Normal Camping for Some, Pain and Minor Mutilation for Me
I’d be lying if I had an accurate date for when this happened. I couldn’t have been more than 19 years old when a bunch of us went camping at Oka Park with the subtle and attainable goals of getting sloppy drunk and setting things on fire. Over the years I usually try to go camping for a single night with buddies at least once during the summer and it’s always a pretty good time. This particular trip was the first time I’d gone with friends and I would be reminded of it forever whenever someone looks at my back.
The group was The Ukraine, his girlfriend at the time Ram, Gonads the Barbarian, two chicks named Knox and French, Tall Boy, Pep and myself. There may have been others but they had done nothing worth remembering and their penance for this is, obscurity. Or maybe it was just the people I mentioned. I don’t remember anymore.
We got to Oka in the late afternoon and it was still light out. We were escorted to our campsite and it was immediately clear that the Rangers had made a mistake. We had asked to be as far away from everyone as possible so we could be free to pump music, get wild and chop down some trees or whatever destructive activities we could think of. Instead they gave us a site next to families with annoying children riding tricycles chasing their pet dogs. This wouldn’t do. There were electrical outlets in the ground for Christ sake. These people could’ve pitched a tent in their backyard and run a 20 foot extension cord from their kitchen if this is what they considered camping.
Anyway, we went back to the Ranger hut and demanded they switch us over to complete isolation. They agreed and even refunded us some cash since we were doing “camping sauvage”. Our new site was better. There was no one around, anywhere, just acres of forest in every direction. We had our own bathroom complex and we were free to roam wherever we pleased. Things were looking up.
The sun was setting and we needed to move our asses and get our tents up. There are few things more careless and stupid in this world than putting up your tent with three flashlights pointed at you in complete and utter darkness. Once all the tents were up, we lit the fire, cooked hot dogs and burgers while pounding some beers. The Rangers provided us with wood for the fire but it became clear after a few hours that it would not last the night.
After a few hours of excessive drinking and burning most of our stockpile of wood, we were all pleasantly drunk. The girls kept going off together to use the facilities and it eventually dawned on The Ukraine and I that we could sneak into the woman’s washroom, without being labeled perverts, since they were the only three females using it. We waited until they got back and watched them have another beer. We assumed it was a beer a piss for them.
Once they were almost done their beers, we took off to the bathrooms. The stalls, which were indoors, had flat plywood across the tops so we decided to climb on top of them and lie in wait for them to come in. After they were done peeing (God willing that would be all) we would scream and scare the hell out of them. Brilliant. We waited a good 20 minutes but they never came. Needing to piss and beer refills ourselves, we hopped down onto the counter, then the floor. The Ukraine did this gracefully, my dismount was a solid fail.
Above the counter were long fluorescent lights, the industrial kinds you’d find in pharmacies and large retail stores. I don’t know how I did this but when I jumped, I turned my back into one and it shattered on the way down. At first I laughed and said oops but then I felt the warm trickle of blood going down my lower back. I felt around there, touched something that hurt and my hand had a significant amount of blood when I looked at it. I showed The Ukraine and he said I needed band-aids, possibly stitches.
I lifted my shirt and looked in the mirror to assess what I’d done. Sure enough, about an inch of flesh on my lower back was hanging open. It was shaped like this _I and I could literally flip it with my finger. I was wasted so my blood was thin and it was pouring out like a fountain. We rushed back to the fire and showed everyone the mess I’d made of myself. When you travel with women, they tend to bring things you’d never think of, like a first aid kit. They cleaned my wound but right before bandaging it up, Gonads the Barbarian stepped in and said we needed to disinfect it.
With what? Peroxide? Hot water? No. A 40 ouncer of Vodka. That was all we had as a disinfectant. When hammered, I have a high threshold for pain. This, hurt like a bastard. Gonads the Barbarian was and still is a big guy. He and Tall Boy were tasked with holding me as someone poured Vodka into my wound. The way I’d been sliced open, anything going down my back onto the wound would push the skin out. I’m a modestly sized guy but I’m sure I gave those fuckers a run for their money with my twisting and pulling. I was screeching like a wounded animal.
When it finally ended, I was covered with band-aids and wrapped with my own blood soaked t-shirt. Pep handed me a shot of Vodka right after the ordeal, it was appreciated. The rest of the night was calm. I felt no pain because I kept hammering beers and Vodka. Tall Boy took it upon himself to hack down trees in a drunken stupor with a small hand-held axe to keep the fire going. I don’t know if he did it to keep us warm or because he wanted to cut some small trees down. I’m sure the Rangers wept openly the next morning when they saw the calculated slaughter and ruins of young trees all around our camp site. And some confusion regarding the droplets of blood and the shattered light left in the woman’s washroom. We would never know.
When I got home, I immediately went to the kitchen for some water. My dad was on the couch and saw blood all over my t-shirt as I passed him. After showing him my wound and explaining how we disinfected it, he told me I was an idiot and to follow him to the washroom where he’d disinfect it properly. After cleaning it, he asked me if I got stabbed. I wouldn’t dignify that with an answer.
So here we are, 7 or 8 years later, and I still have this weird fucking scar on my back. Whenever I’m at the beach, people who don’t know the story ask what happened. I usually lie about knife fights or prison shankings hoping they laugh and avoid asking again what really happened. These curious bastards always want to know the real story. I’m often ridiculed after telling it.