[at-l] Invasion foiled

[optimyst at gmail.com (Richard C Evans)]

True story from a Boy Scout High Adventure week on the Trail:

This experience was just off the Trail in NC when the boy scouts I was
leading begged off the section that included Standing Indian and
Albert Mountain (wimps!) so we took a short day and a blue-blaze
shortcut and set up camp in the early afternoon along the Nantahala
River.  They were excited to be near the end of the backpacking part
of their High Adventure week and to get on with the white water
rafting at NOC which I wisely kept to the end as bribery to keep them
motivated on the backpacking segment.

So with time to kill and on an easy day, I had one of the most
Nature-connected experiences I've ever had.  I lazed on a moss-covered
tree root which formed a perfect seat along the shore and watched the
activities of the river rolling by, which included frolicking scouts,
and a mother and her son on the far shore from the campground on that
side.  The little tyke was skipping rocks, and due to the vegetation
between us I was not visible to him.  Eventually he started skipping
rocks in my direction, imperiling me, but I found to my surprise that
I was frozen into the scene and felt entirely safe and unable to speak
or move despite the rocks clattering ashore right and left, such was
my contentment with my existence at that moment.  Eventually he
stopped and my attention shifted to a couple of rocks on the far shore
which were blinking like strobes as the late afternoon sun struck the
water lapping their sides.  As I stared at the sight they
metamorphosed into two spaceships, one a flying saucer, the other
cigar-shaped and I imagined them as an armada of earth bound ships
from outer space.  As I had grossly enlarged them as a part of this
hallucination, my reverie was snapped several minutes later when a
Jupiter-sized chipmunk hopped onto the incoming flying saucer.  Talk
about a monster from outer space ? this one saved the Earth from
invasion!

Happy trails,

Solar Bear