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When I was old enough, I sampled different special camps, including Crafts,
Art and Photography and Sketching (CAPS); Music and Drama; and even Backpacking.
Every one of them was a special experience. While I was always a little
nervous when my parents dropped me off, by the end of the week, I was
in tears at the thought of leaving my new friends. Some of them became
pen pals who carried on a correspondence with me for years, and sometimes
we arranged to meet again at camp.
At the earliest opportunity, I went through the Counselor in Training
(CIT) program and became a volunteer camp counselor. My goal was to be
like Bill Murray in Meatballs, the fun-loving, understanding counselor
who could make a difference in kids' lives. The culmination of my counseling
experience was serving on the summer staff (Camp Family) at Hartman Center,
the summer after my freshman year in college.
We had permanent bunks in the Stone House, which was the nickname for
the big old farmhouse on campus. Each week, we were sent to various camps
to serve as counselors, depending on the need. I volunteered for a lot
of the adventure camps, one of the only female counselors willing to do
so. This meant that I spent a good part of the summer off-campus. Still,
when I was on campus, I bonded with my fellow Camp Family members, and
we shared much silliness and many inside jokes.
Every Wednesday night, a Camp Family tradition, we'd go to the local
Dairy Queen for a "DQ Run." One of the favorite items: the Dilly
Bars, both because they're delicious and because it's a ridiculous,
slightly naughty-sounding name. It was also close to the word "tilly,"
which was our name for the secret friends we had all summer long. I think
this was the camp director's idea: we would draw names and then, for that
week, did secret nice things for our "tilly." This could be
anything from leaving them anonymous notes to making them special things
in the craft center.
It was the summer of Batman. The movie was big that year, and
we saw it in a theater in nearby Lewistown. At every camp, there was at
least one Batman, a boy who refused to change his Batman T-shirt all week
long. We Camp Family members enjoyed dancing to "Batdance"
from the movie soundtrack, which one of us owned, and we made bat-shaped
chocolate cookies (along with peace signs, courtesy of me, the hippie).
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Our group time was limited to Saturday afternoon and evening,
after one group of campers left from, to Sunday morning when the next
group arrived. We sure packed a lot of bonding into those few spare hours.
The camp chaplain, who was just a few years older than us and also stayed
in the Stone House, had a Milli Vanilli album we liked to play, the guys
acting out different parts of "Girl
You Know It's True," "Blame it on the Rain" and "Baby,
Don't Forget My Number."
Later, when I learned Milli Vanilli been a sham, it hit
me as a personal sort of betrayal. Then I had to laugh, because of all
the times we'd lip-synched to their songs, not realizing the irony. We
also loved the Fine Young Cannibals, "She
Drives Me Crazy," as I remember.
There were so many good times, so many good memories. We
wrote to each other for years, but somehow, the correspondence eventually
dried up. I'm happy to say that after all those years, I found one of
my fellow Camp Family members on Facebook. I promised to share some photos,
so I thought this would be a great topic for this week's Memory Box.
Here are some photos from that summer. I had a camera but
didn't take many pics (don't ask me why). We're wearing our staff shirts
in a lot of these, because we were about to attend the Penn Central Conference,
which is a big annual meeting for the United Church of Christ. Obviously,
I'm not in them because I was taking them! The woman with the turquoise
capri pants, eating an apple, was the Nature Director. For some reason,
I don't have any pics of the Arts and Crafts Director.
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I kept a journal that summer in a three-ring binder which
has, appropriately, a Batman sticker on the front, and a "Smile,
God Loves You" sticker on the edge. Paging through it this morning,
I was reminded of all the happy times. We really were a sort of family,
making each other smile, sharing secrets, and telling each other, frequently,
that we loved each other. While there was at least one confirmed couple
throughout the summer, most of the relationships were close but platonic.
Here's an example of the sort of silliness I'm talking about.
This is from my June 9 entry. We were on the way to another church camp,
Fernbrook, to engage in a weekend training session. By the way, we were
not from Pittsburgh.
It all started while I was asleep, when a white car full of bizarre-looking
women pulled alongside us and Tim [the chaplain] raised his eyebrows
in greeting. Just as I woke up, he was playing tag with them by passing
them and then letting them pass us. Jeff [a counselor] reported that
they'd given us the 'V' salute. Whoah! Of course, Tim didn't know what
that meant or what they wanted. When they saw us laughing in the car,
they got paranoid, and the driver shook her fist at us. Mark [a counselor]
made a sign that said, "WE'RE FROM PITTSBURGH. WHERE ARE YOU FROM?"
and Jeff held it up the next time we passed them. They felt better than,
and when they turned off, they blew us a kiss.
Now we passed Denice's [a counselor] car, where everyone else was.
We held up the sign for them. When they passed us, they held up one
that said, "NO HABLO INGLES." Then we passed holding up another
one: "WE'RE GOING TO CAMP FERNBROOK." They wrote back, asking
for directions, and we replied, "WHAT A COINCIDENCE. WE'RE LOST,
TOO."
Next time, they asked if we could spare some paper. First, we tried
passing it through on my side, but I threw it and missed. Then, they
drove up on our left, and Mark and Jodie [the lifeguard] leaned out
the back windows and passed paper through. [NOTE: Do not try this at
home.]
They wrote, "SEEN ANY HOT MEN?"
"YEAH, ROB [the camp director]."
"WE HEART U."
"WE 'HEART' YOU, TOO, EH? — IGNORANCE IS BLISS... AND WE'RE
MICROWAVING SOME MEN 4 U!"
I could shares dozens of similar moments, but I'll just share one more,
this from June 14, because it's so indicative of how we interacted. Instead
of writing personal letters to our friends and family, we would all join
forces and write composite letters to them, each chipping in a little
bit.
Back in the Stonehouse, and I owe Jeff a million dollars. I gave him
a pen to use to write a composite letter to Mike Lamprinos [a high school
classmate of mine], and he picked up a similar pen. I bet him a million
dollars that pen was mine, and then he found mine.
I've erred!!! (when we say that, we blow air up — get it?)
We were fierce friends, and we had each other's backs. Amongst the silliness,
the harmless flirtation, we also helped each other deal with homesick
campers, rogue camp directors (each camp had a volunteer director in charge;
and some of them weren't great), accidents, and emotional hardships.
After one last weekend together, at the end of the summer once the campers
were all gone, I wrote this on August 13, 1989.
This morning was an anticlimax, an afterglow, an aftermath. One by
one, we quietly slipped out amid flurries of hugs and luggage. Rebecca
and I left at about 9, for a ride home drenched with sun and talk. I
dropped her off at Maison Blanche, curiously enough the same place where
Chris & Sydnee [who were apparently friends of mine, though their
names don't ring a bell] had their apartment. She hugged me good-bye
and told me she loved me.
That wouldn't be the last time we saw each other. We got together that
winter for a reunion at the camp, although as I remember, one or two people
couldn't make it. I carried on a correspondence with my fellow counselors
for years, and Mark and Jeff came back the next summer to serve as Camp
Family again.
I didn't go back to camp after that. If you ask me why, I can't really
say. Maybe because I'd finally achieved my goal of being a fun, compassionate
counselor. Maybe because I had found new things (like college radio and
the Penn State Monty Python Society) to occupy me. Or maybe because somehow
I knew that nothing could top that special summer.
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