Road Trip #21 Twilight Zone at the Ant Hill

Collins and Ratisseau, following the time-honored tradition of dressing for battle.



       We talked around the campfire until late that night, maybe 8:00 or 8:30.  Collins went to bed first, as usual.  The front seats of his Land Cruiser recline to an almost horizontal position and he chose to zip up in a sleeping bag there.  Neil and Wayne chose to sleep outside, on foam pads made for that purpose.  With their sleeping bags zipped tight, a pillow and the special pad, they were comfortable and toasty warm.  Even though it was early in the month of June, by 10:00 PM the temperature was well below freezing.  The wind remained brisk.

     While the others were fishing that afternoon, I prepared my little nest.  Fighting the unrelenting wind, I erected a small tent borrowed from Ian, my Boy Scout grandson.  Inside, I inflated an air mattress borrowed from my friend, Hugh.  I put my new mummy-shaped sleeping bag on top of the mattress and arranged my other belongings in nooks and crannies between the over-sized bed and the walls of the under-sized tent.  My sleeping bag was rated for use to thirty degrees below zero.  Two years ago, my nights here were uncomfortable and I am better prepared this time.  I will be as cozy as a bug in a rug.

McMullen, doing battle.

     I opened the flap of the tent and sat on the air mattress to remove my shoes and trousers.  I had decided to sleep in my shirt, because it was getting downright cold.  The air mattress was bouncy and impossible to stabilize, but I managed to slip off my things and climb into the tent.  I bounced around as I tried to unzip the new sleeping bag.  I thought, Good to thirty below zero.  Ha!  I’ll be nice and warm.

     By the time I got the thing unzipped, I was hyperventilating. Our campsite was near 10,000 feet elevation and the air was thin.  My heart was racing and I just could not get enough oxygen. I got both feet inside the bag, and tried to roll over so I could zip it up to cover my body.   I stopped to rest and tried to get enough air, but it was not possible.  I lay there, heart racing, gasping for air and trying to decide upon a plan.  This damn air mattress was too bouncy to allow movement without reaction and the sleeping bag too slippery to get inside.  Maybe one of the guys would help me.  No, I didn’t want to ask for help.  Besides, they were already asleep.  I was on my own.

     My heart rate settled down to about a hundred and I was able to get some of the sleeping bag under my legs.  I decided to start zipping from there and work my way up.  After ten minutes of bouncy, exhausting struggle, I got the zipper stuck just above my knees.  It wouldn’t budge in either direction.  I was freezing.  I decided to hell with the zipper and just pulled the bag over me and lay still.   Another fifteen minutes of hyperventilation, and my heart slowed enough that I put the idea of coronary thrombosis out of my mind.  Actually, I only pushed it toward the back of my mind—at seventy-five, the idea is always there.  I managed to get my trousers rolled up for use as a pillow and re-arranged the sleeping bag like a blanket to cover the cold air leaks.  This wasn’t so bad.  I was going to be fine.

     I worked the rolled-up trousers under my head, moved the sleeping bag around to stop the cold, and allowed my heart rate to slow to near normal. My breathing continued to sound like Darth Vader in heat.  I removed my glasses and placed them in a little depression in the mattress, well away from the center and toward the back wall of the tent.  They’ll be safe there. 

     All my preparation was starting to pay off.  As George Peppard said in the A-Team, “I love it when a plan comes together.”   I stretched a bit and listened to the sounds of the night.  The soothing sound of moving water wafted up through the trees. There was no moon, but the stars were very close and bright.  Visibility was no problem. No wonder people like to camp out, close to nature.  This was really nice.

     I was just about to doze off when I became aware of a familiar, but unwelcome, sensation.   I needed to pee.  I decided to ignore it and maybe it would go away.  I tried to think of something else.  The water down below continued to trickle over the rocks.  I turned over heavily and heard my glasses bounce off the mattress into who knows where. 

     I wondered, If I just lie here and wet the bed, will I freeze to death? How many more times will I have to pee tonight? Will pee freeze? Will it permanently stain Hugh’s mattress?  Can I just air out my new sleeping bag tomorrow?  Will the down feathers clump together? Wonder what Hugh paid for this mattress?  More to the point, what will he charge me for it?  Can't be worth much if it's been peed on.  How long does it take to freeze to death?  Is it painful, or do I just peacefully go to sleep? No matter---I probably won't freeze.  I'll have a heart attack.

    I decided I had to get up and do it.  I felt around for my glasses, but they were gone.  I found one shoe, but decided to put my pants on first.  Damn, it was cold.  I unrolled the trousers and my change, wallet, and keys fell out and scattered in the dark.  Without my glasses, I could not see enough to find anything.   My heart raced and I was hyperventilating again.  I got my pants up to my knees before I realized they were on backwards.  I lay back on the mattress and tried to relax—my feet were freezing and I was about to wet my pants.  I knew I was going to die out here in the cold, astraddle the Continental Divide, forty miles from pavement.

     With what I decided would be my last valiant effort, I sat up.   The mattress unceremoniously bounced me outside.  I found myself in the cold grass, perched on all fours, gasping for air, pants down around my ankles.  I stood up, faced downwind, and took care of the immediate problem.  I think it froze before it hit the ground.

     I decided that if I was going to die anyway, I might as well do so in comfort.  I pulled my new sleeping bag out of the tent and staggered over to Neil’s Land Cruiser and got into the front passenger seat.  The recline button was easy to find and worked perfectly, even without the ignition switch.  My teeth were chattering, my feet were freezing, and there wasn’t any oxygen up here.  I was surely going to die.

     I can just see it in the morning.  Collins will get up at his usual four a.m. and make coffee.  Neil and Ratisseau will join him about five.  They’ll fix breakfast.  Around six they’ll decide to wake me and discover the empty tent.  Eventually, one of them will discover my cold, lifeless body, frozen in the shape of one half a set of parentheses, lying here in Neil’s truck.  They’ll wonder what to do.  They can’t call 911 from here, no cell service.  They know I won’t swell up and start reeking, not in this cold. Before they do anything, I hope they have the presence of mind to go fishing.  It's downright un-thoughty of me to drop off on them and I’ll keep.  It’s not everyday they get an opportunity to fish up here. 

     I know what I'll do.   I’ll wake Ratisseau and make him promise not to leave me here in this frigid country.  He won’t mind.  He knows I’d do it for him.  He can make it back to Texas a lot quicker than Woodrow Call did in Lonesome Dove.   If he hurries, I won’t thaw out until he’s past Clovis.  If I get to smelling too bad, he can straighten me out and put me in the back with the luggage and those plants in the plastic whiskey bottle from that woman with the dot in Marina.  I’ll make him promise to bury me in that cotton field south of Lubbock---the one where Kandi and I used to park when we were in high school.  Wayne knows she made me happier right there than anywhere else I’ve ever been.

     With hammered breathing and pounding heart, I managed to zip my thirty-below zero sleeping bag.  My glasses were lost, so I couldn’t tell what time I was dying.  My wallet was lost, so the EMS people won’t be able to identify my body.  My shoes were lost, so rigor mortis will probably start with my feet.  I felt myself drifting into a sort of fitful slumber.  Maybe this dying won’t be all that hard.

     Twenty minutes later I came wide awake.  I was soaked.  Sweating.  Damn! It must not be anywhere near thirty below.    

    

Had this turned out to be my last sunset, I suppose it could have been worse.