Throwback Thursday: Summer Camp Days

For eleven years of my young life, I had the opportunity to attend-and later work at-Camp Seafarer in Arapahoe, North Carolina.  It's "more than a vacation," as the promotional videos and booklets claim; it's a place where dancing and singing on the tables at meals is normal, everything from lost teeth to high personal achievement is celebrated, and the biggest social event each week is the all-camp dance with the boys' camp down the street.  It's the kind of place where mothers (like mine) send their daughters years after they attended themselves, campers attend for as few as one to as many as sixteen summers, and a place that brings life and double the population to a little ole' town on the coast of North Carolina.

With the first week of the summer session kicked into full gear this past Sunday, I was reminded that it had been three years since I drove through the gates for the last time headed home after what was the best summer of my life (at the time) and my last at camp.  Having spent plenty of time on both sides of the camp experience (camper and counselor), I thought to myself that it would make an interesting #ThrowbackThursday to reminisce on some of my greatest memories/lessons from my summer camp days.

• Camp is magical.  Coming from an age where technology is omnipresent, it is remarkable to see what kids can do when they are in an atmosphere without phones or computers.  The sole foundation of camp is building relationships amongst campers and between campers and staff members.  Relationships are formed on the basis of mutual contact, togetherness, living proximity and mutual interest.  As a camper, I made my best friends by participating in activities with them and they are still some of my best friends today even if we only saw each other for a few weeks each year.

• If you're ever feeling down on yourself or life, talk to a child.  I 100% believe in this, and it is part of the reason why I want to go into a profession working with kids.  Living in close quarters with little people (as my co-counselors and I called them) could be challenging sometimes, but it always made my day to talk to them.  The way they get so excited about the smallest things or the simple ways they can connect with each other is cute to watch and even more inspiring to see happen right in front of you.  Not to mention, they absolutely adore anybody who is taller than them and willing to give them a piggyback ride.  I still have some of the cute notes my campers wrote to me during the summers I worked at camp.

• Celebrate the littlest things.  One of my favorite parts about camp was going to the mess hall each day.  Not because of the food (then again...food...yum), but because of the excitement that would be cabins standing on their benches and screaming about something.  Usually it was about an achievement like "Cabin 4 is 100% Opti Sailor!" or "Cabin 13 is 100% Alfa!" but sometimes it would be cheering for a lost tooth or a cabinmate's birthday.  Even more fun would be the once-a-meal food contest.  Someone would think that they had the longest french fry, largest carrot wedge, smallest grape, cleanest chicken bone or whatever.  The kids would get so excited about those little contests and celebrations that I started to celebrate my own little successes in life, sometimes as small as getting out of bed in the morning (lol) or as big as doing well on a test.  Because of camp, I learned that every moment is precious so we must celebrate as much as we can.

• Traditions are special.  For as long as camp has been in session, traditions have been set in place for us to follow each summer: sailor shirts at fried chicken lunch on Sunday, bugles instead of alarm clocks, hour long rest periods each day (hallelujah for nap time), pep rallies in the morning, Sunday morning lazy breakfasts, fried shrimp and hush puppies on Long Cruise, and more.  These traditions allowed me to make a special connection with my mom, who attended camp before I did, as well as with my campers, some of whom still attend Seafarer to this day.  These traditions are what makes camp "camp," and is part of the reason campers continue to return each summer.  Some of my favorite camp memories revolve around these traditions, and I am forever grateful to have had the opportunity to live and experience them.

• Every end is a new beginning.  Each 4-week session concludes with what is called the candlelight ceremony.  It is when the camp gathers together in the mess hall for the last time each summer, to sing and really reflect on what the session means to them.  Usually (what is supposed to be) silence is drowned out by the tears of campers who realize the end is near and it is time to go home, but it is an incredibly meaningful experience.  Candlelight celebrates the end of a session as everyone prepares to go back to the world of home, school, extracurricular activities and such.  It's a beautiful but bittersweet atmosphere, but we always know that camp will be a part of us.  I was fortunate to end my last candlelight with an outstanding honor cabin and felt comfortable leaving camp, even if I didn't know when or if I would come back.  Three years out now I still miss it as always, but I am grateful for the foundation it gave me in my life as I continue to move on and start a new chapter.      

For more information about Camp Seafarer, you can visit their website here.