Sometimes the Dragon adventures occur without a hitch; other times, unexpected things happen. Sometimes human error plays a part; other times, it could be the Fates playing a cruel joke…..
I had a brilliant idea while my husband was preparing for a camping trip: why not have one of the Dragons go camping with him? My husband chose Ander, and both prepared for the trip:
During the planning stages for the trip, the time frame was stretched to ten days – too long for a phone or camera battery to last in the Boundary Waters – so without the ability to take photos, it made no sense to actually take Ander on the trip. Instead, Ander went camping in our backyard.
I decided that I simply had to take a photo of Ander making a portage. But where to find water? (An actual pond or lake was out of the question: I live in fear of losing one of the Dragons while doing “creative” photographing of scenarios.) We had a couple of days of heavy rain, so I ventured out into our grove and found a large puddle. PERFECT! I ran back to the house, grabbed the Dragon, backpack, map, cap, and “canoe,” shoved my phone in my pocket and raced back to the spot of what would be my next awesome picture.
Once I reached the puddle, I got to work. In order to take the photo at “eye level” I had to hunker down, stretch out on my tummy to make sure I was eye-to-eye with the Dragon. There I was, prone on the ground with mud, water and muck covering my clothes, propping my elbows on the wet, rotting, left-over-from-Fall foliage, just to get the perfect picture – which, if I do say so myself, I accomplished.
There was just ONE problem:
Yep! I grabbed the wrong Dragon! So, I had to trudge back to the house, dripping with mud and water, grab Ander, go back outside to the grove, and redo the entire portage photo session! (I suffer for my art….you know, in case you were wondering….)
The camping photo timeline took about a week as I waited for appropriate weather. I knew I needed a bonfire in order to roast hot dogs and then marshmallows. I made sure that the wind was in the right direction, thus avoiding a potential accidental torching of the Dragon. All was going well until the wind took an unexpected change as I was snapping the last photo.
I quickly grabbed Ander and saved him from a horrible, melting death. When I looked at the last photo, I saw this:
I don’t know about you, but I swear that Ander’s expression changed to one of horror!
It was at this point that I came to the conclusion that maybe camping wasn’t a good activity for a Dragon. I decided to end the adventure before something truly catastrophic happened, which is why the last photo, taken the following morning, is of Ander having a much-needed cup of coffee next to the site of his NDE…!
(The camping scenario as it was supposed to look:
