I woke up feeling mildly refreshed. I finally seemed to get a hang of this nightshift thing. The rain had provided a wonderful white noise all night, and was letting up nicely for me to finally emerge from the truck. A lazy stretch, awkward rolling into my clothes, and the less than graceful pop out of the tailgate, and I was ready to greet the day. My heart sand as I looked up. A note had been taped to my door handle. Scotch tape clung to a wet ziplock bag containing a white piece of paper.

I tried to recollect anything I may have done that would have irked someone. I was fairly confident no one was witness to my late night squat sessions… but maybe? I nervously pulled it from the handle and opened the wet bag.

Hello fellow Amazonian!

Interested in coffee & breakfast @ my place?

Got UFO videos 2 watch & u can help keep me awake.

Matt

1st Half, 6PM to 4:30

(His number)

All Good.

I just stood there re-reading for a good minute. I was very confused. How did this guy know I worked at Amazon, and where I lived? I know, I know, a little obvious, but there were plenty of trucks parked around. Not to mention, I made a point to park as far away from the inhabited RVs as I could, just to have a tiny bit of privacy. But this meant whoever this was, walked far out-of-the-way to tape this note to my truck. While I was inside…. Sleeping? Watching Indiana Jones? I didn’t know, but it left an uneasy feeling in my stomach. Do I text him?

“God, Katie… no, honestly you can’t be so trusting.” A strong voice from within me chastised. I reminded befuddled at best, but had to get moving to work. “I’ll show the other campers,” I thought to myself, “they’ll tell me if I’m overthinking this.”

Needless to say, the other campers did anything but make me feel better. Made me fear for my life was more like it.

“Well, you have a gun right?”, they all asked, drawls heavy. “No…”. I replied, realizing that I had officially entered into the zone that I never understood, NRA territory. They looked at me with shock.

“Well, hell, we got 5 just in the truck!”, Carl laughed, “If ya want, I’ll give ya the rifle, just to sound off some shells!”.

I had gotten that sort of question many times before, more along the lines of just form of self defense in general, but never have I had such a large group be so adiment, especially with guns in particular.

They got me thinking, may I was being naive? To think I could exist for so long in merely a truck bed, and not have any intruders?

They laughed, called me a Yank, and moved on with their lunches. But I was a little worse for wear at that point. I honestly started to feel stupid for trying to not make it a big deal.

I can tell you I did not sleep that night. I kept hearing imaginary footsteps around the truck. I’d constantly lift the relfectix and peek out and any other potential note distributers.

I’ve never liked guns. I never saw any good come out of them, and could never understand the fun in using something that is only designed to destroy. Call me a hippie, yank, whatever. If you love your guns, that’s fine, but they are just something that make me very uncomfortable.

So I supposed I’ll just try to keep me ears perked and observance clear for possible bad guys. Also avoid UFO video rendezvous.