Vaughn Von and Jean go camping

       My new Tinder date was named Vaughn. His parents couldn’t agree on how the name “Vaughn” should be spelled so they compromised and made his first name “Vaughn” and his middle name “Von”. He couldn’t have been over 5’3,  100 pounds, but quickly proved himself to be extremely charismatic, intelligent, and was a successful teacher in the same school district I worked at. We bonded over telling one another about our own camping adventures and shared dreams about camping adventures in the future. Like a coward, I wasn’t brave enough to ever go on a public date with him due to our size difference and it seemed like he was never too keen on the idea either. Therefore, our dates consisted of filling our backpacks up with beers while walking through the woods at night after he got off of work. During these hikes, I grew quite fond of my small new friend. He was my DeVito to my Schwarzenegger, and we made rough plans to take a hooky day and adventure up to Pike’s Peak (Iowa) together in May to test our friendship on a real camping trip.

      This, of course, was when our relationship was full of text messages and compliments. However, over time, Vaughn and my conversations dwindled down to a few text messages a week and I figured all hope was lost. The only times I really heard from Vaughn were random times throughout the week when Vaughn would get absolutely wasted, drive over, and start banging on my door and texting me in the middle of the night. I would usually let him in because he was clearly not safe to drive home. He would pass out next to me for the evening and his alarm would go off at 4:30AM as usual. He would perk right up, shower and leave for school while I wouldn’t get to school for another 3 hours. This little dance Vaughn pulled made me feel like a hotel, brothel, and a daycare all at the same time. I began to see the tole that a true dedication to teaching had on a person through his alcoholism, lack of sleep, and inability to have ever had an actual relationship with a woman.

        To my surprise, Vaughn texted me out of the blue one day and told me he had taken Monday off of school so that we could go camping. Vaughn, of course, had not taken a sick or personal day in 5 years so this was a big deal for him. I immediately took that Monday off. I was looking forward to getting Vaughn back as an adventure buddy. I needed to rack up some “cool points” with him so he could see how much cooler I was than Jenni so he would want to hike up to Conundrum Springs with me in August. This had been at the top of my bucket list that I had written for my ex-boyfriend and myself which was currently decomposing in a dump somewhere in the Cedar Valley. I truly wanted to make this a camping adventure Vaughn would never forget.

       We loaded up my car with some of Vaughn’s really fancy camping equipment (he used to be quite the adventurer), some food, booze, my dogs Izzy and Ibsen, and we headed out. Vaughn filled the car ride with stories from camping trips he took at UNI to the great Southwest. His eyes would glaze over happily as he chattered on about how he would sleep under the stars. He told me that sometimes he would wake up periodically throughout the night. When he would look up everything around him would be illuminated because the stars and moon would be so bright and flashlights were only rarely needed. Camping under the stars all sounded very romanticized and I wanted a part of all of it. We arrived at our basic campsite started a fire, cracked a few beers, and started telling one another what we would be doing to prepare for our classrooms on this Sunday night. I would probably be putting together a lab paired with a worksheet. Vaughn, of course, one-upped me by saying he’d probably be up until 1AM grading and lesson planning so he could be up by 4:30 to drive to school to set up labs for his 5 preps. I quickly changed the subject in order to feel like less of a slacker. We ate hot dogs, drank some beers, went for a quick hike to check out the peek. This completed the list of traditional things you are supposed to do when car camping in Iowa (beers, hot dogs, wandering. check, check, check).

After we had finished all of the traditional car camping activities I could tell this camping trip wasn’t turning out to be as spectacular as I wanted it to be. I asked Vaughn if he thought it would be a good idea if we gathered our sleeping pad, sleeping bags, and some beers and headed the 5 miles down Pikes Peak to the shore of the Mississippi River, find a sand dune, and spend the night there under the stars. Vaughn being the go-with-the-flow kind of guy that he is, agreed to my request. We put everything we didn’t need in the car (tent), everything we did need in our packs (sleeping bags, sleeping pads, more beers, and chips), grabbed the dogs and started the 5-mile hike down the edge of the peak toward sea level. It was around 5pm at this time and we both took turns calling a co-worker to tell them we would not be coming in the following day because we were feeling ill. Then we told them we would leave our lesson plans on our desk first thing in the morning, (unbeknownst to them that the lesson plans had been planted there since Friday).

       Vaughn effortlessly coasted down the steep dark hill while I took careful and slow steps. I chuckled at how much better Vaughn was at walking now that he wore comfortable walking shoes around me. The first couple late night hikes we went on he tripped about every other step. To my horror when we arrived home and took our shoes off after our second trip I saw why.  Inside of each of his already tall hiking boots with at least 1 ½ inch heel were height enhancing insoles. When I saw them and realized what they were I felt embarrassed immediately and quickly excused myself to the restroom where I texted Landon about it. “No wonder why he was tripping,” I said. “The poor guy was wearing high heels the entire time!” The next time I went hiking with Vaughn I noticed he wore regular tennis shoes. I took that as a sign he was starting to feel a little more comfortable with his height around me and my 6′ frame. To help ease the inadequacy I did make mention that my keen sandals had about an inch insole in them which I joked were unnecessary for someone as tall as me. “You mean, they make you even taller?” Vaughn said in a disheartened tone.

      We hiked through the woods, through the sunset, and eventually into a sky filled with stars. Vaughn was a big fan of story-telling and before I knew it the 5 miles were up and we had stumbled on the train tracks that paralleled the Mississippi River. I felt lucky to have Vaughn by my side and started to see the benefits of having a shortly statured friend. He was compact, wasn’t going to take up much room in the sleeping bag, had an ant-like strength and determination, and had top of the line camping equipment. However, when we got to the river our first problem was immediately apparent. Usually, the Mississippi River has mini beaches and sandbars all along its shoreline. Except for one season every year: spring flooding. There was nothing but jagged rocky shorelines and strips of the forest as far as the eye could see. I immediately regretted my decision but was I stubborn enough to convince Vaughn and myself to continue walking down the train tracks to see if there were any better pieces of reality to set up camp for the evening. The air was warm with a perfectly cool breeze and the stars in the sky lit up the river. All things considered, it was the perfect evening. We kept walking and finally about ¾ of a mile down the tracks we saw an outcropping of a rocky strip. We walked through the small patch of woods in between the railroad tracks and the river and we picked a spot with the smallest and least jagged rocks. We pushed aside the bigger rocks and laid out our camping pads. It really didn’t feel too bad with the pad down. I started to think that maybe this night just might work after all. Just as the thought left my head I felt something on my face. It didn’t hurt but was more of a tickling sensation. I rubbed my face. When I stopped rubbing, the tickling sensation was still there.

“Vaughn, do you feel that?” I asked him.

“Yeah, I think we just walked through I spider web or something.

“It feels like a spider is making its web on my face!” I exclaimed violently rubbing my face again with both hands.

“I’m sure it will go away,” Vaughn said, dismissing me as if I was a child asking how much longer the car ride was.

      As I was getting my sleeping area set up I began to notice my second problem. My dogs were hearing all sorts of noises coming from the woods and they were getting curious. I pulled onto their leashes and got them to lay down. But moments later when they heard another noise they were back up and barking at the dark forest and pulling frantically on their leashes. Without another strategy in mind, I started a routine: get the dogs to lay down beside me, rub my face repeatedly, pull up my sleeping bag around my head as tightly as possible, cover my face with my arm that had the end of the dog leash wrapped around it, and try to drift off to sleep. Without fail, 3 minutes later I would be jerked awake by both dogs who would start chasing after a noise in the woods. Once my arm was jerked off of my face I would start to feel the tickling again. Unless something was covering my face, like my arm or sleeping bag, the feeling was endless and maddening. I was so absorbed in my routine I almost forgot that Vaughn was also trying to sleep right beside me. 

      “What should we do?!” I asked finally asked Vaughn, not wanting to disturb him. “Should we hike back to the campsite?”

      “I have no idea,” he said in a low curt tone.

“I mean we could hike back but that would take hours and it’s already so late. And then we’ll have to put up the tent and that could take forever too!”

Vaughn replied with silence.

       This was the only time I had ever noticed Vaughn was in a bad mood. Normally he was one of the most emotionally composed people I had ever met. He was one of those people that chuckled at everything I said. And since I am a person who is constantly trying to be funny this went over with me well. However, there were no chuckles coming from him right now. My adventure buddy was slipping through my fingers, as was my sanity. We were in for a tough and late night no matter what path we chose. Either hike 5 miles back which would take around 2 hours just to set up our tent at 3AM. Or stay put and hope things got better. My dogs were behaving terribly, the persistent feeling that something was all over my face was agonizing, and then to top it all off every 15 minutes either a barge would go by in the water ahead of us, or a train would go by behind us. My dogs were used to running in the woods but had absolutely no sense that trains or cars could hurt them. I was afraid if I let them go they would get hit by one of the trains that went by every hour. Around 3AM I was all out of patience with the dogs, the rocks, the trains/barges, and whatever the hell kept getting on my face and arms.

       Funny enough, the only thing that was perfect and beautiful was how the stars and the moon illuminated the water and the trees. They were all exactly as Vaughn had described. Nighttime is generally my favorite time to be awake. There is a peace that comes with the territory of being outside on a warm summer night. Plus, Vaughn’s stupid story about Utah is the only reason we’re sleeping here in the first place I thought, as I laughed at our expense. Vaughn was rightfully grumpy. I decided my situation would be easier if I let one of the dogs off the leash. I made the decision to keep Izzy because she was smaller and controlling her would be much easier than controlling two.  Also, my other dog Ibsen loves Izzy and me more than anything, and when he gets off the leash he always hangs around so he can make sure he is close to her. I always said if one of them had to die it would have to be Ibsen. Because if he died Izzy would be fine, but if Izzy died Ibsen would have to die with her. I knew if I held onto her he wouldn’t go far. Periodically throughout the night, I would hear Ibsen barking at something which would bring me some peace that he was still around. The tickling on whatever skin was exposed to the air never ceased, but after what felt like forever the sun finally began to rise.

      As the sun rose up over the Mississippi I finally saw my night time nemesis. Small white flies flew around me and were hovering just over my face. As the sun continued to rise they started to scatter. As the sun came out further, Ibsen came out of the woods and collapsed in exhaustion on the rocks after an all night, all-you-can-sniff and bark binge.

       I wish I loved anything as much as that dog loved sniffing and barking. Finally, after 7 hours, Vaughn and I were able to get some sleep. I woke up two hours later in the blazing hot sun under a sweltering sleeping bag. I ripped open my sleeping bag and tested Vaughn’s mood by making a joke about the evening. He replied with a familiar chuckle which put me immediately at ease. I felt a little better after the 2-hour nap but I still felt awful. My eyes were swollen and took an absurd amount of effort to open. I looked down at my arms and they were covered in small red bumps from the biting whiteflies. If Vaughn didn’t want to hang out with me before he really didn’t want to now. Desperate for “cool points” which I had lost through the night, in my pack I had two luke-warm Sierra Nevada Pale Ales and two little bags of chips which I shared with Vaughn Von for breakfast. We then packed up our gear, woke the dogs up, and started on the long trip back to our actual campsite. As we were heading back on the train tracks we saw a sign that read, “McGregor Iowa.” I asked Vaughn if he wanted to get some water at a gas station. He agreed and we continued walking on the train tracks until we got to a public restroom. I hesitated before I looked in the mirror because I was afraid of what I would see. I looked again at how disgusting my arms looked and I only expected the same fate for my face. If I looked half as terrible as I felt I knew I would be a real mess. I splashed some water on my face and looked up into the mirror. “Phew! I breathed a sigh of relief.” Same old face. Only this time I felt a little badass. “I just spent a night sleeping on rocks by the Mississippi River.” I grinned at myself in the mirror while shaking the water off of my hands. I joined Vaughn outside the restrooms and looked out of the little town of McGregor. It looked promising and we decided it would be worth a little exploration. As we walked we saw the extent of how adorable McGregor Iowa was. Every store was a mom-and-pop shop, bike rental place, or even cute B&B’s.

      “Do you think some of these little B&B’s would have let us stay here last night?” I asked Vaughn.

       “Let’s pretend that’s not true” he replied.

      We continued walking and decided to settle on a Mexican joint for breakfast since they allowed dogs on the patio. We ordered chips and margaritas while my dogs passed out underneath our picnic table from their night of terror. “Awww, what sweet little dogs,” people would comment as they walked by. “Wow! I wish my dogs were that well behaved!” Another person would say. Vaughn and I would nod politely as my little sleep destroyers caught up on their rest below our breakfast table. I bought us two strawberry margaritas to try and compensate for the terrible evening we had. I was still sure I blew my chance at a new adventure buddy. We ordered some tacos and chips before making the 5-mile hike back to the cars. The car ride back was fairly quiet. My intuition was spot-on, Vaughn did not contact me for months afterward. And when he did, I wish he hadn’t.

      Pictures of another girl Jenni and robotics teams filled up his Facebook. I was happy Vaughn had found someone who was secure enough with herself to take pictures with him and publicly post them on social media. But it was clear Vaughn had no more use for his night hiking Amazonian beer drinking friend Jean. I started feeling particularly sad when my best friend and roommate Landon moved out to live in Indiana. I was on Facebook getting ready to see a picture of Vaughn with a robot or his girlfriend when I saw his post about his dog Caleb who had just died. Vaughn’s dog had made an appearance at my house once, and only once before in the past. His dog was as aggressive as he was tumor-ridden and obese. He spent his time at my house chasing my dogs around the yard before he would collapse in obese exhaustion. Large boil like sores covered his body and Vaughn said it was a common problem for his breed. I had seen a lot of labrador retrievers in my day, but none of them looked like this.

       I called Vaughn up and I asked him if he wanted to come over. We were both feeling lonely and had a recent void in our homes. I figured we could use a shoulder to cry on. I asked Vaughn about his dog. He said he had been getting sicker due to his tumors that completely engulfed his body to the point where he couldn’t even make it up and down the stairs. For some reason, Vaughn hadn’t wanted to take Caleb to the vet to have him euthanized but instead let him die naturally in his home with Vaughn petting and comforting him the whole time.

“Wait, so where is your dog right now?” I asked

“He’s in my basement”

“Your basement!?” I yelled

“I put his body on ice and I’m going to drive him to my family farm where all of our pets were buried as kids.”

“Oh, I guess that makes a little more sense,” I said as I calmed down a little.

“How on earth are you going to move that huge dog by yourself?” I asked

“I hadn’t really thought about that”

“Would you like some help?” I cautiously asked

“Yes,” he eagerly agreed.

What did I just volunteer myself for? I thought.

       Morning came quickly and so did Vaughn’s memory which I had hoped was foggy. So as a desperate attempt to win back his friendship, I reported to Vaughn Von’s At 8AM I  to move his big dead dog into his little lime green Ford Fiesta. I walked into his basement and the smell of cat urine and feces hit me like a load of bricks. I guess when a person works 16- hour days they also don’t have time to empty kitty litter. Vaughn was preparing his car for the carcass while I was carefully stepping around his messy basement trying to figure out how he hid a 150-pound dog on ice so effectively. I turned around and Vaughn was ready to go.

“Where is he?” I asked cautiously

“Right in front of you,” he said. I quickly jumped back from the vaguely dog shaped garbage bag in front of me letting out a quick yelp of my own.

Vaughn picked up the head and torso and I grabbed the back legs and haunches. The dog weighed at least 150 pounds and I staved off making a joke about dead weight and showing signs of obvious discomfort in order to show respect for man’s best friend. I could feel every single bone in the dead dog’s haunches as water from the ice dripped down my arm and onto my leg. I tried to turn my obvious disgust off by pretending I was carrying something else. We heaved the big boy into the car and I held onto Caleb while Vaughn walked around to the other side to pull him in. There was a big blanket in his backseat which I visualized being saturated with dead dog water in a matter of minutes. Vaughn dragged the dog through the back seat of the car and I was finally allowed to let go.  I have never been more relieved to let go of something in my life. I was silently congratulating myself for being such a selfless friend when I looked over at Vaughn. Tears were streaming down his small crinkled up face uncontrollably. His best friend was lying in the back of his car. A best friend who just months ago was willingly sitting in the same back seat looking forward to chasing my living dogs and vomit my water all over my deck. Sure, the dog was an asshole but the dog was his asshole. I wiped the dead dog water off my hands and onto my shorts and went over to give Vaughn Von a hug. Vaughn’s head was about the same height as my chest so I bent over so my arms could comfort him instead of my breasts.  I gave Vaughn my condolences and left him to collect himself so he could drive his dog to its final resting place on the family farm.

           A week later I called Vaughn with no answer. A week after that I called and left a message to ask her if he wanted to get together. No luck again. In order to save my dignity, I did not call him ever again. Instead, I was enraged and jilted. How could this little man do this to me? I thought. I was the one who wasn’t interested in him! All original and kind thoughts I felt for him skyrocketed out the window.

“They said men on Tinder were just using women for their bodies!” I yelled Landon over the phone one day.

“I had no idea that they meant this! Call me old-fashioned but when a woman helps a man lift his dead frozen dog into his car it’s appropriate to call her back or at least buy her some breakfast!” I yelled into the receiver like Jerry Seinfeld at my roommate who didn’t stop laughing until we hung up. My mind was a combination of angry and tickled at the absurdity of the whole situation. I had officially had my first experience being “ghosted” on Tinder, and the experience was nothing like I had thought.

Vaughn and I have not spoken to one another to this day. And about 10 months later I saw Vaughn and a very pregnant Jenni walk into a restaurant together. They are now the married parents of a surprisingly large and happy baby.