A Failed Thermal Grade

By Diana Hooley

Summer’s a great time to sleep outdoors, to bed down on the front porch, or in a tent, or to cowboy camp in the open air. Idaho nights are often cool, and the soft sound of a breeze in the trees, owls hooting, and crickets chirping can be pleasantly lulling.

People generally sleep better outside. Going to bed and waking with natural light fine-tunes our circadian rhythms. Also, sleeping in bedrooms night after night, we miss the star show in the sky. The Perseid meteor shower makes its yearly appearance this month in August. 

Yes, there’s a lot to commend sleeping outside—but I have no intention of doing it this summer.

I think for people of a certain age, like me, sleeping outside has a “use by” stamp. In my younger years, the activity felt like a midsummer night’s dream but now it feels more like a nightmare.

I’ve camped in recent years, but on one trip in particular, to Baker Creek near Ketchum, I found all the reasons I needed to stop sleeping outside. I was celebrating my retirement from being a university professor and wanted to camp and fish with my husband.