Getting all the boys together and disappearing into the middle of nowhere is always a good idea.

On paper it sounds questionable as hell, but when you?ve got eight dozen beer, four bottles of rum, two jugs of moonshine and a bag of weed big enough to smother a raccoon, suddenly life feels real fuckin balanced.

You know your problems aren?t coming with you.

They didn?t make the cut.

Nobody cares that the first day is just you drinking until your face turns the colour of a boiled lobster, and the next two days are spent puking your guts out under a big piss-soaked spruce tree.

That?s not a hangover.

???That?s tradition.

You don?t even wait until you get to camp to crack the first beer.

Hell no.

That thing?s open before you?re off the main road.

The truck?s getting beat like it owes money, bouncing through ruts and rocks because nobody wants to carry shit farther than ten feet.

If the cooler can?t be thrown out the back door, you?ve gone too far.

Fishing?

Canoe?

Don?t be stupid.

Everyone?s elbows deep in the cooler, hunting beer like raccoons in a dumpster.

Chips are being eaten like it?s a competitive sport.

There?s no woman around to say, ?Maybe slow down,? or ?You?ll feel sick later.?

Not here. Not now.

This is a lawless land.

There are no curtains.

No tablecloth.

No fancy fan spinning gently above your head.

It?s an old shack built from leftover renovation scraps.

This place exists so grown men can dig at their crotch, wear the same clothes all weekend, and fart just to see who can clear the room first without anyone bitching about it.

After everyone?s got a good glow on, one guy decides, ?We need a fire.?

Now keep in mind, lighting a match in a one-room shack full of alcohol fumes, moonshine breath, and weaponized farts is not what you?d call a safe play.

But this guy announces he?s ?the most sober,? which is drunk guy math for dangerously confident.

He drags in a half dozen wooden pallets he stole from work and decides to break them up himself.

No hammer.

No crowbar.

Just sock feet and bad decisions.

The rest of us?

Sitting there watching like it?s fuckin Netflix.

He?s jumping on these pallets, and they are NOT cooperating.

They?re flexing.

Mocking him.

Halfway through the second pallet, BAM - he drives a nail straight through the bottom of his foot.

????

The scream that comes out of him sounds like a pig getting flicked in the ass with a giant elastic band.

He starts hopping around the shack like a drunk circus clown, howling in pain.

Everyone else is laughing so hard nobody can breathe.

Grown men are crying.

One guy?s on the floor, slapping it like he?s having a seizure.

Then - because alcohol hates intelligence - he stomps down with his OTHER foot?

SECOND NAIL.

Now he?s screaming like a three-year-old who lost her dolly at Walmart.

Two guys bolt for the outhouse because they?re pissing themselves laughing.

Someone?s wheezing.

Someone yells, ?DO IT AGAIN!? which helps absolutely nobody.

Finally, someone goes, ?Alright, alright, someone help this fuckin idiot.?

Thank Christ for moonshine.

They sit him down, yank the nails out, pour moonshine straight on his feet while he screams like he?s being exorcised, and wrap them up with duct tape and an old dish towel.

Fire gets lit.

Pallets burn.

He drinks through the pain.

By morning, he?s limping, smiling, and says, ?Worth it.?

And that?s camp life.

Nobody fishes.

Nobody rests.

Someone always bleeds.

And every single year, someone says the same thing?

?Next year, we?ll do this smarter.?

Yeah.

No, the fuck we won?t.

???????????????...and that's callin' it like it is!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Canadian artist & digital troublemaker Colin John Cook shares his louder-than-life, awkward, and honest-as-hell stories. Packed with humour, real talk & creative insights in a no filter, digital comedy space that laughs at life & calls it like it is. He is also the Founder and President of

The Hidden Gallery - Art Studio & Micro Theatre

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