2023 Regional Gathering

Observations on 2023-Aug-1..10 Texas Gap Gathering

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We got out of Worcester late afternoon on Thursday and arrived at Texas Gap just as the sun went down and the rain started. We parked the car in exactly the same place as last year, but we took the long way to get there. There was a large tarp quite high up between trees across the way we drove in last time.

Some kitchen equipment was under the tarp, but no people. We were planning to put our tent up under the tarp, and explain it in the morning, when we heard voices through the trees. We found people under another, much smaller, tarp. While we sat there talking, the rain got harder.

We decided not to try to put the tent up in the rain, but to spend the night in the car. Since we had not planned to do that, the stuff in the car had to be re-arranged. She went to do that while I set a folding chair under the tarp and tried to sit in it. I tipped over and I fell into a puddle of cold water about 2in deep.

We spent an uncomfortable night in the car. The next morning we were extra glad that we did not put our tent under the tarp. Due to excellent rope work and a strong and watertight tarp, but bad tarpology, the tarp had sagged in the middle, touching the ground and holding about 50 to 100 gallons of rainwater in the pocket.

We were told that the roads were washed out and it would not be possible to leave until they were fixed. It rained a bit more that afternoon and we sat in the car wondering how bad it would get. A bit later it quit raining, we put up the tent and spent the next few nights there, as we had planned.

We spent Friday talking to old friends, including one who was the kitchen custodian for a long time. We talked about NERF history as well as personal memories.

A council circle for the whole gathering was held Saturday about noon. Actually, it was not very circular. We gathered on the gravel road, and the circle turned into parallel lines on opposite sides of the road, with a few people forming two lines across on opposite ends.

The council, as well as the whole gathering, seemed to be full of people who wanted to accuse others of various offenses. The accusations went from trivial (spending Hat money on non-dairy creamer at some gathering years ago), through disgusting (smearing shit on somebody's windshield) and impossible (remotely deleting email from somebody else's device after it was delivered), to unintelligible (NERF has no right to gather in the White Mountains, because they belong to Maine Rainbow, which is not part of NERF).

Another, much smaller, council circle for NERF was held the next day.

Consensus of NERF council at Texas Gap, August 2023
There was a NERF council on the land at the August regional. The main topic was the next custodians for the NERF kitchen. The council reached one consensus by silence:

"The NERF Council on the land consenses that M&J will be custodians of the NERF kitchen equipment, delivering it to NERF regionals and councils as needed."

The kitchen left the gathering with M&J, and it will remain a parking lot kitchen for those with handicaps.

The tent zipper broke and the coffee maker ran out of fuel, so we need some personal equipment before doing any more camping.

We left early Monday morning. We passed some orange cones that marked a washout on one side of FS-39. There was also a one lane section of VT-125, but that seemed to be not related to flooding, but rather a nasty tangle of tree branches and wires in the road.

Ironically, the only place we had any trouble driving home was on Rt-2 in Massachusetts. It was closed at the bridge over the Connecticut River (French King Bridge). We had to follow a detour back to I-95, north to the next exit, and then east across the river and back south to Rt-2, about 15 extra miles.

I learned later that several vehicles, including the schoolbus, had to be towed out of the mud at Texas Gap.