain on canvas brought back memories of some of my less-than-bright moments.

In an unrelated note, I was listening to a writing podcast, where they were talking with a book editor and the editor mentioned something I probably knew at some point but had forgotten; she said that an editor can help a writer with plot but voice is something that a writer just has to have. So I'll probably be trying new things to develop a voice that's mine. I feel like most of my writing feels sterile, with just flashes of me every now and then. I tend to be more serious and staid in my personal writing and explore some of my humor in, say, technical instructions that I write. Does that make nonsense to you too?