Gummy Bears and Camp

Recently I got back in touch with an old friend. His name is Jason. We were great friends when I was 16 and going to a summer program that taught teens how to teach others about the harm of tabacco use. It was a great time, and generally we watched a lot of Rocky Horror Picture Show, and generally just played around. I remember bits and pieces and wish I could remember more....but Jason told me he always likes to throw in something wonderful with something bad...so Gummy Bears and Camp. My roommate was reading this amazing blog yesterday and she said "You fell in a sewer?? How'd you do that!!??" As she is cracking up at a painful memory (sarcasm) I realized that it might be great to write down more things just for her to read, or anyone else who finds me remotely interesting, and know more of the stories my big mouth may have forgotten to tell.

So back to my friend Jason.....Around the time I met Jason my life was kind of going out of control. I'll get into those details another day...but I was looking for something to help me get my life back on track. Well, in Washington State kids attend what it called Outdoor Education. It's a wonderful program I wish more states had. When kids are in sixth or fifth grade they go for a week of camp. It's during the school year, and they go with their teacher. They get to experience water testing, rope making, survival kits, and tons of other great activities. There is hiking, and singing songs...and well just overall happiness. The kids love it, the teachers love it, and I got the chance to love it. I didn't get to attend as a fifth grader or even sixth because at that time we were missionaries in the Philippines. I honestly don't even know how I got involved in the first place, but I did. I went as a camp counselor. The particular camp I was a part of had high schoolers train to go for a week. You even got credit for going! What craziness is this???

So, I went to Camp W. I loved it. There were so many wonderful things to love about it. It was all about good feelings and love, and I felt like I did a great job at it. My cabin was always this amazing place, and I think it led me to my current profession, in fact I know it did. I went as much as possible. My teachers were pretty annoyed that I was constantly asking to go back again and again. Finally one teacher told me no, I couldn't miss another week of school for this camp. I knew what I wanted to do, I wanted to be a paid counselor when I graduated. So, each Thursday was the camps night to have families and friends come to see skits and what not. So, I would go EVERY Thursday after school. I'd drive the hour to North Bend, and I'd help out in anything they asked me to do. I was all about camp. It was as if I felt like I finally had a place in the world where I was needed and accepted.

My senior year of high school I went to camp for a final time. It was always painful the final Thursday. After the kids fell asleep the counselors were awoken and pulled into different fun meetings and such. It was always fun, but thursday was always the night where the counselors cried and said how much they were going to miss each other. It was also your last night to find a guy you might want to try to hang with after camp was over. :) Camp had this funny way of bringing together relationships. I met one of mine at camp....but Askia is a story for another time. So, here I am my senior year of high school, and I'm just basking in the love of camp and my dreams of coming here permanently when a bombshell was dropped. The leader of the camp Mr. Sullivan was not coming back to the camp. He was leaving. Everyone fell apart. We realized they had brought the best counselors that week just for the reason of telling us all camp was going to end. I was devestated. I thought for sure there were hints they wanted me to work there. How could I have been so wrong? As the campers went to leave Mr. Sullivan asked me to stay behind a minute. I stayed and he told me that he knew my dream, and he didn't want it to die. He told me they were going to open a New camp with a new school district and wanted me to be a part of it. I was elated!!

I was walked away from the camp fire by the two associate directors who told me that I was to tell no one of this new camp. I was told that a few others were going to be invited to be a part of it, but we weren't to talk about it. It was one of the best days of my high school career! I knew what I was going to do after high school since I knew college was something I couldn't afford. I had a purpose! I went to bed that night feeling great.

I went back to school and graduated, and then went to work for the Boy Scouts of America. They were the ones who owned the camp that we were moving to. Right away after graduation I went to work...well not right away. First I went to Disneyland, and a backpacking trip with my dad, and then it was right to work. I was 17 and it seemed like my life was falling into place. The camp was in the other direction from where Camp W was. This camp was in Olympia. It was a mess!! We got there and were told the whole place had to be redone. We had to paint, and clean, and....oh what didn't we have to do? It was like starting from scratch. We were there at six in the morning working, and our backs were killing us! But, there were four of us chosen to work there, plus the three directors, and then anyone else that would stop by to help, and tons of people did. It was this great experience!! We'd play music, and sing and just think about how exciting it was to start this great adventure together!

About a month into it, we started working on the curriculum. I was a great typist, and was asked to type up the curriculum. It was basically looking at the other camps stuff and retyping it....it felt a little weird, but I did what I was asked. I would write and work for hours. I was there before the sun camp up, and left after it went down. I was told I did more work than anyone, and I felt like I loved this new job more than anyone. I know that's just not true, but it was how it felt. So, we get this new office about 15 miles from the camp. We're told to be there bright and early. So, we get there, but apparently we were five minutes late. Oops. No oops. We were told if we couldn't get there on time to not come, and we were firmly locked out of the office. Now, I'm sure the other three have different memories of how this all went down, but this is the way I remember all of it. The next morning we were all there waaaaay early. So we're allowed in, and the leader of the camp shook our hands and said "Good Morning Ms. Karen" and greeted each of the others by name. We got to work, successful day. The next morning when we got there, not all of us greeted each other with a handshake. We were again berated and told that if we didn't do it right, don't do it at all. So, you can probably see the pattern. Each time a new lesson was to be learned, and soon we caught on quick. You do it Sullivan's way or not at all.

Well the time came for kids to start showing up. We all moved into camp. Let me tell you, the boys had this A-frame that was a real kind of house right? Well me and the one other girl were given a room in a big hall (I don't know how else to explain it was a meeting building with like six rooms). They converted one of the classrooms into a room for us. And in the bathroom they took out one of the toilets and put in a shower. It was all very weird. Because during the day kids used our bathroom, and we were supposed to somehow keep it clean enough they wouldnt' realize we lived in there? I dunno. It was all a bit weird. Oh! And the female teachers bunked in our rooms and we had to get up at four, and we weren't allowed to wake them up. So we'd keep our pagers (you didn't have cell phones back then) under our pillows so we could be woken up without bothering them. It really was pretty terrible.

We had on Monday this nature preserve about 20 miles away...maybe less. But we had to be there before the kids to have everything ready, then when the kids were loaded on buses we had to race back to camp and get there before the kids did to greet them. It was insanity! I don't know how we did it without getting pulled over. Well, that first Monday went great. All week went great! Mr. Sullivan kept saying how wonderful we all were. The four of us were the greatest ever. We were amazing. This is what he kept telling us. It was great. Only about 20 hours sleep a week, but who cared we were flyin high! Friday we would drive home, and I remember getting the biggest big gulp I could and sucking it down to drink enough that I had to pee so bad I wouldn't be able to fall asleep driving home. There were stretches of road I don't remember driving cuz I was so tired. I would get home and sleep literally for sixteen to twenty hours. I was exhausted...but to me it was worth it.

So week two comes....not so great. Every little thing that seemed wonderful the week before is now terrible. We're getting yelled at for every little thing. I didn't sing well enough, or I didn't talk the right way. It was just this whole week of mistakes. We left feeling dejected. Well I did at least. I felt like I couldn't do anything right. I determined I was going to make things better. Well, this is getting long, so the shorter version (to be followed by updates later)...things got weird from there. I would be pulled aside and told to go tell P to chop the wood faster. So I would go, and P would threaten to kill me with the ax he was holding if I didn't shut up. I always believe he was told I thought I knew better than him. Because then I would be told to go tell M she was doing something wrong, and she would flip out on me. The three other counselors hated me. They didn't dislike me, they HATED me. I remember a conversation with Mr. Sullivan. He pulled me aside and told me they hated me because they could see I was better than them. He told me I was the one who would go on to be a teacher, and I would be amazing, and that I had to deal with the way they treated me. It was terrible. I remember hating them, and them hating me, and Mr. Sullivan along the way showing me the ways that I could learn from their mistakes.

Now, I was young, and so I was happy to see the people I hated making mistakes. It felt so good to know I was better than them. Was I better? Not a better person not at all. I was lead down a path of believing that I was. Looking back, I hate the way things went. Here was my dream, and because I wanted to believe I was better, and listened to someone filling me with lies, I lost my dream job. I still miss camp, and I know two of the three counselors are still heavily involved in camp. After six months of hell, I quit. I was coughing up blood and green crap from not sleeping or eating. I had lost 40 pounds (a blessing) from not having time to eat. I was told that I was a quitter for going to the hospital. So I had enough. I quit. I always look back and wish I could have stuck it out. That I would have let the other three torture me and make me stronger. I wish I had the space to write more details of the experience, and maybe later tonight I will....but it's hard for people to understand if they weren't there.

Camp will forever be a part of me. FOREVER. If you were there, you understand. It was this place where you felt like everyone loved you...until you got into the heart of it. When you got into the heart of things you started to see the cracks. In past years I've reached out through facebook to some of the people who were involved in camp, I even sent this blog posting to one of them in hopes he'll read and see that we both had our hell at camp, and I understand the pain he went through. The pain of the experiences there will be with me always. It was something I LOVED and I let it go. I loved it more than anything I've ever experienced. I even use the stuff from camp in my classroom every year. I want those wonderful memories rubbed off on my students. I've tried to set up a camp experience here in Florida. While this particular blog update may not reach all of you, I know one it will, and I hope he knows he wasn't alone in his feelings about camp.

Song from Camp:
There's a new place that I've come to know. It's off I-90 just on down the road. The sun it shines here almost every day...the wind and rain they just stay away, and it's home...my Waskowitz home. I've got my buddies and my new friends too. They're special people I know just like you. So many faces that I've come to see, and now I've added to my family...