Out of the Box

iUniverse, Inc.

Chapter One

"Can you believe that, kiddo? I counted one hundred and twelve of them! One hundred and twelve goddamn camels!"

I couldn't believe it, actually. Not that I thought the camels were a mirage or anything. They were clearly real, as anyone with eyes and an olfactory organ could attest. No, the truly unbelievable part was that my sixteen-year-old preppy self was sitting cross-legged on a Bedouin rug in a huge open-sided tent in the universe-sized vastness of the Sahara Desert with my Uncle Bob, a drunken New York priest, a retired Texas oil rig worker, and a remarkably pretty kindergarten teacher from Cleveland named Candy.

I actually think it was Candy who inspired my septuagenarian uncle to count out loud with such schoolboy enthusiasm, as one hundred and twelve camels passed by our little odd-duck camp. Driven by Bedouins clothed head-to-toe in bedsheet fashions, the camels were laden with salt slabs from Timbuktu and going to market. (And yes, there really is a place called Timbuktu.)

An awe-inspiring, hot as hell, seventeen-day camping trip to the center of the Sahara was Uncle Bob's sixteenth birthday present to me—complete with two guides who carried automatic weapons, just for the fun of it. I personally believe the trip also provided Uncle Bob with some good cover—but for what I'm still not sure to this day. According to him, it was all about boxes. In any case, it was an incredible coming-of-age gift, revelations included.

Looking back now, I sometimes marvel that my mother even let me go. Given my health issues—not to mention jihadists in Niger and random kidnappings in Algiers—she could have been a protective party-pooper, and no one would have blamed her for it, maybe not even me. But she wasn't, thank God ... and honestly, I think her belief in an almighty power actually did have a lot to do with it. She'd been a big proponent of "letting go, letting God" ever since I was born—two months prematurely and somewhat miraculously. You see, I decided to make my surprising entrance into this world on the same day that my dad and Uncle Bob made it up much of Mt. Everest.

"Two climactic life moments, shared by satellite radio!" as Mom loves to tell it.

I also have to believe that my father's and Uncle Bob's long-shared spirit for adventure played an honorary role in Mom allowing me this rite of passage—especially since my father's half of that spirit flew off this earth in a plane crash outside Minneapolis when I was two. For the record, though, my mother says she let me go simply because she preferred me to brave the Sahara Desert with Uncle Bob than spend spring break in Ft. Lauderdale with my boarding school friends. And from what I heard tell about Florida that year, the Sahara probably was the safer option—just barely.

Uncle Bob and I first met up in Paris and then flew on to Algiers to rendezvous with the group. It was the only part of the trip I remember Uncle Bob being on high alert. He told me Algiers was on the State Department's travel warning list, with kidnappings becoming more and more prevalent among tourists.

"You're too blonde and pretty. You're a target, kiddo," he warned. "Just stick close to me until we get out of here."

At first I thought he was exaggerating, but I soon had to admit the city was not the place of postcard-perfect experiences. Danger did seem to lurk in the shadowed doorways and littered alleyways. I found myself clutching tightly on to Uncle Bob's hand as we walked the streets—just like when I was a little girl in downtown Chicago. (I could only hope those warped-minded passport guys weren't tailing us.) He did let me out of his sight for about two hours that afternoon but only after he'd hired our guides-with-guns to sit outside my hotel room. He said he had to see a guy about starting up a box plant. Two hours later, he was back with a smile, and I didn't even think to ask him how things went. Mindless teenager.

The next day our anxious little group of travelers piled into a well-dented, white four-wheel-drive van and happily left Algiers in our dust. Once out of that forsaken city, the desert took us in fast—and there was an odd comfort in its vast nothingness. Most of the real threats were in cities at the time, and we were far more likely to run into an ancestral band of nomadic Bedouins than modern-day terrorists in the desert—or so our soldier guides said anyway. Uncle Bob must have concurred, because he soon reverted back to his relaxed, charming self as sandscapes enveloped us.

The goal of the trip was to go to the center of the Sahara and back, a trip of about thirteen hundred miles through an endless expanse of desert, day after day. If that sounds horrible to you, I have to admit I, too, had my doubts the first few hours in the van. No one knew each other, with the exception of Uncle Bob and me, so it was a relatively silent and worrisome outing at first, kind of like my first bus ride to overnight camp in Michigan. By the time we got to that night's campsite—a sand dune amid sand dunes from what I could see—I had started thinking I'd made a big mistake in swapping the sands of Ft. Lauderdale for those of the Sahara.

My fears didn't last long, thanks to Uncle Bob. That first night around the campfire I watched him work his unusual magic, breaking the ice with stupid jokes but more importantly, smart questions. Before long, he had everyone sharing their life stories, and in the process, I noticed he made his own life sound as boring as all get-out. Lesson learned.

Uncle Bob's not a loud man by any means; in fact, just the opposite. He's got a quiet yet strong way about him and a good sense of humor, and to be totally honest, he knows how to use his good looks and winning smile to best advantage. I'm a sucker for the guy, obviously, but that night was the first time I realized he has that effect on most everyone, men included. By the time we went to bed, spirits were high, there was adventure ahead, and camp-like friendships were forming. I also remember thinking Uncle Bob's smuggled-in wine was a whole lot better than bug juice. Another lesson learned.

Our fellow travelers were as memorable as you'd expect people to be who signed up for a spring fling in the Sahara. Uncle Bob talked for hours on end with Hans, a Czech-born, Canadian-raised adventurer who had successfully gambled with his life atop a Texas oil rig for many years. Now retired, he was hell-bent on spending his winnings in most every country in the world, and like Uncle Bob, he'd already traveled more than a hundred countries. Hans regaled all of us with his far-flung stories, and I might add, he included some pretty hot details about women in every port.

My uncle, on the other hand, told a few G-rated tales that portrayed him as a far more gallant adventurer—as much for schoolteacher Candy's benefit as mine, I thought. She was, as I've said, a beautiful woman, and Uncle Bob liked to flirt with her—as he did, and does, with most women. How she ended up on a trip to the Sahara, she couldn't really say. It just called to her, she told us. She'd seen a magazine ad at the dentist's office, went home, and booked the trip, and there she was playing hooky from her kindergarteners. Go figure.

Hands down, though, the wildest guy at the party was Father Moses. That was not his real name, but it is what we called...