The hills are alive, with the sound of paaaaniiiiiiic

So I'm a compulsive planner, to say the least.  Especially during the summer.  And especially here in Colorado.  Because in Colorado, there's really no such thing as spring.  It goes from winter into some sunnier months that one would normally refer to as spring, but with the "holy shit, what is this?" snowfalls as late as Mother's Day, and often later.  And then - BLAM! - summer is here and QUICK, YOU HAVE TO PACK ALL OF YOUR FUN HOT WEATHER ACTIVITIES INTO THESE THREE SHORT MONTHS BECAUSE THE SNOW WILL BE HERE BEFORE YOU KNOW IT AND THE POOLS ARE ONLY OPEN DURING THIS TINY SLIVER OF TIME AND AAAAAGGGGGH, EVERYONE FREAK OUT!  So our summers tend to be insanely busy and insanely pre-planned.  One of the things we love more than anything is to go camping, and we had been in the habit of going to the same spot every year, right in the heart of Rocky Mountain National Park.  And for me, it's never just been "let's go camping here".  No, no.  It's "let's find the best camping spot here, and stake our claim".  So year one was doing online recon and trying to find the best looking site from the pictures.  Then we arrived and saw in person where some better sites were, and years two and three were spent at those better sites.  Then year three was bending the ear of the park ranger and learning about the secretly best spot in the whole park.  And so we planned for that spot this year, on year four.  And true to form, I found out the exact earliest date that we could make reservations, and I made our reservations on it, exactly six months in advance.  Planning.  So for six months, we've been doing all of these other great things, and in my heart, I was positively giddy over our upcoming camping trip.  Reservations, check.  Packing, check.  Secured house sitter, check.  Working like a crazy person to get to a good stopping point so I could actually enjoy my vacation, check.  Everything was all set.  And then the night before our trip as we were driving to Subway, Tex turns to me and says, "Did you see the weather forecast?  It's supposed to storm there all weekend."  I almost crashed the car.  Then I started pummeling him with questions on just how accurate this information was, and can he name his sources?  Then I went into denial and thought, "We're still going.  Canceling is not an option.  We'll go and we'll have fun, no matter what the weather's doing!"

"This game is fun.  Fun, dammit."
     -- Crash Davis, Bull Durham

And my mind was racing with our options, going into that panicky, neurotic, anxiety-ridden overdrive mode, and as I was babbling incoherently to Tex and checking off pros and cons list in my head, I looked up and saw a splendidly perfect rainbow adorning the Subway parking lot.  I could see the whole thing from start to finish.  It was breathtaking.  And something in the back of my lizard brain felt like maybe that was God saying, "Everything will be fine.  Just chill."  Except in my brain, it played more like the scene in The Big Lebowski, except I'm The Dude and God is Walter.

"Nothing is f***ed here.  You're being very un-Dude."
     -- Walter Sobchak, The Big Lebowski

So Tex and I went into action mode and formulated a plan.  I would spend the night researching the weather all over the entire state of Colorado, then pack the car, and we would head out first thing in the morning in hopes to find a walk-up spot somewhere not stormy.  After an exhaustive search, I found exactly one spot within a 4 hour drive that predicted virtually no storms: Steamboat Springs.  So we headed there and called the National Parks people on the way to find out about availabilities.  They kept telling us to call back in an hour, and inevitably, when it was an hour later, we'd be on a patch of road with absolutely no cellphone service.  Eventually, we reached them and got some pointers.  Went to destination #1 with hope in our hearts, and they turned us away.  They only accepted campers intending to stay one night only.  Obviously not us, considering our car looked like a clown car, it was so packed.  My heart jumped into my throat as my stomach cramped into one big ball of nerves, and I fought the waves of anxiety as we drove to destination #2.  Being the ever faithful pessimist, I prepared myself for the reality that there would be no available sites, and we'd have to turn our butts around after 3 hours in the car and drive 3 hours back to our house, in defeat.  But apparently The Big Man Upstairs had different plans for us, since not only did destination #2 have available sites, but it was breathtakingly hit-yourself-in-the-head-wondering-if-this-is-real beautiful.  We literally got out of the car and surveyed our site, a perfect little camping spot nestled in a sea of wildflowers and backing up to an expansive and lush green meadow.  We weren't in Colorado.  We were clearly in Switzerland and this was clearly the set of The Sound of Music, since Wee Man started running through the meadow chasing butterflies in the sunshine.  I would not have been surprised if he'd burst into song.  Lord knows I was ready to.

If I were to try to share the details of that four day camping trip, this post would be 10 pages long, so I'll just leave it at this: it was amazing.  And the wildflowers.  Ohhhhhh, the wildflowers!  They were everywhere.  They were on our hike to the tops of the peaks, they were on our hike around the lake, they were everywhere.  That trip included some of the most dazzling beauty I've ever witnessed, and it simply took my breath away.  The weather held out beautifully, with only a small bit of rain on our last day, and before we knew it, it was time to drive home.  In classic Colorado fashion (worst drivers ever), all three routes home were covered in accidents.  So we ended up adventuring and taking a crazy route home that involved a very steep pass and at least 30 miles of back mountain roads with hairpin turns.  But it gave us a bunch more ideas on camping spots, and when we finally neared our house, I looked to the right and what did I see?  A rainbow.  Okay, God.  I get it.

"It's not a subtle point you're making."
     -- Simon Bishop, As Good As It Gets

In case I had any doubts that he'd told me four days before, "Hey, spaz.  Chill out.  Everything will be fine", he bookended our trip with a finale rainbow to drive the point home.  If I had a dime for every time God said "Told you so, told you so", I'd be filthy stinking rich.