Locked out

Scout and I were settling in for our first night in our new, mountaintop campsite. (Okay, it’s probably not a mountaintop — more like a hilltop on the way to the actual mountaintop — but I’m sticking with it.)

The sun was red over the next mountain as the light began to fade through the pines.

I had worked up a sweat that afternoon, moving the kitchen stuff from the back of the van to the rotting wood picnic table. It was carved all over with initials and graffiti. I wondered how many years back they went.

I unloaded the tools, tarps, and other equipment to a small tent that my friend Linda had loaned me earlier. I won’t be sleeping in it; the van is much more comfortable. The tent is my ‘garage’ for storage and also to serve as notice other campers when I’m not here:

“This site is taken, sorry!”

I wanted to set up my jerry-rigged tarp awning on the van’s roof for shade but I was tired and hot, and the gnats were driving me crazy. I decided to wait a day or so to see which direction I should park the van to get the maximum cooling effect while still having enough sun for the solar panel.

Scout jumped on me, whining. I knew what that meant.

“Oh, FINE,” I said, knowing I couldn’t put our evening walk off any longer.

I put on my hiking boots, filled a small bottle with water, and unhooked the twenty-foot cable tie-out that kept her from running off after a bird or a squirrel.

“Let’s go,” I said, irritable as I swatted gnats from my face. One managed to fly up my nose.

“ACK!” I snuffed and sneezed.

Scout looked at me with an astonished expression.

Really? We’re really going for a WALK?”

“Yes. Really.” I smiled unconvincingly and started off. “C’mon.”

Scout pranced like a pony, jumping and shaking her head as we headed down the dirt road to who knows where.

The unknown makes me a little nervous, to be honest. We hadn’t driven past the campsite when we came up here, so everything in that direction was a blank. My inclination was to turn right, back the way we came. It would be easier too because it was downhill.

“Don’t be silly,” I told myself, and we turned left. “Uphill going out—” I repeated the hiking mantra I’d learned at my first RTR, “—downhill coming back.”

Scout raced forward, yanking hard at the end of the lead.

“Ow!” The thin cable hurt my hand.

Scout was sitting now, looking back at me with a ‘What’s wrong?’ look on her face.

I looped a few feet like a lariat to prevent another incident and walked toward her.

“Try to contain yourself, ok?”

At the word ‘ok,’ she was off again.

This time the cable wrapped around my feet, and I barely stepped out of the loop before Scout yanked hard again.

She waited patiently for me to catch up, then ran from side to side, excitedly sniffing each plant and tree along the road.

I’d like to say I enjoyed the walk as much as Scout. I started this whole thing in order to be out in nature, after all. But I was breathless in a few hundred feet, not so much from my lack of fitness as the altitude.

“Wait!” I called to Scout, who stopped and sat, polite.

I gulped the air but couldn’t get enough oxygen for several deep breaths.

Finally, I was ready to go again but she heard something behind us and growled. Then I heard it too — a vehicle was coming up the road.

I hurried to pull all the cable and Scout to the side of the road, just as a red pickup hurtled around the curve into view. I smiled at the driver, a handsome young man in a baseball cap, but he ignored us.

“Friendly asshole,” I said to Scout in the cloud of dust, letting her lead out again.

We trudged on — well, I trudged on. She scampered.

Another truck passed soon afterwards, and this driver smiled at me as he went by. I felt a little better about things.

By the time we got back to camp, I was drenched with sweat and ready to relax in the comfort of my van. While Scout lapped at her water dish, I straightened up the place and locked the doors, leaving the front windows cracked for ventilation.

No more trucks came by.

The silence and solitude were delicious

I took a baby-wipe bath and changed into a clean pair of yoga pants and t-shirt.

“Ahhhh.”

I spread my unzipped sleeping bag across the backseat ‘couch/bed’, sat and draped it over my shoulders to ward off the growing chill. Getting out my Chromebook, I was ready to relax with one of the movies I had downloaded before leaving San Diego.

Then I noticed Scout licking her food bowl. I’d forgotten to feed her dinner. The dog food bucket was outside, doing duty as an end table next to my camp chair. With a melodramatic sigh, I put on my shoes.

“Stay,” I told Scout as I stepped down and slid the side door shut.

In that instant, I knew my mistake

The key was inside.

“Oh no oh no oh no,” I muttered, panicked.

I hoped I was wrong, that the side door wasn’t locked. I tried it frantically, but it wouldn’t budge.

Soon after I’d bought this van, I had two duplicate keys made. I’d put them in my wallet, planning to get a magnetized key box and put one of them inside the wheel well — but I’d forgotten all about it. My wallet was inside the van, along with my phone. I couldn’t even call for help.

Scout watched me through the window with interest.

The sun had slipped behind the next mountain and the chill was coming on fast. All my warm clothes were inside the van.

I tried the door again.

And again.

And again.

Nothing.

I tried all the other doors, Scout following me from window to window.

No dice.

“Couldn’t you just unlock a door for me?” I asked her through the glass. She didn’t answer.

I began to think I would have to walk back to town for help. Staying here overnight in my thin cotton clothes would be foolish and possibly dangerous.

“I’ll just walk fast,” I told myself. “That will warm me up.”

The nearest town, a sleepy village named Fawnskin, was several miles down a very bumpy road. But then I remembered that I wouldn’t be driving so the bumps wouldn’t slow me down like they had in the van.

Scout was safe and comfortable, with a bowl of water at least. She’d be all right.

It was getting dark. Would the moon come out soon? I hoped so because my solar lantern was in the van along with everything else I needed.

“I’d better start.”

Then I looked at the front door windows, cracked a few inches for ventilation. I could never fit my fat arms through those gaps. But what if I had something in camp that could reach down and pull up on the lock?

Thank goodness I’d had the good sense, for a change, not to put off unloading the tools and kitchen stuff from the back of the van.

What did I have that was long and thin and strong with something like a hook on one end? I rummaged through my toolbox. The rebar stakes that I used to tie down the awning and laundry rack weren’t quite long enough. Neither were the tent stakes.

What about the kitchen?

The soup ladle. I had bought it years ago because it reminded me of the kitchen utensils in my mother’s diner: utilitarian, stainless steel, and over-sized.

I got the ladle out of the large plastic tub of dishes and utensils that I’d placed on the picnic table. Now to find something to stand on so I could reach the few inches of space at the top of the passenger side window, which was above my head.

Scout’s dog food bucket. Would it be strong enough to hold me? I hoped so. I put it in place and reached up to the window edge to steady me. The bucket wobbled a little, but it held.

I slid the ladle through the crack and reached down as far as I could, but it wasn’t long enough.

“Shit! Shit shit shit shit!”

Why had I forgotten to get that key case? Why had I locked the doors? Why had I let myself get so fat?

I pushed my arm farther through the window, hard. It scraped painfully, but the ladle reached the door handle at last. But where exactly was the lock? The light was nearly gone, but I could just make out, through the glass, the lock on the driver’s side. It was right next to the handle.

I moved the ladle an inch or two to the right and lifted up.

Nothing happened.

I tried again and again, with no luck.

I moved over to the driver’s side and pushed my other arm through that window, feeling the bruises form.

Nothing.

“One more try,” I told myself, “and then I start walking.”

Melodramatic visions of myself, cold and weak, lurching down the dirt road calling hoarsely, “Help! Help!” danced through my head.

I went back to the passenger’s side, shoved my arm through and tried again.

“Just one more,” I muttered, and heard a click so faint I nearly ignored it.

“Wait, could that be it?”

I tried the door and felt my heart leap when it opened.

Scout licked my face joyfully while I pondered my good luck. The van, when I climbed inside, never looked so big and cozy, so homey and safe.

I have never felt so grateful.

That was three days ago. I went to town yesterday. Guess what I forgot to buy.

That’s right: a key box

*sigh*