ani

Camp, Alaska, and Amazingness
2006-08-16 @ 10:24 p.m.

So I just came home from camp. I'll try to write a little but I know I won't be able to even come close to describing everything that happened. Or at least I'll fail in portraying how it all went down. I don't think there are enough words in world for that. Also, I haven't slept in about 36 hours so I'm pretty tired.
The people were simply amazing. The whole area is beautiful. The camp directors were incredible. Their whole philosophy is about creating a safe space to just be yourself and they succeeded. I learned so much about who I am and what I need. I feel like this summer was essential to becoming someone I really like. I really don't even know how to begin.
Precamp training was so intense. We learned about conflict resolution and setting girls up for success. We danced in the basement of the dining hall and watched the sun set at 11:30 every night. We played the part of camper and we played the part of counselor. I met a moose while I was on a hike. I watched a bald eagle fly right over my head. I met people from all over the world. At the end of it all I found out my first staff partner would be NaNa, from Thailand.
After an awful and dramatic first time off, our first campers came. NaNa and I had a group of five and six year olds. I dealt with so many wet beds and clothes in those first three days I was about ready to quit. The second group of campers came the day after the first left. We had fourth and fifth graders this time though there were much fewer bed wetting incidents. The controlling and dramatic girl made other campers uncomfortable and I had no idea how to deal with it. They left me feeling even more crushed than I had before.
I became more motivated with our first family camp coming in after a break in which I didn't go anywhere. It was so much easier to deal with children when I wasn't actually responsible for them. I went into a new week with a new partner, Huckelberry, and one girl cried every single day. We learned what some children will do for attention and began to ignore. Eventually, she stopped and minor dramas came up. Overall though, it was a good group. We sent one girl home with the rudest father I have ever encountered and the others followed. The next few days were spent fixing up camp some and practicing Open Space Technology. After taking out canoes to see if they would sink or not (all but two did) and hauling wood from place to place, I learned the meaning of life.
Open space is this great philosophy. It has four basic principles.
1. Whatever happens is the only thing that could happen
2. Whoever comes are the right people
3. Whenever it starts it starts
4. Whenever it's over it's over
It's also about following your passions and staying someplace only as long as it holds your attention. We basically all came up with a bunch of different topics that we wanted to learn about like dealing with grieving kids or learning about the garden we had on our property or any number of other things. It was so great to be able to participate in something like that and I've decided to try to build my life off of the four principles mentioned above.
In that time was Huck's 21st birthday so there was much jubilation and a cake made to look like a naked women. There was a bike ride and dancing involved too. We made ice cream (because it was also the fourth of july) and we watched Whale Rider. And our assistant director quit. That part sucked.
Anyway, we were given an extra day off because basically we rock. Me, Huck, Tigger, and Tator rented a car and went down to Seward. Dinner was eaten and the movie Cars was seen. A hostel owned by a campers parents was stayed at. My car left the next day and went to Anchorage. I inherited Hucks fake ID since hers was now valid and bars were gone in to and drinks drank. After a revealing game of never have I ever and a failed attempt to learn salsa dancing, we returned to the anchorage hostel with a lot of alcohol. It was pretty much a great break.
Next was an incredibly difficult two weeks. I worked with Tigger this time and we had a lot of girls with a lot of problems. There was the girl who peed everywhere. Her bed. The tent. The floor of the bathroom. Not surprisingly, her parents forgot to pick her up at the end of the week......Luckily she was taken off our hands until they came though. The next week was good and involved me learning tons of cats cradle tricks and a lot of me getting my hair done by nine year olds. The next break was hiking in Hatchers Pass and an awful night in Anchorage.
Another family camp followed. That was pretty cool. I earned my small craft safety certification and decided that it is necessary for me to take a semester off at some point before I finish college. The next week I worked with Blaze. We had a drama group and I had a great week despite Blaze being pretty down mentally and physically. We worked on original choreography and singing of Under the Sea. The girls got really into it and it made me feel so good that something I planned actually worked. There was however one girl who threatened to kill herself a few times. Yeah. At ten years old. It was pretty bad but she talked to the director a few times and it ended up being ok. The next break we split into two groups, a white water rafting group and a glacier hiking group. I hiked the glacier. It was amazing. We went to a restaurant and ate. A birthday party was arranged for Tiggers 20th and it was awesome. It was, however, tainted by the fact that two staff had to leave to get back to real jobs. After that emotional blow, we returned for the last two weeks of camp.
OK, a little background. There was low enrollment in camp this summer so though 16 counselors were hired, only 14 were necessary. There was, however, a shortage in kitchen staff. This meant that every week and different counselor pair took a turn in the kitchen. I had not yet had my turn and was feeling really stressed out by kids though and I ended up asking the director for my turn so she put me in there. I loved it except for the one day that something just went horribly wrong and I got really frustrated with the other person in the kitchen with me. I stayed in the kitchen the second week too as per my own request and that was how I ended camp. These past few days have been spent cleaning and being incredibly emotional. I am home now and it feels weird. I need to kind of reset myself and be prepared not to fall into a lot of the traps that I did last year. I think I can do it. After this summer I feel like I can do anything.