Last Saturday we traded in the tiny house for a tent.

And when we got up to pack we took a moment to look at our tiny house and admire it--because to both of our surprise, we have yet to appreciate it any less than the first day we moved in. This house is ours and it will be for some time.

Some time.

We packed a tent, sleeping bags, an American Flag flask with brandy and headed North to meet 11 other folks at Mother Neff State Park.

We first made some very necessary stops at some local favorites for breakfast tacos and most likely the most addictive latte you will every taste.

We put on some Canned Heat and Paul Simon and an hour later we were in Salado to tromp around a bit. There was a Scottish festival, so we watched the river dancing competition and agreed that river dancing is indeed one of the most unadulteratedly joy-filled hobbies for children to possibly partake in. We toured a local winery and popped into Fletcher's--a wonderful, disorganized bookstore that was playing Christmas choir music.

Another hour passed and we were in a Ghost Town in Coryell, Texas where there is only a saloon, two general stores, a post office and a sheriff's station. In the middle there is a well swallowed by cactus.

Here's a brief (and perhaps uninteresting to you, but critical to my point) history:

The Grove was established around 1859 by German settlers and was named for a grove of Oak trees nearby.

By the late 1860s the community had two general stores, a mill and a cotton gin.

In 1874 the post office was established. J. B. Coleman was the first postmaster.

Between 1880 and 1900, the community continued to grow with three general stores, two grocery stores and a population of 150. By the first decade of the 1900s the community had a two-teacher public school (with 60 students) and a Lutheran private school.

During the 1940s the community began to decline when it was bypassed by Highway 36. In the late 1940s several local farmers were forced to relocate due to construction. Due to population declines, the public school in The Grove was closed in 1948, while the Lutheran school continued to operate until 1962.

Some time passed.

And now it is an official ghost town--empty all except two tourists who dropped in on their way to camp a few miles down the road.

And down the road we went, to campsite 19 where 5 tents were already pitched and 8 people already there preparing food, throwing around a football, stoking a fire, and milling about. Two dogs--a lab named Louis and a poodle named pippin--ran around. We both loved Pippin.

But because winter has come early to Texas this year we took a quick little walk around the park.

And then we all gathered around the fire and drank and ate and chatted and did all the things people do while camp. Point out the stars. Someone brought a guitar. Then we all went into our tents.

And then we woke up.

After a breakfast of fire-made breakfast tacos and coffee from the percolator, we hung around for a few more hours until we all decided to begin packing up. We've been getting better at taking ours down, so we were the first to be packed away and decided to take a hike on a trail. The trail ended up taking us all the way around and back to campsite 19 where as expected, there were no more tents, the fire had been put out, all the food put into coolers and totes, dogs put back on leashes, and guitars in their cases--everything that was there was now gone.

Thus, camping is the most perfect example of a microcosm of the timeline of humanity.

A civilization comes and goes and in their moment, they are the only moment they are thinking about--those stars are stars for their lifetime, that portable nylon fortress is a temporary home and their (our) struggles of sleeping in freezing cold with not enough blankets are real.

Campsite 19 had nothing left of us. Even less evidence of our being there than a German settler had of once living in the ghost town down the road. The only thing to do is to go home to your slightly more permanent abode and enjoy it for awhile in your tiny house with your little cat named Little Cat.

"All moments, past, present, and future, always have existed, always will exist."

--Vonnegut