If you have watched the Discovery Channel on cable TV, you may have seen a show called “Naked and Afraid.” On the show people are dropped off in a remote place and left for three weeks with virtually nothing except a knife and a firestarter, or a few other survival items The program is how they adapt and whether they are able to survive.

Day One – Time to take off clothes. Don’t look, Edith! Nobody wants to see that many sags and wrinkles. What is in the burlap bags? Grandpa has an ax. Grandma has a cooking pot.

Day Two – Build a shelter from brush and leaves. Are they kidding? Old folks were chopping wood before they were born. Get out of the way and watch the chips fly.

Day Three – Getting thirsty, needing water after all the wood chopping. Grandma uses dowser rod and hunts for a place to dig a well.

Day Four – Need fire. Grandpa rubs two sticks together while Grandma gathers kindling. A toasty bonfire in no time. What’s so difficult about this?

Day Five – The bugs and skeeters are biting in places we can’t mention. Grandpa makes a poultice of wild tobacco to put on the bug bites and take away the itching.

Day Six – Grandma cooks up a mess of poke sallet to go with the possum Grandpa knocked out of a tree. He’s been throwing rocks since childhood and is a pretty good aim.

Day Seven– Raining outside so have to stay in shelter. To pass the time Grandpa makes a sling shot with a stick and possum gut.

Day Eight – Still raining. Grandma weaves baskets. Grandpa whittles to pass the time. He doesn’t make anything, he just whittles.

Day Nine – Sunny at last. Grandpa shoots some birds with his sling shot and Grandma roasts them over the fire. Tastes just like chicken.

Day Ten – Scouting around, Grandma finds a wild persimmon tree and Grandpa spots a bee tree.

Day Eleven – Grandpa smokes bees out of tree and gathers honey in Grandma’s pot.

Day Twelve – Grandma and Grandma improve shelter with a rock and clay chimney and stuff clay in cracks. This should keep the shelter warmer and make cooking easier.

Day Thirteen – Grandpa doesn’t feel so good. Grandma boils some roots and makes sassafrass tea to cure his stomach problem.

Day Fourteen – Grandpa decides to go fishing. He digs worms for bait and chops down cane for a fishing pole.

Day Fifteen – Grandma roasts the fish on a splint in the fire and serves with some of the wild fruit she picked. Delicious feast!

Day Sixteen – Grandma gathers wild herbs and mushrooms for her medicine bag, in case of any further ailments.

Day Seventeen – Grandpa checks his traps and brings home the squirrels that he caught. Grandma skins and boils up a pot of squirrel stew and cattail root.

Day Eighteen – Grandpa chops wood to make a raft, which they will need to travel down the creek to their extraction point on Day 21. Grandma helps him tie the raft together with vines.

Day Nineteen – Grandpa goes hunting and kills a rabbit with his slingshot. They make stew and eat a final meal to keep up their strength before leaving.

Day Twenty – Tomorrow they will leave the wilderness. They sing folk songs around the campfire and are thankful they have come this far.

Day Twenty-One – The raft holds up pretty well in the creek. They use the long poles Grandpa chopped to guide it away from snags and floating debris.

The adventure is over. Grandma and Grandpa survived the way their ancestors always have and achieved a survival rating of 10.0.

The hardest part was keeping their private parts blurred out and hidden from the TV camera.  Next time, they will use fig leaves.

Copyright 2014 Sheila Moss