Guess What I Did at Camp?
Posted at 6:00 AM on March 4, 2010
by Dale Connelly
(41 Comments)
As March begins and the weather starts to warm, our thoughts turn to spring and the pleasures of summer. For children, this means hours of unstructured leisure time (or at least it used to). And camp!
Personally, I never had the pleasure. My summer "camp" happened at home and involved helping my father build fences, pour concrete and repair automobiles, but I hear that summer camp can take a child far away from home for weeks on end and the experience is often formative (or transformative).
The activities, the stories, the songs, the skits, the campfire late at night or the bunkhouse early in the morning - lasting memories are made in the woods in the heart of summer.
Today, summer camp doesn't have to be in the wilderness - it can happen in the suburbs or the inner city and be about anything at all, like math, science, manners, space travel, cooking, throat singing or care and feeding of your goat. Camp can be a great opportunity for youth to experiment with different identities and imagine themselves doing adult jobs. It's important, harmless fun.
In fact, it might have been an impromptu winter sampler for the Junior Air Controller's Camp that sprang up at JFK in New York City last week, when a youngster got to talk on the radio and say a few words to some real live pilots. The child was following instructions and seems to have been closely supervised, so it's a stretch to say a kid was "directing traffic".
For that kind of full immersion experience, you'd have to go to camp.
Spending a week or two at Camp PULLUPPULLUPPULLUPPULLUP! provides a fantastic opportunity for our youth to step into the stress-drenched shoes of the good people who keep our airplanes from running into each other. Just roll out of your tent, climb the winding stairs to the top of Moose Antler Tower, put on your headset and talk on the radio all day, surrounded by cool machines. Plus, you get to watch planes fly. It's fun!
Following the Junior Air Controller experience, some stay for FAA Disciplinary Hearing Camp! You'll be called on a REAL CARPET!
Good times, hands-on learning experiences and great character building exercises!
Although I might have imagined it.
Did you go to camp?
Comments (41)
Morning Heartlanders!
Dale, I went to the same camp that you did, only my mother's version, with yardwork, mattress airing, closet cleaning, etc. My daughter thinks this is unfortunate because when she is not off and about, she also goes to this camp in the summer!
(And on a non-related topic left over from yesterday... Barbara, I also think you'll enjoy Michael Pollan. I've read a few of his books as well... thought provoking but not preachy!)
G' Morning, Heartlanders
My camp was the LarryJo Dude Ranch in Boone, Iowa. For two weeks I'd get to live the life of a cowboy, doing the usual camp stuff (like weaving a lanyard) and riding horses.
All campers wanted to ride Diablo, a tall white horse thought to be the fastest in camp. I finally got to, but then learned that Diablo was lame that week and could barely walk, let alone run.
That day we had a game of hide-and-seek in the woods. You would hide on your horse until someone who was "it" would find you. Eventually everyone would be "it."
Faced with the problem of hiding with the largest, slowest, whitest horse in the game, I found a creek bed with overhanging branches. I led Diablo down there and we waited. For a long time I could hear hoofbeats thundering around, then eventualy silence.
I knew time passed slowly when you were hiding, so I went on hiding for what seemed hours. And it turns out it was hours. When I came out, the woods were empty because everyone was back in camp. Nobody had noticed I was missing.
By the time I got to the bunk house, the town cops were already racing toward the ranch with their gumball lights spinning. They would join the search for me or my body. To my huge annoyance, people kept referring to me as "the Lost Camper." I preferred to think of myself as the "Hide-and-Seek Champion."
there's a throat singing camp!!!? seriously. what's the age limit?
got to go to "Methodist" camp once with my friend. it was great fun. sang songs i still remember. made hobo dinners. went to camp church. took camp communion. When my Lutheran Mom found about the latter, she was mad. then, she thought, it was just grape juice so it didn't count :-)
but i never got to go again.
My mother always told us stories about her years at summer camp. There was a lot of emphasis on sun poisoning and leeches. I now think it was a plot-I had no interest in camp and stayed home.
My son spent many lovely summers at the Y day camp inspired and supported by magnificent young counselors with names like Jelly and Owl. He came home dirty and tired. My favorite was family night where parents got to learn the camp songs and join some activities. My favorite camp expressions are still used here including, "What do we do when it rains?....Get wet!"
Only in Minnesota does weather above freezing make us think of summer camp!
st johns leadership in collegeville was a great place with the brothers and the monks and the cigerettes in the woods cousin dan would come down from fargo and we would set up shop. find some big kids that went there during the school year and find out where the secret places were, the rope swings in the woods by the lake and stuff like that. the cold showers built charachter (but shrunk other things) it was fun getting into innocent trouble. cafateria food and dorms who could ask for anything more. i think that was the object of the camp but i am not sure how it was directed. we got up did stuff and then went home at the end a week later. it was fun for all.
Greetings! My parents were Scout leaders, so vacations were always spent camping -- never stayed in a motel until I was an adult. The group summer camp experience was usually just day camps. But I still enjoyed the hour on bus singing all those dumb songs, rounds, etc. Hiking in woods, making fires, outdoor cooking, crafts and learning other important skills.
My most memorable camp experience was going with with Senior Girl Scout Troop Ship 99 to Isle Royale for a week. You can only get to Isle Royale by boat or plane in Lake Superior, so you better know what you're doing. You carry in everything you need and you darn well better carry it out again, too. Serious camping, hiking, wilderness, animals, etc. Amazing experience. But I still don't like camping.
Good Morning All,
I did go to camp once. It was something like the one that Allen Sherman sang about in the song I'm sure you know, Dale. I think we should hear that song.
I went to boy scout camp because I needed some place to stay while my mother was out of town. I don't remember getting home sick at camp, but it was a somewhat strange experience living in a tent, I think, or was it a cabin, with a bunch of other boys and eating in a mess hall.
I guess the camp was a good experience with a lot of swiming, some boating, and crafts. I can remember starting to put together a basket backpack from a kit which I really liked.
no camp for me either, just 3 months of endless days with no schedule, roaming the neighborhood, riding bikes, it was great
my grandsons will be going to Inventor's Camp for one week and one of the Science Museum camps for a week, something to do with making things; the rest of the time we will be outside in the yard with the dogs and the garden and their treehouse and lots of books
I have to get in a smug dig at the boys here -- while on Isle Royale with my extremely well prepared and serious camp-oriented Girl Scout Troop there was a Boy Scout Troop of morons who had all their stuff shipped in for them. They created all kinds of waste, brought sports gear to play games and basically acted like they owned the place.
Of course, we looked down on them with disdain. We carried everything we needed on our backs, ate camp food while they had Kraft Mac & Cheese and we were in harmony with nature while they brought their backyard with them. Secretly, I envied them. But they were out of place on Isle Royale.
Barb,
There's no Throat Singing Camp that I know of. I made that up. Sorry! But it's obviously a very, very good idea that someone should run with.
Camp Ondar!
Camp for me was (and still is) Camp Courage in Maple Lake MN. I have met so many in my social group there. I didnt have to do art and crafts, or canoe workouts, I just met friends and girlfriends there. . Also can you play Camping by the Sun by Peter Mayer if you havent already? Thanks.
One year at camp my son learned all the songs from Guys and Dolls from his Broadway-bound counselor who'd had the lead in the high school production. The counselor asked me if I minded. Who could object to 2nd graders singing Sit Down You're Rockin the Boat?
Went to Camp House in Brimson after grade 3 for it turned out two weeks. CH was then run by the DM & IR RR Employees Assoc,. Went for first week, which cost $6 and then got a schloarship for the second week, so it cost $4. A basic summer camp, one of my mother's many attempts to socialize her very very quiet and passive child. Don't argue, I was!! Later my kids went there when it was a Lutheran camp. My daughter now serves on its board and goes there with her family for family week.
My other summers were full of wood-splitting, composting, fertilizing with manure, cultivating (remember that weird thing?), planting, hoeing, canning, feeding cows, chickens, ducks pigs, and horses (and unintentionally rodents), haying, butchering chickens and ducks. Some of that could be spun off into a camp today. But it did at that point in my life make the summer camp seem sort of weird. I had no idea there were so many kids who had nothing to do all summer.
riding bikes and hanging out all summer. baseball games in the wilds of bloomington that river town of the 50's population 13,000. we would get on the bikes head for the river and explore all day every day. we had differnt spots for diferent activities, mostly in the woods on river banks crawling throug drain culverts, climbing on barges and biulding fires for shore fries. with baseball cards in the spokes and a peanut butter and jelly on wonder bread in the saddle bags. everyday was summer camp in the burbs. we had box hockey and 4 square at the elementary school and pick up games on the field where you really would choose up sides by catchint the bat and then doing the one hand on top of the other to the top of the bat to see who got fist pick. guys would go home for lunch and come back to find the game still going on. big kids taught the little kids it was part of the neighborhood mentoring program. that was the way life worked. a baseball cap and a canteen was all a person needed. see ya at sundown.
Aaron, I took my mother-in-law to Camp Courage every summer the first few years we were married. CC is on our short list of places to which we give. Go get em Aaron!!
Sherrilee and Barbara-later I will post a good quote from Michael Pollan that I think fits this group.
I did go to camp more than one summer -- Fanny Bailey Alcott near Eveleth...spent one session in the nurse's office soaking toes infected from scraping on rocks while learning (?) to swim. Fond memories. But a friend went to YWCA camp near barnum and they got to ride horses...that's where I really wanted to be.
Now I go to adult camps -- a few years ago joined an intimidating group of poets, writers and musicians at Robert Bly's Great Mother Conference (now always in Maine) And just this week registered with Concordia Language Village near Bemidji for a weekend of Norwegian (some language, lots of food and, I hope, some folk dancing)
I camped with the Lutherans a couple of times (a week of camp in junior high got me out of weekly Wednesday night confirmation classes - seemed a good trade off). Camp Onamia I believe was the name of the place - lots of spiders in the cabins, cold water in the lake, and an 8th grade boy I had a crush on...
Also ran a camp for high school students for a couple of years. It was a week-long camp focusing on business and business-related topics. We managed to get about 150 kids to sign up for each of the week-long sessions. I liked working with the volunteers and the college campus staff where we hosted the camps...but I was not meant to ride heard on 150 high schoolers Just not in my makeup. (I'd rather deal with words and web sites - much less likely to do anything that'll make me call parents at 7 am.)
Clyde, I am glad your mother in law gets a lot from camp. I think there is a spirit there that binds people together tighter than I have ever seen. The friendships go deep there and I am returning this summer after a 5 year hiatus, so it should be a good time.
I went to a molecular biology nerd camp at Iowa State for a month. That's where I decided that mouse hearts were gross and I wanted to do science with plants instead.
I remember going to an Izaak Walton League camp in Boone, IA. At the end of the camp, a girl and I exchanged addresses. She wrote me a couple times, but I was not a good pen pal and I never wrote back. Many years later, in college, who should appear at our door to pick up my roommate for a date but this girl who I never wrote back to.
Aaron, just to give you a timeline, my mother-in-law went to CC from about 1966-78 and died shortly after. She had severe arthritis. But yes, it was wonderful for her in all of the ways you named and more. Glad you are getting back.
Jim--I used to do a three hour session at leadership camp but it was at the other campus when I did it.
So what would you call throat-singing camp: Camp Gitchi Glottal Gammi, Bass Camp, Camp Swallor or maybe Camp Don't Swallow.
Good story Clyde!
plants geek vs molecular biology nerd and not writing back to the girls. every mothers dream charlie charlie how is your life today? i am concerned.
you really went ot molecula biology camp???... man charlie...
Steve--Dale's comment just reminded me how wonderful your story was. I have a lot of IA connections, but I still wonder at a place in IA where you could hide a big white horse. My mother used to play hide-and-seek with her grandchildren and then not look for them to get a few moments of quiet. Hmmmm?
tim--look at summer "camps" offered by places like Carleton College. I want to go to many of them.
Best summer camp movie portrayla ever--Addams Family Values.
Hi all,
Not much camp for me either... I remember a church day camp once and then a few days at another chuch camp- 'Good Earth Village' down by Spring Valley MN... Since we lived out in the country on a farm my summers were spent with the one closest neighbor kid (and I didn't even like him all that much) and doing whatever farm work we were doing. And following my Dad around 'helping' with whatever he was doing. It was hard to vacation too; hard to find someone to milk cows and do chores.
I remember going to DC with Mom and Dad to visit my oldest sister when I was 10... and then when I was 16 Mom and Dad traveled to Europe for 3 weeks and left me in charge of the farm. (We all survived mostly intact... and what went wrong wasn't really my fault...)
Now my wife; from the time she was about 10 years old she would travel with an Aunt and Uncle every summer. Eventually was 4 kids traveling with Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bill who didn't have any children of their own. Drove to 47 states I believe and camped out 95% of the time. A tremendously wonderful experience for all of them and captured forever in the hardcover book Aunt Ruth and Uncle Bill had printed for all the kids. Ruth and Bill have passed away now along with one of the travelers but those memories are very precious to them.
I love hearing all the stories!
Hey, I bet nobody else caught fireflies...and then extracted luciferase and made the light-emitting reaction go over and over again in a test tube. I'm pretty sure I turned out OK (found a better girl, had kids, got a plant nerd job, etc.).
My daughter went to two horse camps in MInnesota in different years. They'd take trail rides out into the country and have overnights. After a meal around a campfire, camp leaders would tell gruesome stories about the madmen and ghouls who lived out there eating children. There would be some horrible creature with bike reflector eyes up in a tree on a rope and pulley. After an hour of terrifying stories, this thing would drop out of the sky, lit by flashlights.
She then moved on to the Concordia language camps, including a Chinese camp near Bemidji. When Molly got an arm injury, she was treated with Chinese medicine by a doctor who kept a tiny monkey in his shirt vest pocket. The treatment for her arm involved a poultice of ground deer antlers. Molly came home convinced that Chinese medicine was WAY advanced over western medicine.
Charlie, Charlie, Charlie--we all did that but not in test tubes. Put it all over our faces and chased each other around the yard--night tag.
So what plant nerd job? Do you have pocket liner full of ting trowels?
Ben, what a cool story about your wife's aunt & uncle! And Charlie and Steve, I've spent time in Boone, but had no idea those camps were there! Are either of you from Iowa as I am?
It was LIKE camp at the trailer park where we spent 3 summers while my dad went to summer school in Greeley Colorado, late 50s -- situated between football and baseball fields, we had the grandstand and ticket booths for our forts, could bike all over the place with the other kids, played kick the can etc. in evenings... Kid heaven. (I've probably mentioned this before.)
Our son got to go with a friend to Space Camp in Florida. I was at church camp when I was about 12, and then Y-teen leadership camp later on. But the best was as an adult, folk dance camps, esp. a week of Israeli dancing in North Carolina mtns.
Sherilee and Clyde, I'll definitely read some M. Pollan...
Great topic, Dale!
Charlie--good memory of firefly luciferase. I knew a guy, a Finn, who combined that with some reagent he made. The compound instantly detected the presence of bacteria. He sold the patent for it to 3M for over a million dollars, which he lost (totally) by trying to grow morel mushrooms in his basement.
Barbara--I grew up (18 yrs) in Ames. LarryJo Dude Ranch no longer exists. I was there in 1957 or thereabouts. Where did you grow up?
This thought was caused by Dale's recent song selection: the opposite of throat-singing camp would be Bob Dylan Camp, held at the deepest level of the Hull-Rust Mine. Participants would be encouraged to come with colds to help set the right nasal sound.
Good MPR money raiser.
I went to Lutheran camps in the Boundary Waters and in the Black Hills. My kids have gone to Concordia Language villages -German, French, and Italian- as well as the International Peace Garden Performing Arts Camp that straddles the North Dakota-Manitoba border. Lately we have also spent time at summer Suzuki String Intitutes in Brandon Manitoba and Montreal, Quebec. They have been great experiences for our daughter. This year we are going to a summer institite in southern Ontario since some violinists she met and befriended in Montreal are going there this year. What's nice is that my husband and I get to attend the institutes as parent-observers, and that is a nice change of pace from what we normally do.
I went to Camp Wawanaisa on the Severn River in Maryland every summer, earning my way by selling Camp Fire Girl candy door to door. One of the unique features occurred in August, swimming with the sea nettles. Every year some counselors would sneak off after lights out and canoe down the river to the Naval Academy.
By the time I reached high school I discovered the Methodist Youth camp held on the campus of Westminster College: real beds instead of bunks; waiters in the dining hall; no ticks, mosquitos, sea nettles, blue crabs, or mandatory swimming lessons; boys; dances; did I mention boys...
Like Cynthia, I still go to summer camp, although mine is less intimidating (language camp - you go, girl). I really look forward to August and Clearwater Chrysalis, a retreat/summer camp for women at Clearwater Forest in Deerwood, MN. We can swim, canoe, hike, walk the high ropes, be inspired by a keynote speaker, take workshops in bible study and arts/crafts and cooking, work on beautiful quilts, sing around the campfire and generally forget about what may be going on at home.
Last evening I was with a group of people who call themselves a spiritual community, a church, but who are simply inert, insensitive to the pains of others, to the mystery of it all, to the power of life, and, I fear, to the basic point of the Gospel. It’s a church we recently joined out of a sort of despair which I will not explain. But the church is now dying, clearly of their inertia. They are so inert that, while they want to survive, they cannot will themselves to act on that wish. Then later I read the following in Michael Pollan’s “A Place of My Own.”
“I read in a book by Hannah Arendt, a sentence that kept coming back to me as a kind of rebuke. ‘Nothing perhaps is more surprising in this world of ours,’ the philosopher wrote, ‘than the almost infinite diversity of its appearances, the sheer entertainment value of its views, sounds, and smells, something that is hardly ever mentioned by the thinkers and philosophers.’ At first, this sentence struck me as being poignant, even profound. But then, with this piercing sense of deflation, I realized that anybody who regarded this observation as anything but obvious—as anything but pathetically obvious—had a serious problem. And that included me.”
I realized that I was a part of two communities: 1) that church that has no wish to recognize Pollan’s “pathetically obvious” fact, and 2) this group that lives fully in that recognition, by the music you treasure and by what you say of your lives and experiences. Thank you all for that.
clyde de nopunchline
this is one heck of a group isn't it. thanks everyone for making the coffee klatsch so wonderful. it is a true delight and i look forward to it every morning.
you cant get too caught up in the church group. as a recovering catholic i have proclaimed myself spiritual but not religious in the orthadox sense for many years. you is enough, don't worry about them.
but i am concerned about charlie...
In support of Charlie, I will confess to only you, tim, no one else, that I am 8 credits short of a degree in biochem. Shhhh.
Hey Clyde... thanks for the quote. It sounds very much like Michael Pollan. Guess I'll have to add that book to my list!
cly de qt
the secret is safe with me.
sherilee keep it under your hat.
that was a great quote.
I will be finishing the book soon and love to give away books (tain't no but little bits of room on my book shelves), so if anyone wants it . . .
I saw a book on a table at Barnes and Noble a few months ago that cracked me up. It was called,
"I'm OK With God, It's Christians I Can't Stand."
Anyone here read it?
Dale - Camp PULLUPPULLUPPULLUPPULLUP! That cracked me up too!
Steve - I grew up in Marshalltown, class of 66, then went to Iowa State...
Donna - hadn't seen that one, but I used to have one in my little bookshop called "Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism."
Clyde - I'd take that book when you're finished, if you'll let me pay for postage... mmbbhassing@usfamily.net
I want the book Donna saw; will look for it.
Barbara
Bishop______ (cannot remember his name) sort of over-rescued the Bible.
Will contact you when I am done with the book.
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