...i do and i miss going backpacking desperately...i need to find women who like to camp...and a big bunch of dogs to go with us...the next person i date will have to like to go backpacking and own a tent --- scratch that, they just need to own a tent so that i can go...

-- Anonymous, January 10, 2000

I am a city boy...Going to the beach is the closest to being outdoorsy that I get...I cant stand cold weather and like sleeping in my own bed too much to enjoy camping out...

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

OK, this is by way of being a question, as well as an answer:

Why do people put up with things they really REALLY dislike for their partner? Why does their partner ask them to?

I mean, if, by some miracle and or/disaster, I should fall madly in love with a frantically outdoorsy type, I would tell him that yes, I have tried camping, I have camped, I have had the joy of Doing Number Two in the woods (or rather, trying), I have had the joy of wild cattle stampeding through the camp, and experienced the joy of wild cattle manure, and however much I may love him, this is NOT happening again. Ever. Anywhere. Day trips, sure, fine, OK. Spend the night in the great outdoors? I don't think so.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Once, several years ago now, I bought a Gore Tex jacket when i was going to go travelling with my then boyfriend. I have never worn it.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

My preferred relationship with nature is one that has me standing on a deck or porch, surveying said "nature", drink in hand, hot and cold running water in the heated shelter behind me. I like to look at nature, all right -- it sure can be pretty -- but as for actually walking its actual length and breadth...uh...no.

I've always hated camping, since Scouts, since I used to go camping up in northern Ontario with my sister and brother-in-law as a kid, since I fell in some swampy water in the local park. For the record, my sister and her husband aren't all that crazy about camping anymore -- but it was the seventies, and it seemed like the thing to do then. Now they borrow the father-in-law's motor home or rent hotel rooms. Smart people.

Thankfully, K. doesn't love th'outdoors all that much, either. We have a deck garden, though! Hey, does that count?

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I think that's a good question -- Why is it expected that we do extremely unpleasant things for our significant others? Why do people make their partners come camping when they hate the outdoors, or make them go to baby showers, car shows, sporting events, and bridal shows against their wills? I'm not talking about unpleasant things that can't be avoided like Thanksgiving at the feuding in-laws or family funerals.

It's not like the relationship will unravel if the partners spend a day apart from time to time. But that's the only reason I can think for dragging an unwilling person along -- the fear that they'll be gone by the time you get back. How on earth did this get to be the expected thing -- that couples go together to all sorts of events that one would dearly love to avoid?

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Well, I have a different question: why on earth would you hook up with someone whose idea of a good time was radically different from yours? I actually do like camping (yes, even without toilets and showers), and in fact I'd rather stay in a tent than a hotel any day. After yesterday I even have to concede that snow isn't so bad with the proper equipment. (See today's entry, which will be posted in a couple of hours ... snow shoeing is exhausting and I just woke up.)

Jeremy and I mostly disagree on specific activities -- I don't like danger and I think falling down a mountain on a pair of skis is torture, not fun -- but we are both basically outdoorsy people. My last boyfriend liked bars and hotels and clubs far more than he liked the outdoors; he would have never taken me on a wild goose chase in the middle of the night up to the mountains to see a meteor shower that didn't happen.

I don't think partners should force each other to participate in any activities, but on the other hand, I wouldn't want to be with someone if I didn't like doing things with them. (For instance, I don't think I could date anyone who has posted in this topic except for Ginni and Jenn and Lisa and Colleen and Eleanor, the other campers. Sorry.) I have gardening and writing; Jeremy has cars and computers -- but we ought to be able to do things together once in a while, or what the heck is the point?

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Beth asked, "[W]hy on earth would you hook up with someone whose idea of a good time was radically different from yours?"

Money, great sex, shared backgrounds, shared primary interests (just because one hates car shows doesn't mean they have nothing in common), pretty good sex, complementary skills (one can program the VCR, the other makes good popcorn), commute in the same direction to work, supporting each others neuroses, codependency, and, hell, even bad sex is better than none.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I love them. and miss them VERY much.

I grew up going on camping trips. That's what my family did for the ever dreaded, family vacations. My Husband feels the same. I don't like to fish though.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

The outdoors I mean. And snow, where I grew up, was a fabulous thing. Dice Runs for Snowmobiles and 4 Wheelers. A ski rental place right down the road and we lived on top of the largest mountain area. Upper Pennsylvania is absolutely breathtaking in Winter. I remember loving cross-country skiing. My Grands had a bar and grill thing and the cool thing was that we could go in to sit in front of a fireplace while eating home-cooked chili and drinking hot chocolate. For free. At the tip of your fingers.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I don't do things with my partner that I absolutely hate, and I don't ask him to do those things with me. But I do expect him to occasionally do things with me that he's lukewarm about, or that he's never done. He came to Harbin Hot Springs with me, he didn't like it much, he says he'll go back maybe in a few years. Fair enough. But it was important to me that he try something that is dear to me. It's also important that my partner once in a while do something that he knows is a big part of my life, like come to the incredibly weird bead store with me, just because it's a big part of my life. Now he knows what I'm talking about when I come home from another visit and tell him about what new strange object the sales people have covered with beads. It's kind of like coming to my office once, just to see what the place I spend so many hours a day is like.

He doesn't ask me to do things with him much. He doesn't ask a lot, generally. I try to encourage him in this and in other things that I see as the give and take of relationships. I've gone along with past boyfriends to things I didn't think I'd like or didn't know anything about, and some of them became things I liked to do too. Some of them remained things that I don't want to do.

The other side of this equation, to me, is that while we like the other to come along on a lot of our adventures, we encourage each other to do things without us. I like going to hot springs and saunas and he doesn't. He encourages me to go without him, even to places where other men will see me nude, and even buys me gift certificates to do so. He likes to play golf and I give him my blessing to go do this on Saturdays. A couple of friends have asked me if I'm going to take it up since he's doing it. I don't plan to. I'm comfortable with it being his thing.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

Actually, there have been times that I wished that I did date an outdoorsy type, because I've always been curious about what it might be like to go on a long biking trip, or hike long trails or go on real camping expeditions.

That's one reason to date someone whose interests and ideas of a good time are radically different from yours: to try out new things and expand your horizons.

Sometimes I get so sick of all the same old same old and Sabs isn't much encouragement for getting out and about so we both kind of tend to stagnate instead.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

My dad loves to camp, fish, hike, etc. So I grew up doing all of the above. My husband is actually less of an outdoor person than me, he likes to camp, but he grew up in a family that was like "it's so hot.....whine, whine, where is the restaurant....whine, whine". To me there is nothing like a good camp. Or a day of fishing. My dad would get me and my brother up at dawn and bring us home at 8:00 pm, no food, no sunscreen, nothing(my mom would get so pissed). We would be on a boat so if we had to pee my dad would say, "you better get in the water".

As for what my husband and I do together, we are more beach people. We love love love the beach. Give us a beach, some sunshine, a football, lots of beer, and park us by some beach shack that sells greasy beach food, we are set.

We have a lot of potatoe/potato issues though. I love to read/he hates it. I love to water ski/he never has. He loves to ride his four wheeler for entire days at a time/it's a little too rough for me. He likes to ride his motorcycle like a bat out of hell/a little to dangerous for me.

But we both like our space, so it works for us. We don't have to do everything together.

My girlfriend(aka Wilder-Woman) tried to get me to train to climb Shasta two summers ago. I was like, "how many fucking feet did you say?" Not for me man. Jeremy has bigger balls than me. I will stick with just hiking around Castle Crags, more my speed.

-- Anonymous, January 11, 2000

I used to go camping as a kid every summer, for fortnight long stretches, and I loved it. I didn't care that I had sand in my hair, between my toes and under my nails, that I wasn't going to get all that mud off until I got home, or that the ground was really hard.

Now, I do. I like to be outside, but I wouldn't ever camp again. I'm not terribly energetic, but a nice afternoon strolling through the bush isn't bad at all, especially if it's a hot summer day and there's a mountain stream to splash in afterwards. I appreciate the outdoors, but I don't particularly like to be immersed in it.

The current boy is a recent addition (~ 4 months), but I know he's not a camping person, and not into all that outdoorsy stuff to any degree. This makes me relieved. My parents are very active, and I've spent many years dragged along to things. They hiked a 5-day track for their honeymoon, for pete's sake! I am not like that at all.

He does, however, want to learn to dive, and is trying to convince me to go as well. The thing is, having water on my face makes me terribly nervous. I spend a long time in the shower every morning because I have to wipe my face constantly, and try and wash at the same time. The idea of going underwater for more than a lungspan terrifies me. Otherwise, I would probably go along. I don't mind him going off and doing it on his own at all, and I hope he would feel the same way if it were the other way around. He wants to learn to snowboard too - I'm game, I'll try that one next winter.

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

Just to clarify: I think I asked my question up there rather badly.

People don't always know what you dislike. For that matter you may not know that you dislike a particular activity until you've actually done it.

> Well, I have a different question: why on earth would you > hook up with someone whose idea of a good time was > radically different from yours?

Because you didn't know that when you first hooked up, and because by the time you DID know, there were other compensations. Actually, that part of it didn't even occur to me. People do (and should) have different interests.

What prompted my question to be phrased the way it was (rather badly, it seems) was that in the entry, it seemed that Jeremy was trying to get you to do things that you had tried to do, and that you disliked and that he knew you disliked. And I know several couples, both het and gay, where one partner does something that they dislike because the other partner asked, and I never understood that (well, beyond a certain "get along" point, but camping never struck me as a "get along" activity, which is my bias)--either why they continued to do it or why the partner continued to ask. That's what made me wonder. Sorry if it came out wrong, there.

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

I love the great outdoors. As a kid I grew up on a farm and roamed all over the farm and played in the "crick" and loved to go to the timber and find vines to swing on and play Tarzan. In the summer, now, I spend a lot of time working in the garden...I can pull weeds and work a long time in the sun (covered up of course), but absolutely hate sitting on a beach unless it's under a tree and those are not easy to find on a beach. I love to lie on my chaise on my screened porch and look up into the leaves and branches of the big tree next to it. I would like to buy a pop-up and try camping, but think I should rent one first to try it out. I have never been camping. My husband was strictly an indoors person so I pretty much spent 30 years without trying any of these things. I loved the hikes I went on on my trip out west this summer and with Heather in Yosemite. I tried skiing several times in the upper midwest in the 2 years before I met my husband and I absolutely loved it. It is so beautiful and peaceful taking a quiet, easy, downward slope through the trees ... We tried it together just once at the Playboy Club in Lake Geneva, WI and about never got my husband down off the hill! The instructor skied down backwards, bent over, holding the fronts of my petrified husband's skiis! My plans include joining a local hiking club and exploring some of Indiana's forests and parks and perhaps joining the Sierra Club. I think a rustic cabin in the woods would be great to have.....if I didn't have to do the upkeep on it.

-- Anonymous, January 12, 2000

I must get my love for the woods from you, mom (though I'm not sure I'm a skier...easy downhill slopes don't sound too bad, but I'm always afraid of hurting myself).

Recently, I've decided to stop bitching as much about living in a city (Oakland) and go on some hikes on the weekends. Now, I grew up in Indiana, where it's flat; I'm slowly learning to enjoy climbing uphill without having my eyes entirely focused on the path in front of me (I'd learned to feel out the path with my feet on the mostly flat paths of Indiana woods). I love wandering through the trees and coming upon a snake or bird or unusual fern. I love nature.

I'm definitely more of a "warm woods" kind of outdoorsy person; although camping in the snow is cozy, I'd as soon be in a cabin with a fireplace inside if I want cozy. I've also done Burning Man (dessert camping) for two years now, and I don't like the barren, dry, dusty conditions (though I admit it's beautiful in its own way). I dream of owning acres and acres of wilderness in Northern California, where I can (with a furture SO) build an ecologically sound house, with everything from an organic garden to a hot tub. I'd love to be able to go hiking for hours on my own property, slowly learning the character of the land during the years I live there.

The last guy I dated was a city boy who grudgingly agreed he enjoyed the hikes I dragged him on, but never was too easy to get out of his apartment. When I hang out with him now, in his smoke filled apartment, I still wonder at how I can love someone so closed off from the world. We had lots of other things in common - books, movies, cooking (he cooked, I ate), writing (sorta), similar sense of humor - so I suppose it isn't too odd. But still. It gets old having to beg, plead and convince convince convince someone to go do something you consider good for your soul. And, the one time I did get him to go car camping, his comment was, "I don't see the point, what with the car so nearby and civilization so easy to get to." Yeah, like I could've convinced him to go backpacking into the wilds for 10 days!

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I love the outdoors. I love to camp. I love to backpack and canoe. As for mountain climbing, ... I don't do anything technical, but if there's a trai to the summit, or nearby, I'll go there.

I don't fish. I eat fish; I don't clean fish.

I really don't understand why one would try to convince his or her spouse (partner/signficant other/date/available one/etc.) to do anything (other than clean the dishes, take out the trash, clean house, or stuff like that in a shared domestic environment).

I mean, what's the point? I don't like developed beaches and beach towns. I'll go, if she wishes, but I'll never advance the idea. I hate the crowds and the noise and the ... everything. (Mind, I love salt marshes and undeveloped tidewater areas, including beaches.)

I don't try to convince anyone, regardless of the type of relationship we share, to go outdoors when I do. If we go together, I'll adjust my pace, if needed, and work with her if she's new to the experience. But, don't get out there and then more or less demand to go back home just because you are attacked by a BUG. If so, it's gonna be the last time we go out on such an expedition together, and I will go out.

I think that we get together with someone because of that person, not because we can share everything. We just develop, or are smitten, by an intensely intrinsic interest (alliteration, anyone?) in that other person. I don't feel threatened or disappointed if she prefers Ocean City or a shopping mall to a trail in the Appalachians.

-- Anonymous, January 13, 2000

I like camping, even though I've been avoiding even the civilized version for a few years (I think that's for social reasons, though). I like hiking a lot. But I hate danger, heights and snow. Since snow usually tends to be found up high, that is convenient for me. I generally prefer the coast, anyway.

I guess it's not that I dislike being outdoorsy in the snow, but I did absolutely detest going up to Truckee for Thanksgiving and Christmas, trying to function somewhat normally in all the mess. So I guess I'd like to go visit snow, but I would never want to _live_ in it.

And I just realized that the main reason I _haven't_ done much camping and hiking and such recently is that I don't have anyone to do so with. All the people I used to go with scattered to the four winds, and I haven't been able to get anybody else to go. But even though I like camping, I couldn't date you, Beth. 'Cuz that would be bizarre.

-- Anonymous, January 15, 2000