Camp o' the Pines

This is the time of year when my thoughts turn to summer camp. National Public Radio, television and local Camp Fairs remind me that parents and kids everywhere are labeling socks, buying cases of sun block and bug repellant and parsing all of the print on those waiver of liability forms. You know the ones - the forms that you must sign promising that if anything happens, anything at all, be it an act of God, reckless stupidity on the part of either the camp staff, fellow campers, horses, or your own kid, you agree that no insurance carrier will ever be held responsible for damages.

You are signing this at the exact time that you learn that the summer camp of your choice offers a riflery course with live ammo taught by an instructor formerly employed by the Israeli Army (seriously - the camp is in Michigan), a ropes course, horseback riding, archery and scuba. Why they don't just throw in Blindfolded Lawn Darts, Glass Cutting, Venomous Snake Handling and Infectious Disease Trekking (which cabin will be the first to discover cholera in the drinking water?) to round out the options for hazardous activities, I don't know.

All any parent can do is cringe, say a prayer to the Big Chief of summer camps (Chief Run Amok) and sign the form. You can pack your kid enough underwear, get her sleeping bag from the garage and shake all the geckos out of it, and get her to camp on time. But beyond that, the whole affair is pretty much out of your hands and you are sending your beautiful child off for two weeks to a place where she cannot benefit from the nimbus of safety that your constant vigilance provides.

And I sign, knowing better than many parents the realities of sleep-away summer camp. Rose could miss me; she may not get on well with her counselor who may be of a certain flavor of counselor that I cannot abide; she might be injured; she might have her young heart broken when she like-likes a junior counselor who, of course, like-likes someone his own age; other campers from rougher backgrounds could rough her up a little and she might return to me not quite as innocent as she was when she left me. It's a risk, for sure, but it is a risk I am more than willing to take. While I did not attend summer camp as a child, I am a five-summer veteran counselor. I have witnessed the daily blossoming of kids at summer camp, and I believe with all my heart that it's a growth opportunity.

During my first summer, I worked as both the camp "nurse" (this with absolutely no medical training*) and crafts instructor at a Lutheran summer bible camp. (That was the year the study was devoted to Corinthians - I always said that Paul must have been the worst pen-pal of his time; all those letters to the Corinthians, but he never asks them "So, what's going on with you guys? How's it hangin' in Corinth? Your Buddy, Paul").

The following summers I worked for a handicapped children's camp as a cabin counselor, a cabin director, director of outdoor skills (fires and fish) and, finally, an assistant camp director. Those summers are burned onto my psyche; I learned everything I ever needed to know about myself and life at summer camp. I discovered compassion, romance, creative expression, humor, endurance, leadership, grief, courage, pettiness, incompetence, jealousy and hate. Not bad for just a few months out of every year.

Summer camp holds the same possibilities for the campers as it does for the counselors. Even now I ponder how so much intensity is distilled into what should be just a summer diversion. And I am not alone. Generations of counselors and campers are nostalgic for their summer camps and the happy times they had there. I still go to camp in my dreams. It is unforgettable and life changing.

From my vantage point as a Camping Elder, I think camping allows kids to have that first taste of life without parental interference. Summer camp signals that it's time to grow away. What could be more exhilarating than the independence of just making your own choices and doing things for yourself? Or more terrifying? It's a time to face and conquer fears - to be really, really homesick and discover that it gets a little bit better each day and you can always turn on your flashlight inside your sleeping bag if it's too dark and too quiet.

Counselors create an intriguing alternative reality and take their campers along: "Ashley, you build a huge fire; Erin, you go get all the shaving cream cans together before the boys get here and we'll attack them on my signal; Marissa, stop crying, it's not bleeding that bad!" Or, a page from my own camping journal - "Jennifer, do you mind if we just bury your clothes instead of washing them?" (Jennifer had some sort of intestinal disorder that was wrecking havoc on her clothes and I was just too busy to keep doing her laundry. Jennifer didn't mind and we made a very nice moonlight party out of digging a hole and tossing her reeking garments into it. Her parents had a lot of questions.) It's all very freeing, psychologically, and gives the camper a real indication that life can unfold, quite pleasantly, without the micromanagement of an anxious parent.

For counselors, it's a lot like going to Vegas, "What happens at Camp o' the Pines, stays in Camp o' the Pines." It wouldn't be appropriate for me to share any personal stories of my own camp exploits, but I'm happy to fink on others. Friends of mine had left camp on their night off. The evening had, apparently, been full of high spirits and no one wanted to stop the party when they arrived back at camp in time for curfew. Someone (probably Dan...it was always Dan) thought that a condiment fight in the bathhouse might be fun, so the counselors crept into the dining hall and armed themselves with all the squeeze bottles of ketchup and mustard that they could carry. A night of unbridled food warfare commenced, with agents going back out for reinforcements of barbeque sauce and tomatoes.

The counselors made it back to their cabins by dawn, but the scene that awaited the morning cleaning staff in the bathhouse was horrific. It didn't take long to round up the perps, who left it to Dan to negotiate with the camp director, Gary. Gary was a nervous man and he was caught between the proverbial rock and an even harder place - a director cannot fire summer camp staff for mere high jinx because it's virtually impossible to replace them. You have to maintain a level of discipline, but you can't be too harsh or else staff will just quit, and, again, you can't replace them. Most directors take the position that if campers' safety is not compromised, all of the practical jokes and silly behavior must be somewhat tolerated as part of camp life.

Gary was less worried about the loss of supplies and the outrage of the cleaning folks than he was about the possibility of sex. Sex worried him. After yelling at Dan (the senior counselor) for half an hour he finally said, "Look...I understand the horse play. I understand stealing the ketchup and squeezing it all over each other. Just look me straight in the eye and promise me that no one was naked." At which point, Dan looked him straight in the eye and said, "Gary, I promise you that no one was naked." And that was that.

Gary, eventually, suffered from a nervous disorder that made it necessary for him to leave summer camp administration. But not before the fly-over in the summer of '83. Someone had an uncle who lived near the camp who worked as a crop duster. The female staff started noticing that many of their bras had gone missing. One checkout morning, as parents came to have breakfast and pick up their youngsters by the flag pole, a small plane came flying in low over the lake and circled the camp several times - trailing a ribbon of bras behind it.

Camp pranks are hardly limited to the ingenuity of the counselors. My own campers, all disabled kids, often didn't have a lot of opportunities for foolishness in their lives away from camp. Some kids had relatively minor physical challenges and other campers came to camp knowing that they had terminal illnesses. I had a camper whose face was disfigured from the bite of a camel; I had campers affected by thalidomide; I had campers with syndromes and congenital conditions so rare that I never heard of them again; I had one blind camper who (as if blindness weren't enough) had been born without an actual nose. Our campers had lives that were often filled with pain, therapies, surgeries, medication and the constant overarching sadness of their parents.

But camp is not a place for sorrow. Camp is the place where we learn to swim, and we sleep under the stars and we sing all of those stupid songs no matter what hand life deals us the rest of the year. It's the place where we meet people and make life long friendships and, most important of all, play practical jokes on our counselors.

My favorite from those years happened very late one night when I had a camping session with teenagers. One camper, Mary Ann, had been born with legs that ended at her thigh. She had a set of artificial fiberglass legs that she kept dressed in a pair of jeans to pull on if she needed them, but they were heavy and hot. She preferred to get around in a wheel chair unless there was a special occasion, like a dance or church. In between, Mary Ann's legs just occupied a corner or were shoved under her bed.

That summer, I had the top bunk by the outside door to Wing A of the Cherokee Cabin. I had the night off and was out on a date, so I came in as late as I possibly could. The moonlight was streaming in through the old casement windows of the cabin. The ceiling fans were turning sluggishly. It was very, very quiet as I climbed up the side of my bunk in semi-darkness, pulled back my quilt and found a disembodied pair of legs wearing shoes and jeans in my bed. I screamed; twelve adolescent campers broke out in howling laughter. That was when I learned that life is both painfully dark and hilariously funny at the same time. Mary Ann, already, knew this very well. I was just catching up.

Camp counseling is an act of service. Oh, sure, you get paid enough to keep you in spending money and you usually get one free camp t-shirt per summer. The dating pool is excellent and you leave at the end of the summer with a tan and new best friends. You get to spend the summer outdoors creating fun and, hopefully, happy memories for your campers. But every counselor is asked to give the best they have around the clock.

It is your place to offer concern and wise counsel to the homesick kid who is almost dehydrated from crying so much. You have to energize and entertain; you have to hold the hand of the frightened camper who needs stitches and go back along the trail in the rain to find the lost plushie. You have to play the hundredth game of Capture the Flag with the same wild enthusiasm with which you played the first. You have to help your campers resolve all of their personal crises at the same time that you're dealing with your own. "I thought that Derrick and I were a couple...but now, I just don't know. He went out to Flatrock dam with Sherry last weekend, and...well...I'm just not sure."

You have to be responsible for your own behavior at all times, because you have a very immediate impact on the well-being of the kids entrusted to you. You don't get much sleep and you are bound to get sick yourself once or twice. For all of the good and crazy times, it's not an easy job. But, like most things in life that require an effort, there are huge rewards. The camaraderie that counselors have is so enduring that I have maintained many of those friendships over all these years. Only a few occupations create those kinds of bonds.

I don't think camp culture or the rituals have changed too much since my counseling years. The part in the old Disney "Parent Trap" where Hailey Mills meets herself at summer camp was, after all, accurate even though it was from the cinematic Dark Ages for me twenty years later. I don't expect Rose to come home with a mosaic ash tray or a macram� plant hanger that she made in Arts and Crafts, but I'm counting on a lanyard. I am going to know most of the songs she learns (especially if they have frogs sitting on logs in the chorus, or if any ants go marching anywhere). I anticipate the hilarity of short-sheeting, toothpaste on the noses of sleeping counselors and sneaking out "without the counselor knowing" (forget it - the counselor always knows - unless the children of the Baxter twins are now attending camp and have passed on their sneaking skills to their offspring. Those girls could really sneak...they could have left, gotten a ride to the border crossing at Laredo and made it back in one night, and I would never have known.)

The administration in every generation is still slightly out of touch. There is still canoeing and dancing and intense romance. There is still competition for Best Cabin. Skirmishes between cabins and campers still break out. The really dreamy guy counselor who both counselors and campers adore (see Derrick, summer of '79) has packed his guitar and is ready to break into "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" or it's modern equivalent. There is everyone's least favorite kind of dweebish, humorless counselor who, somehow, manages to keeps his clothes immaculate and doesn't like practical jokes, especially if they are being played on him. (He's also the sort of counselor that the administration loves to bring out to give the parent tours - he's neat, he's polite and he is universally disliked by counselors and campers alike. He has a female counterpart who is very perky, insists on good table manners in the dining hall, makes fighting campers "say one nice thing about each other" and keeps her nails perfectly polished.)

Summer camp is also my rite of passage. It's the classic time for parents to let go as sort of a short practice flight for the time when the fledglings hop out of the nest and don't hop back in again, It's my time to evaluate my rather laissez faire parenting plan. Did I teach her anything that will be valuable to her? Did I offer her any kind of worthwhile example that she can draw on and did I leave anything important to chance? Are we ready?

While I'm letting go, this year, I'm also clinging nearby. I will be hovering at my own campsite, 7.5 miles from my daughter (I DID, after all, teach her how to camp) - out of touch, but still able to get to her within twenty minutes if needed. Unless, of course, they still need one more counselor on staff. I'll take the top bunk. *No kidding. A recruiter came to my church and hired me on as the camp first aid director when I was 17 and a senior in high school. By mid-summer, I was dispensing prescription meds and giving insulin shots. Obviously, this sort of thing doesn't happen in summer camps today. Or if you find out that it does, remember to sue their neckerchiefs off.

Note-to-Self 2: If you're not quite ready to part from your youngsters for summer camp, or if you can't stand to miss the fun yourself, check out a family camp. I don't have personal experience, but the idea is that you go with your kids to summer camp. Each family group has its own cabin. Your kids go off with counselors for their activities, and you have the option of joining in or staying behind with the other adults. It sounds like a nice compromise for families that both want a vacation together, but would like a little space apart as well. Or, perhaps it's a good choice for parents of young campers who are not ready for a long separation. Check out www.medomakcamp.com for more info on this.

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Ingrid divides her life between the San Juan Islands (where her heart lives) and Austin, Texas (where her paycheck is generated). While Ingrid is spiritually promiscuous, she credits her guru, Jimmy Buffet, for her mantra ..."If we couldn't laugh, we would all go insane."

Ingrid is an old-school Libra and believes that the Revolution should be a catered event.

Her column appears every other Thursday in San Juan Islander. To contact Ingrid, send emails to ingrid@sanjuanislander.com

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