Page 11 of Wayfarers

Winslow’s sweet head in my lap, I decided Enough,

I told myself, This is a vacation, go be with other people

on vacation, and I booked myself three nights

at a fancy campsite in Buckley that came with WiFi

and a firepit. They had mini golf (for a fee) and

bike rentals (for a fee) and volleyball (free

somehow)—and a pet playground. That was

the important part. Winslow dozed

on the drive there, me making him little promises

anyway about a doggy seesaw I knew he’d love.

At the KOA it took me too many tries

to back the van into my spot. I parked.

I cried. Leashed Winslow and went to get

the lay of the land: lots of little kids, lots

of retirees. No one my age.

Once Winslow was tired, we sat

at my firepit to people-watch. The only ones

I couldn’t get a read on were the group

in the skoolie (I knew the lingo from Reddit),

bright yellow still, bus seats taken out. A few RVs

clustered around them to make a courtyard

and there they’d laid out blankets covered with stuff to sell

in epic piles. Stacks of paperbacks, friendship bracelets,

weird wire sculptures. And yeah I like to thrift

but it wasn’t interesting. The people selling it

were. Tanned, raggedy, blond from the sun

mostly, and I couldn’t keep a count because someone else

was always stepping off the school bus

to start their shift. What was their deal—

drugs? Religion? Dharma bums? I couldn’t stop