Respect The Bubble...

The day in age we live in has taught us that the societal norm is to watch out for number one. To take the short cuts we see, to take the most convenient path for US, even if we are inconveniencing others. This past Labour Day Weekend, my husband and I decided we would go camping. It's our favourite adventure and where we feel the most peaceful. Since it was a rather last minute decision, we had a hard time finding available sites (our favourite is MacGregor Point Provincial Park), we landed on a second choice of Rattlesnake Point Conservation Area. Rattlesnake Point is right outside of Milton and we had never been there before so we weren't really sure what to expect. When we knew we were close, we were super excited to see that we have a big winding road ahead of us (Rattlesnake Point is on the Niagara Escarpment, which is only mildly mind-blowingly beautiful at any season). We rolled up to the check in building, we were greeted by a nice young lady who gave us excellent service! So far... so good... It took us a minute to figure out where the campsites were... because they didn't look like campsites at all...they looked more like an open public space to have an afternoon picnic at... We found our reserved Campsite 3 and took a peak around, which didn't take very long since it was so open. There were trees on the backside, but nothing giving us privacy. The whole front of our lot was open to the ACTUAL family picnic area... much like a public park. We were so disappointed in this that we went back up to the front desk and asked if there were any other open sites for the weekend. At this point, being a holiday weekend, there was nothing for us to choose from. Which in the end wouldn't have made a difference anyway since none of the other sites were any more private than the one we had. So, we went back to Campsite 3 and started unloading our things. When we got ourselves somewhat settled, we decided we would make the best of it... and hey... on the bright side, the rest room was SUPER close and we even had a little pathway right from out site directly to the rest room. It didn't take long for us to realize that little pathway was literally going to drive us insane. Now one thing I can say about Rattlesnake Point is that it has quite the assembly of hiking trails. We did a10km hike weaving from parts of the Bruce Trail (over 890km of trail spanning from the Niagara Escarpment all the way to Tobermory, On) and back into the local trails. There are amazing lookout points that give you a high point of view overlooking the luscious lands below. With such fulfilling hikes at hand, the Conservation obviously brings in quite the volume of traffic. There were cars and people everywhere, all fighting for parking and dodging each other on the hiking trails. It was so great to see so many people outside and getting their fix of nature. But not so great when it comes to respecting the bubble.... While hiking the trails, trying to collect and revive some inner peace, the last thing you want to happen is for something to disturb the melody of the forest sounds... Seriously... don't harsh my mellow man... The amount of disrespectful people that came through those trails were unbelievable. The amount of Kleenex used as toilet paper and thrown in plain site... The amount of loud voices... The amount of UNCULTURED SWINE... Okay....okay.... maybe that was a little harsh..but really!! But out of all the people on the trail being disrespectful, none of it compared to the complete ignorance of people walking through our actual campsite. Remember that close proximity rest room I mentioned earlier? Well, I wasn't lying when I said it would drive us insane... Between the traffic of the trails (which ran right behind our site and is where the rest room sits ) and the open visibility from the public picnic area through our site TO the rest room, we could not get people to stop walking through our site!!!! We even had a sign saying NO TRESPASSING right in the middle of the pathway leading from the rest room into our PAID campsite. Made zero difference. People would look up at the sign, read it and keep walking... To better our odds we even leaned larger sticks against the sign to further block their paths, but to no avail, they kept on walking. We got to some serious mean mugging, some mean mugged back, which was quite comical. Out of a full day (minus a few ours of hiking ... and a short time away from the camp because we truly couldn't handle it and needed ice cream to cool down our hot heads), we had a total of 3 apologies for walking through our site. An apology makes all the difference, because it shows respect. And that my friends, is the moral of my story... Respect the fucking bubble! There is nothing I hate more than to feel disrespected. And truly, we felt more bothered by the feeling disrespected than the actual people walking through the site. I mean, we will never camp there ever again, but after we had some time to settle into our site we understood it was quite an open site. What I would like to see, is people that aren't so absorbed into their own bubble that they can't respect the bubble of others... Let's make the 50/50 effort to accommodate each other. If you need to cross over into my bubble, thats groovy man but at least make an effort to acknowledge the fact that you are CROSSING INTO MY BUBBLE! . . . I think there is something to be learned here. We are all capable of being in our own worlds, and in doing so that may or may not cause of to have a lack of respect for others. But we live in a time where respect for our surroundings is one of the most important things to preserve. The media, the politics... they all seem to have a declining aptitude to remind us of what respect is. But if we can make a conscious effort to continue our respect for one another...to open the door for one another... to say please and thank you... you give a compliment... to pay it forward... to simply be aware of someones space... now that... that they cannot take from us...they cannot take our acts of respect...