Willow Dawn Becker

No one sleeps at a sleepover.

Now that I am on the other side of 30, I can clearly see that sleepovers were invented by the Devil. I mean, what good, uplifting stuff happens at a sleepover? Unless you count the transcendental feeling of flying that is induced by 48 hours with no sleep and 700 mg of Pixie Stick cocaine-sugar in your nose, the answer is “nothing.”

Sure, they’re fun. But, you have to admit, there is a lot of emotional and physical fallout that results from a well-designed sleepover. You will go to pick up your sweet, lovable daughter only to find that she has dyed her hair Cherry Flavored, is speaking in Pig-Latin and can tell you with perfect accuracy the contents of a “screwdriver.”

Being the hypocrite that I am, I am actually on my way to my first adult sleepover. I’m so excited! Seriously, how cool is it that I have a job where I can go camping with a bunch of half-crocked Mormon writers just so that I can skinny dip and talk about boys for 4 days AND I get to write all of it off as a business expense?!

“Camp Castaway” was the brain-child of me and my friend Liesel. The plan was to do a little writing getaway; to hobnob with our fellow wizards. We’re off to Coer d’Alene to do some serious work on our novels, stories and screenplays.

Deep down, though, I think we all know the score.

Allowing writers to get together with no “adult” supervision is equivalent of allowing monkeys to perform brain surgery. My guess is that we will not sleep very much and that someone will return home with at least one body part missing.

Then there is the problem with packing. I have no idea what to bring. The token items from my early sleepovers seem unfitting for this type of party. Do we play “Light as a feather, stiff as a board,” until someone gets dropped and we pretend that it wasn’t on purpose? Do we make microphones out of Dr. Pepper cans and scream-sing “Total Eclipse of the Heart” until the park ranger threatens to call our husbands? I am totally unprepared for the absolute freedom and total lack of common sense that I am expecting from my group of highly creative friends.

Here is my packing list:

• Matches
• Cool-Aid
• Bananas
• Blindfolds
• Playing cards
• Streamers
• Books
• Alien antennae
• Magic 8 ball
• Story cubes
• Thesaurus
• Clothes
• Food
• Pixie Sticks

From an outsider’s perspective, I am either going to the best party in the universe or a convention of warlocks who are not from this planet. Either way, they would be right.

This weekend is really just my chance to make fresh memories. I’m sure to be so enamored by the brilliance of my companions (and taking shots of jalapeño pickle juice) that I won’t write a single word. Still, I think the general purpose will still be served. My job is to tell stories, of course, but it is impossible to do without making a few stories along the way.

I heard a quote once that said, “Stories happen to people who can tell them.” For a lot of my life, not many stories have flown my way, probably because I had no intentions to share them with others. Now that the universe knows that I have stapled myself to the keyboard permanently, I’m hoping to find that there are many more stories in my life than I previously thought.

This weekend might end in flaming wreckage and a police report. So be it. There might literally be lifelong scars waiting for me in that tiny cabin on Devil’s Lake. I relish the thought that I will be uninhibited and disastrous with the finest group of crazies that have ever worn a straightjacket. If the weekend is a success, I may look at making it a regular occurrence.

Â

You Have Time for Just One More:

[su_carousel source=”category: 20″ link=”post”][su_carousel source=”category: 13″ link=”attachment”][/su_carousel]