At least, that’s how I’ve always told it.
Dad took us camping more times than I can count, and we had our fair share of camping extremes. It was honestly one of the best parts of growing up. Dad worked hard. All the time. So when he escaped work (either work work with the Air Force or work with church or with the baseball team of any of the other things that kept him operating on all cylinders all the time) to do something fun with us, it was the greatest experience every time.
Sometimes we went camping with the Boy Scouts, but mostly it was just camping with us guys – my three brothers and I. On occasion, Mom and Tena would come along too. Mom came on fewer campouts after the one summer trip when we all splashed her too much while swimming in a mountain river. I still feel bad about that.
One year we were on the annual Father-Son campout with the church and we were all settled in. We had already setup the tent – technically a retired surplus Air Force parachute, and we built a slightly bigger campfire than necessary. It was just big enough that most of the other fathers and sons joined us. Dad was always a little over the top. That might be where I get it from.
There were probably five or six dads and their sons there around our campfire. We had already had our campfire stories – not the bedtime kind; the kind that has you jerking your head to the side when you hear a twig snap in the dark distance. Scary stories. I loved them and hated them. After what dad had said about Bigfoot having been seen in this very valley several times recently, we were a little freaked out.
I think I was too busy cooking marshmallows to notice dad had escaped the scene. All the dads had. Us boys were just enjoying the warmth of the fire and getting our fingers sticky with melted marshmallow. I may have had an unfair share of chocolate. About the time one of the boys noticed his dad was gone, we heard a terrifying dad-scream off in the distance. It was a deep-throated and total-exhale Scream! Like someone had their arm torn off by a nine foot tall hairy Goliath.
All of us boys were looking at each other and wondering where our dad’s were. The older boys were smiling like this is funny, but also in a nervous way. Then I heard my dad’s yell. It. Was. Crazy. He was running straight toward the campfire, carrying an axe covered in blood, and yelling “RUUUUUUNNNNN!!!” There were other dads running too.
He ran right through the camp, jumped over the fire, and kept going. He had blood all over him. I think my soul ran right out of my body. I ran in the same in the same direction, unable to keep up. My oldest brother was ahead of me and sort of keeping me un-lost. He stopped once we got a little too far from the campfire, and suggested we head back.
It took us a while to make it back – walking cautiously and stopping to listen for danger. I confess – I was thrilled. Not like happy, but like a thriller movie leaves you. I knew it was all fun and games but I was still shaken. By the time we got back to the campsite, the dads were all there. My dad was rinsing the ketchup off his arms and face. I was a little mad, but also felt a little initiated. Like I might be a man now that I survived my first Sasquatch encounter.
Years later, I wanted to recreate the experience with my own boys, but decided it might scar them a bit too much. But dang if I didn’t tell them this story in as real a time as I could – even while sitting around a campfire. Eli once said, after I finished telling it and we all laughed, “Dad, I’m glad you didn’t do that to us.” His brothers and I laughed, but they all agreed. It was a little much.
Would I recommend covering yourself in ketchup after a campfire Bigfoot story? No. It was a little extreme and Mom wasn’t happy that Dad had used a whole bottle of ketchup. But I love that I got to experience it with my Dad. I miss his stories and the way he told them. I hope I have had that kind of effect on my own kids.
Disclaimer: The very, very real looking photo of Bigfoot at the beginning of this story is not very real.