by Jimmy Scarboro

Created on: May 08, 2008

We started getting ready to go early on a gorgeous spring day in April of 1999. Later, my wife and I were supposed to meet some friends and family at the lake for a long weekend of camping and relaxation. We hoped to arrive in time to pitch the tent before dark. As usual, we packed enough for a dozen people to survive at least a month and we had waited too long to reserve our campsites. We were still able to get five sites together for everyone, but they were the last ones available, and were what you might call "primitive". These sites were the furthest from the parking area. There was a dirt path wandering through the woods up and down the steep hills for about a quarter mile before reaching our spot. Not an easy path over which to haul the kitchen sink.

When I go camping I don't like to go back out to civilization to get anything, so I brought my big five foot long Coleman cooler full of ice blocks, plenty of food and drinks. We started out with my wife on one end and me on the other. I lost my wife after the first hill. At six feet tall and two hundred and fifty pounds, I am a big boy, but that cooler just about did me in. About ten trips later; we had moved it all. We ended up trying to set up the tent in the dark using flashlights that only worked if you slapped them a couple of times. What a shouting match that turned out to be. We don't work well together under the best circumstances. Luckily, our arguing was muffled by the shouts coming from our friends struggling with their own tents nearby. By midnight, we had a big fire going at my sister-in-law's campsite. We were all gathered around it comparing notes about our misadventures and laughing at ourselves. After having a well deserved cocktail and winding down for a while, we made plans for meeting at my site for breakfast, and retired to our tents for the night.

I'm not sure what time it was but I awoke during the night, as I usually do, needing to relieve myself. As I tried to untangle my legs from the sleeping bag and climb over my wife who had insisted on sleeping by the door, I got a cramp in my thigh that took my breath away and hurt so badly that I nearly passed out. As I was walking it off, the other leg did the same thing. These were the worst cramps I ever remember and I woke my wife up to ask her what to do. She is an RN with many years of experience, so I hoped she would have the answer. She suggested pinching the piece of flesh that divides my nostrils just above the lip. Twenty years

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