Tuesday, July 19, 2011

The Summer of 2011

is quickly passing.  Although everyday at camp seems like 4 or 5 days I am realizing that the end of camp is about as close as the beginning.  So far it has been a great combination of long hours of work that is much harder than I imagined and an environment of wonderful people, love and caring and sharing and almost enough alone time.

The camp is truly a magical place that reminds me every day of what Hogwarts must be like.  Kids are allowed to escape and be themselves no matter if that means wearing your shorts pulled up almost to your boobies or breaking your arm because you jumped out of a swing that was going just a touch too high.  Counselors are encouraged to make fools of themselves which makes fitting in for me quite easy.  The other night I got to go on an after-dinner treasure hunt with the Brookside Unit which is the set of tents and cabins filled with 9 and 10 year olds.  It was explained to the boys that the point of the hunt was to get the unit to work as a unit and that we were going to walk as a team not run as a bunch of individuals after each clue was read and figured out.  It took about 3 clues for the counselors to figure out that while the ears of 9 and 10 year old boys hear walk, and their brains understand walk, and they know they are supposed to walk it is just impossible for the legs to not run as fast as possible (team? what team?) to the next clue.  Because, well there is no because, that's just the way it is.  Has been since 1922 when the camp started and will be in 2022 when the camp will be 100 but the boys of Brookside will still be 9 and 10.

We served 750 grilled cheese sandwiches yesterday with 25 gallons of homemade tomato soup.

Wednesday night is the final game of the summer baseball tournament and the kitchen is responsible for a hot dog and hamburger bbq.  It should be great fun and very tiring and we'll get up the next day and do it all over again.

4 Things I won't miss hearing.
1. What's for lunch today?  (What do you care kid you're not going anywhere.)
2. Do you have any apples?  Not the green ones, I like red.  (No kid, today's fruit are bananas.)
3. The upper dining room milk machine is empty.  (Try the one in the lower dining room kid.)
4. What's for lunch today? (You're the 217th person to ask me that today.  You win a set of hands around your wind pipe.  Just kidding, now get out of here kid.)

I had a day off today and had a great motorcycle ride over to Middlebury and back.  Got a haircut at Bud's where haircuts only cost $12 and only take 5 minutes.  When you have as little hair as I do there's little sense in getting fancy.  Got to see Erin (yea!) and have lunch at Mister Ups and catch up.

On the ride back I took the back roads over Bethel Mountain, through Randolph, up and over to East Randolph, up and over to Chelsea, up and over to Vershire, Ghost Green, South Corinth and finally to Bradford and Colatina's Pizza.  Where I now sit enjoying open mike night, Switchback beer, a 12" sausage and mushroom pizza, the Red Sox playing the Orioles and internet access.

The smell of fresh cut was so sweet coming down through some of the nicest hit 'em hard freshly paved curves I've been on in awhile.  My oh my.  Clover 'bout knocked me off my bike.

Well I best go.  The Sox are down 3-zip and I've got to figure out what to serve for lunch tomorrow.  And suggest that Jackson wear his shorts just a little lower.  A 10 year old boy's boobies need to breathe.

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