To start the new year, I made a bet with my good friend, Pinky. Whoever spends more nights outside wins. Wins what, you ask? Wins more nights under the stars, more nights on the beach, more nights breathing fresh air, and more nights falling asleep to the sounds of a world not contained within four walls. Anyway, Pinky has the distinct advantage of living in California and having almost no winter. Taking an early lead of nine nights outside, Pinky left me no choice but to set-up my tent and start camping out. I found myself a beautiful campsite on "Hidden Beach" near where I live in Northern Minnesota, and made myself at home. Doesn't it look serene?
As I contemplated spending my third night on the beach, I fell asleep reading Aldo Leopold's, "A Sand County Almanac." I awoke at 4:21am, a minute too late, and effectively gave up on the idea of staying outside as I had to work in less than four hours and it was already starting to snow. I fell back asleep. At 7:30am, I re-awoke, got dressed, ate, and hitched a ride to work at the ski hill. My tent can weather a day of snow, I thought. 
Work ended early because of high winds, low visibility, and snow. By noon 4-inches had already fallen, so I hitched a ride back home. There I found my bike caked in white stuff. This didn't surprise me, I'd left my bike outside in the snow before and I just had to clean it. But my fragile aluminum tent poles could snap under the weight of too much snow. I suited up and headed to Hidden Beach to assess the situation. As I scrambled down a steep trail to the beach, it became clear that I had no situation to assess. My tent was gone! In it's place, the pounding waves of Lake Superior. The Lake had eaten my tent right up, swallowed 'er whole! No rain-fly, no tent poles, no shredded nylon to attest to its brutal demise. And I left no hope for ever seeing the tent again, as I'd heard Gorden Lightfoot sing too many times before, "the lake, it is said, never gives up her dead." 
I'd bought the tent in 2008 from a friend no more than 350-yards away, it replaced my previous tent which a black bear had ripped apart. Many nights I've since spent in that tent falling asleep to the sounds of nature and waking up to the light of our nearest star. But all things come to an end, and when I left my tent within reach of ol' Gitche Gumee, I took a chance.
Standing where my tent once stood, I turned toward the lake and squinted into her blinding East wind and whispered my concession, "you win."
Keep your stick on the ice,
P.S. I'm still gunning for you Pinky! Pinky:9 X:2
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