So today kinda sucked. Yep, I’m on a 6 week vacation in a beautiful location, and today stunk worse than the RV dump station on a hot July day.
Here’s why it sucked. First, we woke up to find that it had snowed in the night. Not so bad, right? Except the snow had accumulated on the truck bed cover in such a way that it buckled under the weight. Not have adequately prepared for winter in June, I exited the semi-warm camper in my hoodie and began scooping off the snow from the truck bed with my bare hands. Those who know me well know that I hate snow. I REALLY hate snow. It’s fine as long as you can sit next to a fire with a cup of hot coffee and look at it from inside. That’s really the only time snow and I get along. So going outside at 6:30am to shovel snow with my bare hands already started me off in a bit of a sour mood.
Next we decided since it was cold and we were running low on propane for the furnace we would drive into town to trade in the tanks, fill up on potable water (5 gal jugs I then siphon into our fresh water tank), and buy fire wood, which is basically about 5 matchsticks plastic wrapped together at the low low cost of $5 a bundle) and honestly, this all would’ve been fine had it not been for grumpy kids. Alright, I was grumpy too, but I’m telling you, the thought of purchasing one or both of them bus tickets to Bloomington Indiana may have crossed my mind.
Let’s back up a little and talk about the kids attitudes. Mostly they’ve been great. Truly. They’re great travelers. But I guess I expected something different. I expected it to be warmer, first of all. I expected them to be able to play outside, to at least have moments of solitude, or even moments where I could sit in the sunshine and listen to the kids play, or even fight, so long as it was at a distance. (Fighting with your sibling is important for social development, so who am I to intervene in such foundational moments, right?). Anyways, I wasn’t prepared for this, all of us together all the time. ALL THE TIME!
So we get back to the campsite after some souvenir shopping (because they certainly weren’t going to stop asking when they could get their souvenirs), we unload the truck, the water, firewood, and propane. I start siphoning water and go connect one of the propane tanks. And immediately I notice that my tank gauge shows that this tank I just paid $20 for is only half full. Are you kidding me?! And then…it started snowing AGAIN! But I can’t just go inside and get warm. I still need to finish siphoning water (which takes about 30 minutes for 20 gallons) and change the oil on the generator. Normally I wouldn’t bother with this, but I knew it was supposed to get down into the mid-20s tonight and we would likely need to run the generator all night. Also, that thing was expensive and I need it to not die on me! So yeah, I drain the used oil into some empty water bottles and realize I forgot to bring a funnel. No worries, I thought, I’ll just make one out of another water bottle. That’ll work right? Except the mouth of the bottle was just a little too big and I couldn’t get the right angle, so while I did manage to get oil in the tank, I also managed to get it pretty much everywhere else, which was super fun to clean up as the sky decided this was a great time to begin producing sleet. Fantastic!
By this point my fingers are throbbing, I’m two jugs into the siphoning process, and couldn’t touch anything without getting oil all over it. Right then, Alyssa came out and informed me that the furnace wasn’t working. What? Not working? No. Not today. Not when everything else sucked. Surely the universe wanted me to enjoy something about this day, right? But no, she was right, the furnace wasn’t lighting. But what it was doing quite well was blowing out pungent/poisonous propane gas all through the camper. Lovely, just lovely. Everybody out! Put on your coats and shoes. Go have fun playing in the sleet while daddy kicks into problem solving mode. Also, don’t bother me for a while, because I will probably rip your cute little face right off your precious little skull. K?
So there I was, airing out the camper in June/January, feeling oh so light headed from the fumes, dismantling the furnace, and pouring over the instruction manual, which was conveniently tucked in the back of the instruction manual for the hot water heater (it’s cool. I didn’t mind spending an extra 30 minutes looking for instructions on how to handle this mess). Finally I was able to diagnose the problem. Altitude. Yep. Altitude can interfere with a furnace’s ability to light. And you know what can happen when a lack of oxygen shuts your furnace down and you don’t realize why it turned off? Anyone? That’s right boys and girls, you can die from carbon monoxide poisoning! So keep that in mind if you’re ever in an RV at 7200 ft. Pay attention to whether or not your furnace lights right away, or you may get more of a relief from your crappy day than you wished for.
Don’t worry, we got it figured out. You don’t need to drive to Wyoming and check on us to make sure we haven’t suffocated in our camper (Mom). And for safe measure, we’re only using a ceramic space heater while we sleep from now on.
After all this I realized something. That’s what this trip was supposed to be about anyway. Mindfulness. It’s easy to be mindful and at peace in your mind when all is well and life is smiling on you. But when it hits the fan…or furnace (see what i did there?), that’s when I struggle. That’s when I tend to let my frustrations get the better of me. It’s day 4 of our journey, and I feel like this was a good time to be reminded that my peace should not be contingent on circumstances beyond my control. In those moments I must be reminded to breathe in the fresh air, listen to the kids playing, survey the snow covered peaks, and realize that all was well all along. Because it really was. We learned the do’s and don’ts of camping in high altitude. The kids still had fun, even playing in the sleet! And my beautiful wife somehow managed to maintain patience with her grump of a husband and cook us a lovely meal.
And when the sun came out, we took off on a hike (bear spray in hand) and thoroughly enjoyed the sights, sounds, and smells of this breathtaking park. And as we settled in to our now cozy, warm camper, Alyssa read aloud the next chapter in an enthralling novel.
It was a good day. Not a perfect day, but still good.
Note: as I wrote this it once again began snowing. The mountains will be beautiful in the morning!
journeywithus 