1

The fire crackles. It’s loud. So loud. And smokey, because the wood delivered by the campground guardian angel is a bit damp. But that’s ok, the smoke is keeping the mosquitoes away. It’s just 8 pm and really bright out—bright enough that I’m reading my giant Haruki Murakami book. Which is getting a little sooty. The campground has no facilities so I haven’t washed my hands all day, although I’ve intermittently smeared them with sanitizer. They’re stained with soot and cherry juice.

They look like happy hands.

I’m camping and off-grid for the first time in oh, five years? Almost exactly five years. The camping part is lovely. I have a secret campground at which I can almost always find a site if I need it, and it’s close enough to the city that it doesn’t require overplanning. It’s unpopular for two reasons: First, everyone who finds it immediately takes a blood oath to not ever tell anyone else about it. No Google reviews, no tags on social posts. It does not exist, don’t tell the others.

Second, it has no services. Or cell service. And while backcountry campers are all over that kind of thing, most people who do less adventurous camping… I don’t know, I have a feeling being off-grid totally is getting harder and harder for most of us. No? What do you think?

It’s a little weird. I mean—right now? I don’t exist. You can’t check in on me. I can’t check in on you. I don’t know who won the Canada-Switzerland game. I don’t know if the US has started another war. I don’t even know if the weather forecast has changed—the skies look blue, so I hope I’ll have a dry night. But I don’t know.

It takes me a while to remember this feeling. This is what life used to be like, almost all of the time.  If you’re even just ten years younger than me, you probably don’t really remember. And if you’re twenty or more years younger than me, you can’t remember life like this at all.

And that is a little weird. Cause, like, I’m not that old. (Unless you ask my kids.)

2

My main companion off-grid is my giant Haruki Murakami book, 1Q84. It starts off good (but massive). To follow the story, I’m largely ignoring Murakami’s total inability to describe—or mention—a female character without referencing her breasts. What can we say, he’s clearly a boob man. Soft boobs, hard nipples, lopsided boobs, big boobs, small boobs, bouncing boobs, straining boobs… Fellow-boob possessors, should one of us tell him? That we don’t just sit around thinking about our breasts brushing against fabric, water, the air? That we just, like, have them? Sort of like he has a penis and testicles? Also, seriously, how can someone be this imaginative a writer… and grow into their, what, sixties? … without ever having a conversation with a woman or two about how she actually experiences her body?

(He also seems to be into pubic hair. I’m not sure I’ve ever read a novel before in which I was, a few pages in, intimately acquainted with what the pubic hair of every woman in it looked like. And this is odd, friends, because I read a lot of filthy romance novels.)

Still. I want to know what happens next. So I roll my eyes when the breasts make their inevitable appearance in sweaters, mirrors or characters’ self-reflective thoughts, and move on.

3

At one point, I almost start the Great Alberta Fire of 2026. Wait, don’t judge—I said almost. I didn’t. And given how much it’s been raining the last few weeks in Southern Alberta, it was a pretty slim almost. Still. My personal stash of wood plus the coals the last camper left behind plus some Walmart fire starter… magic, kittens. Magic. And then kind of scary. To the point that I put all my drinking water within reaching distance of the fire in case I have to quench it.

Fortunately, the fire starter dies out and, as I add the campground wood to the dregs of my wood, I make more smoke than fire.

But that’s ok.

4

You ask me a couple of times if I’m excited about going camping. I tell you the feelings are complicated and I don’t elaborate. The feelings stay complicated. I’ve got to confess, this is my least favourite thing about getting older and older and acquiring more and more experiences and baggage. Nothing is simple anymore. Everything has a backstory. The dentist. Camping. Spilling ink. Nothing is just what it is. 

It’s very annoying.

I don’t like it.

5

What I like: Being outside. The smell of fire. The sound of fire. The sound of water and wind. And insects and birds. The colours of the setting sun. The dance of sunlight on grass and branches. My all-croissant camping diet. (I understand there are people who cook when they go camping. I don’t get it, unless, I suppose, you’re going for weeks. But for a day or two? Food bars, chips and croissants and the occasional hot dog will keep you more than alive—perfectly happy even. But then, I think after you cook for a family of five for a couple of decades, your primary idea of time off or vacation per force includes, you know, not cooking. And not doing the dishes. Especially without hot running water. But I digress. The all-croissant camping diet. I recommend.)

I even like peeing outside. The campground has a very clean outhouse. But we all know I’m not walking all the way over there once it gets dark.

6

What I don’t like: Overthinking. But man, am I ever good at it.

7

The fire crackles. Who needs wifi or television when you’ve got pinecones?

8

You’re reading this, so I’ve come back. To wifi, to distractions, to connections.

Whenever I’m away, there’s always a real—to me—chance I won’t. Because, who knows. Many things can happen. Death by grizzly, death by vehicular manslaughter. Madness. The urge to run away and ne’er return.

None of these things have a probability of zero.

Still. Clearly. I’ve come back.

Did you miss me?

xoxo

“Jane”