Labor

Sometimes in my grandmother's backyard the camp coffee will bubble on the bbq, so our outdoor souls can speak in the air of the woodhood; an encapsulation of childhood, though everything is set to be circled around the dining table within; it asks us to slow down. The camp coffee was packed in the '03 33-foot Fleetwood RV. Bill spent weeks tuning it, grandmother making the bed, toilet paper and chai stocked and all the flips and switches reviewed. I just swallowed my ----, unsure how it came to be that I have such a generous and trusting family, that they trust who I love and how capable he is, and said, Take and Enjoy and Don'tCare. It took us forever to get out of town, as it does, and it felt as though the center of me was white-knuckling, trying to trust spacial awareness and the heavy guttural coughs of the engine. We were like the santa claus of wine, stopping in every major city to drop off cases to the good boyz and through thick rushes of rain before we made it to Cle Elum for our stayover, driving up a mountain, the whole length of us, to the mansion cabin on top. Sloppily sucking melted ice cream sundaes on the couch in front of a projected Depp film. In the morning it was hard to to accomplish the 18-20 miler, a workout must on the first day of Dave, as is tradition. Within was a 10-mile progression run along fields rich in horses, striding through nebulous packs of ankle-snippers, and wave after wave of the backcountry road traveller giving such good room. It was hard - the workouts have become as much, or they always were, I'm just excited for the imminent taper.

Waiting at the top was a rustic breakfast of flank steak sliced, eggs over easy, roasted fingerlings, and buttered toast. Thick in a blanket of white salt, my body, the shower felt incredible, shampoo lathered for the last time in days. Then, Ellensburg to meetup for fresh ingredients, more booze and coffee. Three of us caravaning: the Westy, the Lacey's and Fleetwood, waiting in line to camp, the hot liquored breath of the camp attendant and parking one by one by one with room to claim. Tents erected, pop ups poppin', cornhole set, beer tabs cracked, and all the fold-out chairs in a circle with magazines and plasticized snacks. I like unpacking. I like putting things in drawers and hidey-holes. We all sipped our mixed drinks like some kind of Las Vegas-hoochie-Florida-retired-Dave-Matthews-Band pack of youth and adult. Youth enough to take shots, adult enough to think about the next morning. Ber & Scott the Fox made annual shirts for Camp 41, tie-dyed and covered in glow-in-the-dark stenciling, which we wore the first night in.

The walk in feels forever, dusty-footed and a lot of garbled cross-communal talking, girlfriends hiding their boyfriends from view though drawing attention to them as they piss on wooden fences. People as monkeys, in tutus, in blankets, zoned out, hyped up, high heels? Through security, where the smart or endowed or falsely endowed are coveted. Ticket zapped, and on into the land of shitty beer for $14 and $50 Dreaming Tree, sidestepping bodies under blankets, and sideways eye'in girls who only stop glaring when they need a favor from you - Save my spot? We roll in deep and grab land hungry. Pass around kettlecorn and beers. The snuck ins. Snap glowsticks & glow necklaces & glow bracelets. Leaning slightly into one another on the slope of grass, groovin' on angle. Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros already buzzin' and coarse. And Dave, finally, on, jawline blanketed in growth, puckered lips, eyebrows on full keel, arched in emotion, and all the complexities of a South-African-born, New York transitioned voice boss.

It went fast (too). Al came into camp, as did some of Red's friends toting Mexican beers, sugar cookies and cheese platters, all of us women got to walkabout in bathing suits and sunglasses, Ber with her basket of homemade crispies for $1, cocktails in hand. Glowing, browning, laughing. Dust storms and tents to Oz like kites. On our final night Red & I got to sit with friends near the front, a closer look at the arch of Dave's brows with wafts of shitstink emanating from the porto's. And, despite the stress of a lot of New, everything worked out and was well loved; I want to be back there, in that place where everything is careless and Don'tCare.