From Paradise: Camping at Painted Rock

July 26, 2011

Camping at Painted Rock

“I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.”—-Agatha Christie

Gah. It is July 26th, a day that by it's sheer placement on the seasonal calender should be a feel good day. I, however, am stuck on my own personal calender of ups and downs which has declared that I will not enjoy it. Feeling edgy and generally irritated both emotionally and physically. It even hurt too much to brush my hair this morning. It's one thing to be a moper during winter; heck, you are just joining the crowd on those days. It feels recklessly wasteful on a summer day like this, however. And yet, here I am.

Catching Rays and Reading

So, to get off of that downward train of thought, I will now think of only happy-ness.

I'll start with last weekends camping foray. We had such a nice time. We went to the Painted Rock area (about two hours from here, on the other side of Darby). There was an icy creek there that the men and kids spend hours reshaping with dams built from fallen logs.

The kids (and grown ups more adventurous than me)spent their time floating up and down the creek on the myriads of tubes we'd all brought, and playing on the tiny sandy beach. I spent my time down there catching some sun, chatting, and reading.

Also spent some time in a lovely hammock. There are few things are relaxing as rocking gently in a hammock, listening to a chilly stream and the voices of friends and kiddos talking and laughing.

We planned on doing a project with the kids while we were up there- Tie dye T-shirts. It was so fun! I know for a fact that the grown ups had just as much fun with that as the kids did.