Shawnee National Forest

When my husband was feeling good, we went to a beautiful place to camp, the Shawnee National Forest in southern Illinois. It was five years ago almost to the day. Billy was post stem cell transplant, and was strong enough to do some hiking.

He said something so funny when we were hiking across those gigantic rock formations, walking up to the very edge, one at a time, to look down. He said, “We have to be careful, or this will turn into a Dateline episode!” We laughed so much. It was a little cold for camping, but Billy always tried so hard to make me comfortable. He brought wood and chopped it into kindling, and I could see his effort, but he was so happy. We sat by the fire he made and cooked a simple meal on the camp stove. We slept in a bed he built a few years back that fit across the back of the van. We lay our sleeping bags on that bed that was covered with several thick, quilted moving blankets and topped with a 4 inch memory foam mattress cover. It wasn’t the Hilton, but we survived. And we had a Little Buddy propane heater at night to keep us toasty warm.

It was a wonderful trip. It was great to be in a beautiful place out in nature.

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