Forethought

Once upon a time it was brought to my attention that forsight was a virtue I lacked. To wit- wandering out so far into the California foothills one night that I had to call my roommate to pick me up. In fact, it was then that my particular deficit was made known to me.

One would assume that I would have adapted, at this point, to this peculiarity as I have to my inability to retain short term memory (my wallet, if nothing else, is meticulously organized, see also, at times, my pants pockets) but, sadly, I have fabricated no evolutionary or organizational mechanism for this dilema.

Case in point. I do not know the proper assembly for my rainfly. Now, in case you were wondering, a rainfly is the part of the tent you use in the rain in order to keep dry, it's got a flap that covers the doors to the tent as well as the mesh part on top. A proper rain fly keeps rain out. You can now see why the proper assembly thereof is integral to a good night's sleep on a dreary, dismal, freezing cold night like the one I just spent in Nebraska.

Suffice it to say that one oughtn't go camping in Nebraska in October in the rain without a little thought put into how exactly one is going to be sheltered. I woke up around 3:30 with my feet numb in a small puddle that had already soaked the bottom of my blankets.

Perhaps here, though, we can see that I do, in fact, posess a powerful tool in the fight against my lack of forethought: Innovation. That's right. I climbed back in my car, tied my pajama bottoms into knots to make feetie pajamas in hopes of salvaging my toes in the morning and curled up under my coats, shivering and waiting for sleep, or morning, or something.

That's when I saw it. A few drops of water glistening on the windshield, caught precariously in the predawn light, and, you know what? They were the prettiest stars I'd ever seen.

Take that lack of forethought!