I grew up going off to sleepaway camp, packing my trunk and sleeping bag; no technology, friendship bracelets (before Taylor’s Version), camp songs, overnights in the woods, cabin drama, skits and songs…the list goes on. Maybe it’s a generational shift, maybe it’s cost-prohibitive, maybe we are less trusting, I don’t know, it doesn’t seem like we are sending our children off to camp anymore. In fact, I find that we are one of the few families we know that aren’t solely doing day camps.
I firmly believe that attending camp is one of the most formative experiences of adolescence. It fosters such a unique sense of independence. Often, you’re away from your parents for the first time, having to make new friends and navigate personality dynamics and literally living with strangers while you’re overly exhausted; what could go wrong? I also appreciate that counselors are often young adults who are themselves still learning and growing. Giving my children the opportunity to advocate for themselves and foster their own community outside of school, neighbors, and our family.
I love that each time I go and pick up my kids from camp, they have learned a new skill, fallen in love with a food they would never have taken a bite of at my kitchen table, tried something that scared them, or seemed impossible. They’ve been responsible for all their belongings, competed for the golden dustpan (cleanest cabin wins-competition is fierce,) done chores around camp, helped in the kitchen and all the other kids around them are learning and doing with them. Hiked to an overnight campsite and slept in the woods. Climbed a rock wall, capsized a kayak “accidentally” in the lake, channeled their inner Katniss Everdeen in the archery grounds, and wrote a script for their skit.
It’s just plain, silly, exuberant, childish FUN. Last year I saw a photo the camp posted of my oldest pushing a counselor in a grocery cart, wearing half his wardrobe while his cabinmates carried a mattress piled with blankets up a hill. No context, just the biggest smile, a few questions, and trusting that it was just a “camp thing.” I later found out they were en route to all camp skits, and I never actually got the whole story of the skit because he couldn’t stop laughing long enough to explain it. Camp songs sung at breakfast, traditions I ‘wouln’t understand’, legends and lore, silly games, no TVs or iPads, just kids being kids.
If I hadn’t gone away to overnight camp, the first time I was truly alone and left to fend for my own survival would have been getting dropped off in the college dorms. There’s a big GULP thinking about how intimidating that would have been. Camp provides children with an opportunity to experience all of these things in a safe and comforting environment. Counselors are trained to help deal with homesickness, friend drama, overly exhausted kids, first aid, illnesses, you name it. There’s a camp doc, a nurse, kitchen staff, counselors, directors, so many people that are so invested in creating the best experience for each and every child that walks into their cabins.
Year after year, we pack them up and drop them off to survive and thrive. The second we hit the gravel road, you can watch their whole selves perk up. Because camp is THEIR place, one of those thin places on Earth that they can see, hear, and feel that they are safe, they are loved, they can be themselves, and they can fill their cup. I often have to drive home with the windows down because they only took lake showers, and their clothes smell like something died. No full pair of socks survived, and they’re asleep before we have even left the gravel behind, but their first question is usually, “When do we go back?”
