Camper envy

I have always thought of myself as fairly level headed when it comes to THINGS.  I'm romantic and tend to hold on to sentimental items, but apart from that I've never considered myself a "material girl".  I'm not particularly fond of shopping and I was raised in a frugal home, so splurging on furniture, jewelry, or clothes just isn't a part of who I am.  Or so I thought, until this past weekend when on our camping trip I developed a serious (SERIOUS) case of camper envy.  Who knew I had it in me to turn so green over a dining canopy?!

There I was, perfectly content with our new screened tent that we bought in June.  It looks like this:

We discovered when we put it up the first time that it was a tad small for the picnic table, but hey, my husband's motto is improvise, adapt and overcome, so we turned the table on the diagonal and voilà, it fit just fine.  Well, maybe not fine, but it fit.  So when we arrived at the park this last weekend, we happily put up our nifty new tent, assembled our dining canopy (with an angled table) and set out our chairs by the fire pit.  Done.

 But then we went for a walk.  And discovered our camping neighbors on our left had this:

A dining canopy with a straight picnic table and room to spare!!

And THEN we walked the other way and discovered our neighbors on our right had this:

A summer kitchen. Complete with a stand for the grill and one hundred miscellaneous cooking appliances. Plus--can you see them?-- hooks for the cooking utensils.  I stopped dead in my tracks and I know I turned green.  I could feel it.

Seriously...a full cooking station, plus a prep table?  And then they had a separate screen tent for dining.  And their picnic table fit.  And they had cute candles on the table.  And even worse (are you ready for this?!) I spied a Coleman camping coffee maker.  I could have wept.

Suddenly my instant coffee seemed so...instant.

Later that day we were out hiking and came upon this camp site, and my husband helpfully pointed out that at least our dining canopy didn't look like this:

Cold comfort, my friends, cold comfort indeed.  And since I have already confessed to breaking a commandment:

I might as well go all the way and confess that I coveted these two beautiful vintage boats as well!  And I've never even wanted a boat before this weekend!  But aren't they beauties?

Look at how clear the water is!

I feel so much better now that I've confessed to my dark side.  I guess we all harbor secret envy of some kind or another, that's just human nature.  But at the end of the day, it really isn't about what kind of tent or boat I may or may not have, it's all about hanging out with my best friend of thirty plus years, playing footsie in the water and just enjoying our time together.

And speaking of hanging out together, here's a fun poem by Ted Sherman to start our day off with a smile.

Let's all hang out with someone we love today, shall we?

Can we just try hanging out together?
What we do doesn’t matter whether
It’s on a sandy beach or bicycle ride,
Just so long as we’ll be side by side.

Hanging out together will be great,
The lovingest couple in blissful state.
Never again would we ever be fated,
To go drifting away and be separated.