Phyllis and A Full Night’s Rest

             So, I bought a car.  Michael, Steve, Lexi and I pooled together our New Zealand monopoly money for a Mitsubishi Diamante. We've been calling her Phyllis.  Along with Clinton’s reelection and the second to last packers super bowl title, Phyllis is another gorgeous child of 1996.  A sexy beige, wheel on the right, owners manual in Japanese, 220,000 kilometers (whatever that means), and a few cuts and bruises, but nothing out of the ordinary for a decade of life. 

            With the pink slip somewhere and a loose form of insurance protecting our names, we filled our baby’s trunk with tents and hit the left side of the road.  Our destination was Wanaka – a mountain town near the west coast.  There we met up with Jack and Tris.  Together we crawled up mountains in the sunshine.  At night we pitched our tents on the shores of Lake Wanaka. 

            I have spent most of my weekends here in a tent.  I love sleeping outside, but in the past it has been hard to find rest.  Nights under canvass roofs seem long.  Dawns refuse to come.  Noises from dark trees cut ribbons through dreams. 

            But lately the ground has been feeling different – warmer, softer, familiar.  My face presses deep into the pad below me, and I wake up at first light.  I don’t stir.  No noise steals my sleep. 

            What more does a man need than a fifteen year old whip and a full night’s rest?

            So let me make a suggestion.  Dust off a tent and head out for the weekend.  Up north perhaps?  It’s the time of the year when we all should be sleeping under the stars.