Camping, Families, and Odd Occurrences

S i x

 S i x ♥ June 28th

Well, I ended up not going to the bonfire. The minute I’d gotten back to the camper, I had another fight with my spoiled brat of a brother, and he left to go visit with some kids around his age. So, I stayed in and once the daylight went away and became a dark, starry night, I went straight to bed.

   It had been a long night and I’d been tired from the hiking and fighting and meeting the Bennetts. So, I took to sleeping.

   When I woke up the next morning, it was the same as yesterday pretty much. Cole and I got up, I quickly took a shower at the bathroom/shower station, and then we left with the Gardeners and Matt to the Porcupine Mountains Visitor Center. There, we met up with the other groups of people at camp and had to sit down through a boring-ass thirty minute showing of wildlife.

   The only good thing about this showing was that I was sitting next to a girl about my age (maybe older) on my right. She introduced herself as Valerie. She had a slight accent that I couldn’t quite put my finger on, but I would’ve felt like I was being rude if I’d just asked her straight out.

   “This is boring,” Valerie whispered to me halfway through the showing. I nodded in agreement. I had always hated these little showings, even when I went to historical places with them. I just couldn’t get myself to sit and watch through them.

   It seemed Valerie was the same way that I was.

   Shortly after saying how boring it was, she squeezed my arm, motioned to the exiting doors of the theater and got up. Lucky for us, we were at the end of the aisle of seats so we slipped out of it quite easily. I didn’t feel bad about missing it. It wasn’t like we had to pay for it or anything. The showing was completely free and optional.

   The minute we were out, Valerie started laughing. This I liked about her. She didn’t giggle obnoxiously. She laughed; a true and sincere laugh that made me want to join in with her. So, I did.

   The visitor center consisted of four main places; there was the theater room, the gift shop room, the main room which had a map of Porcupine Mountains and its trails on it, and then a sort of animal room where there was life-sized statues of bears and wolves and coyotes.

   Being the wolf-fanatic that I was, I was instantly drawn to the gray wolf display and stared up at the beautiful creature. Ever since I was a little girl, I had been completely and totally entranced with wolves. They were so beautiful and magnificent to me. Everything about them was amazing.

   I was a dog person, after all.

   Valerie came up behind me and reached around me, pressing a “try-me” button in front of the wolf. The button’s speakers gave a long howl and Valerie smiled. “So your favorite animal’s the wolf?” she asked.

   I nodded and walked to the other side of the room to look at the bear display, Valerie trailing close behind. “Yeah. What about you? What’s your favorite animal?”

   She paused to think for a minute. Finally, she shrugged. “I don’t really have a favorite animal. I like zebras, and antelope, and wolves, and bears…I don’t know. I like them all, I guess. They’re all so different from one another.”

   “Except for pumas, panthers, and mountain lions,” I commented cheekily. “They’re pretty much the same.”

   Valerie laughed. “Yeah, but most of them are different. I like a variety of options.”

   I nodded in understanding. We quietly listened to someone talk about bears for a few minutes until she interrupted it, saying, “So who are you here with? I came here with my parents. Well, I was supposed to come here with them. But they sort of ditched and chickened out, deciding to leave me here with the trailer and stay at a hotel.”