There were actually some less glamorous parts of camping in Europe that were part of the package. Like the toilets in Paris. Because we weren't staying at hotels or buying gas at local service stations that would have restrooms, our choices were limited. Literally to a hole in the cement floor in the stall some places. Or male/female open air bathrooms on the busy streets---you could see people's feet as they were in the cubicle. To me, people seeing my feet while peeing was the same as seeing my face, which would have been red and extremely contorted. Or what if "they" could see other body parts? Horrors! Being pregnant, I was more than interested in finding suitable "toilettes". Often desperate, in fact. One time, I had had enough, and forced Dad to buy $5/gal gas so I could enjoy a regular bathroom then. We were used to paying a quarter for a gallon of gas at the military stations, so it was a rude awakening for him, but necessary in my mind. So we would have to forgo food and shelter, at least we could have some dignity, no?
He found a way to get even on some trips by having me, obviously very pregnant, and with you in an carrier on my back, begin to blow up the air mattresses by huffing and puffing. What a shill. He would be in the background setting up the little tent, and people of all different languages would come out of the woodwork, well, out of the forest, to gallantly help me by trying all their different air pumps. Inevitably one of theirs would do the trick, and we would be in business without having to buy an air pump or exert ourselves much either. Did I mention we were poor?
Then there was the time in Switzerland when I got the attention of all those people from other countries by another method, this one rather inadvertent. Most campgrounds there were very unlike their American counterparts. Instead of private or semi private sites, your tent basically was staked right next to someone else's, with only a little area in front so you could walk to the path to the restrooms (Yea! They did have decent restrooms in good old Switzerland!). That night, we drifted off to sleep with the cacophony of so many people talking in so many languages. It seems as though I should have been dreaming about the Tower of Babel. But no, I dreamed a dream that life should end. I dreamed a dream I was being buried alive, a nightmare!
With limited space in our tiny 2 man pup tent, with you sleeping in the middle between us, I had rolled over with my pregnant belly into the side of the tent and was inhaling canvas into my mouth. Terror filled, and screaming bloody murder, I woke up! And so did everyone else in the vicinity. Trying to figure out what had happened and explain it when you literally don't have the words to jump the language gap, is a bridge too far in the middle of the night. Things eventually settled down, and I wonder how many were now convinced that American GIs beat their wives. Who knows?
But I couldn't get past the overwhelming claustrophobia one must have when being buried alive, so Dad took my sleeping bag and turned it around, stuck my body in it with my face totally outside the tent pointing to the heavens, and zipped the flap down to my neck. One way to deal with panic. Yep, it almost immediately started to rain. But what's a little drizzle when you can still breathe? At least I knew I was alive. Humiliated, but alive.
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