Camp Champions Blog

Yesterday, I told you about Man Cave and Friendship Circle.  Today, Susie Ma’am pulled me aside and shared some conversations about a particularly fun Friendship Circle.

One of the silly traditions that we have at camp is the Steve-Sir-double-thumbs-up.

For the last several days, Susie Ma’am and I have been enjoying one of our favorite parts of camp: Friendship Circle and Man Cave.

Friendship Circle (for girls) and Man Cave (for boys) is our effort to spend at least one hour with every cabin at camp.  We schedule the cabins to come to our house, sit together and just talk.

Susie Ma’am is full of fun ideas.

Hers was the mastermind behind Friendship Circle.  I will write more about this tradition soon, so I will give a short description here.  Friendship Circle is when a cabin comes to our house for a treat and one-on-one time with Susie Ma’am for an hour.  In this way, she gets time with every girl.  After seeing this great success, the boys’ side added Man Cave (which is the same thing with the boys cabins and me).

I love the energy of this term so far.

We had a wonderful full day.  As a result, I am not quite sure what to share with you.

I know that I said that I was through writing, but I had to share some last words with you.

I think they might be distorting the time!

We are truly in the home stretch.

Starting several years ago, I started to conduct a survey with my oldest campers.   Here are the questions.   I ask all of them in a row without getting any responses.  I then ask them to answer using their fingers.

• How long does the first week of camp feel like?
• How long does the second week of camp feel like?
• How long does the final week of camp feel like?

I have asked this at least a dozen times and the results are remarkably consistent.  The first week feels like 7-10 days, the second 5-7, the final one 1-3 days.

I find this intriguing.  This is not the difference between a week when you are 8 and a week when you are 40.  We all know that time seems to go faster as we age, but should it change so much over 21 days?

By the way, I am fully aware that time operates differently on the parent side.  Every week seems to take the same amount of time.  For our first time parents, I suspect that each week felt like a month.  [Note: knowing this makes us admire your willingness to give your child a camp experience.  It is not easy on parents, but it is wonderful for your children.  Ultimately, so much of good parenting is making sacrifices for your child.  This disparity of time perception is one such example.]

As long as I am making odd observations, here is another one.

People get louder when it rains.  We got another 45 minute cloudburst right before dinner that charged up the campers.  I think it starts when they are attempting to talk over the sound of rain on roofs, but it continues outside and even grows. When we told them they would get cake, they erupted again.  The “Attitude Checks” were as loud as I have ever heard (a call-and-response competition between the girls and boys to see who is feeling better).  When we announced the winner of the Trojan Spartan games (Spartans) in the Fillin Station, it was as loud as a rock concert.

With the rain, we cancelled Torchlight tonight and went straight to the Pajama Dance.  Once again, the energy level was tremendous.

You will be arriving in a couple of days [translation – 12 hours camp time, 7 days mom-time] and we are committing to cram as much friendship and togetherness into the remaining time.

Steve Sir