Thursday, July 31, 2014

This is the true life adventure of kids at summer camp...

Betsy is at camp. If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram or, you know, life, you know this. I miss her like crazy. So does Felicity. And Nicholas. It's like this part of our hearts is missing. It has been the longest week ever. EVER.

All of this has me reminiscing about summer camp. Which is slightly hard for me to do, because I only ever went to camp one time. I went to sixth grade camp, which is kind of mandatory. And my partner-the person who signs up to be your buddy the whole week-bailed and did not come. So, while there are a few memories of the week that I look upon fondly, they are few and far between. I tried my best-I hiked, I tried strange foods, I even proved somewhat decent at archery. But it was a long week. In which I just mostly wanted to go home.

I'm a homebody. Always have been, likely always will be. I love being at home, curled up with a good book. That is my idea of heaven. Nothing about camp really appeals to me-sports, crafts, being outside. None of it.

Betsy eats all that stuff up, so no doubt she's had a fabulous week. She's so much like April. April loved camp so much that she basically lived there all summer, first as a camper and then as a counselor.

So, anyway, there isn't a whole lot to reminisce over. I'm doing my best to keep the movie Sleep Away Camp out of my mind. It is literally the scariest movie I've ever seen. I saw it at 12, at my best friend's house, and the damage done to my psyche was irreparable. (I watched it again as an adult, and I must say that it is a deep and amazing film for basically being a slasher film, an allegory for coming into one's sexuality and not knowing how to handle it and that it has imprinted my life in so many ways that I really can't count them all.) But still-SCARY. Terrifying.

So, instead of dwelling on that bit of gore that changed my life, we shall move onto the only camp experience that has nothing but happiness associated with it. Bug Juice. Yes, back in old 1997, when I was a senior in high school and reality shows were not really a genre outside of the Real World and Road Rules, Disney aired a show about the true life adventures of kids at summer camp. Oh, the joy. This is what camp should be. Nothing but kids struggling with cliques and crushes and figuring out who they are at 14. This I could embrace. Summer camp from the comfort of my couch.

Bug Juice makes me want to go to camp. To Camp Waziyatah, specifically. I looked it up tonight-it costs almost $2000 per week. This is helpful information. Clearly these kids are rich, rich, rich. But still-they are kids who are in that early teenagehood that I had so recently shed. Being 14 was still fresh in my mind. 14 was really hard for me. When my hormones began to come into play, I was so naive and dumb and I had basically no outlet at all for any of them, so I just became intensely depressed. The idea that being at camp, the idea that you could somehow meet other kids, kids who did not just know you as the nerdy geek who had become somewhat a gothic weirdo-it appealed to me at a deep level.

I most closely resemble Megan, who seems nerdy and kind of a loner. But she works it all out and fits in and has the happy ending that everyone in this show basically has.

So, anyway, that's the closest I can get to camp. This TV show about camp from when I was 18. It's not too shocking, I'm sure, from a girl who lives next door to her parents still. Who still would so much rather read a book about camp than actually go. But this week I'm so lucky. Because Betsy is coming home and she will be able to tell me all about her camp experience. And I'll be so proud. Because even though I'm always going to be that nerdy girl, I'm raising some amazingly cool (albeit nerdy, because I'm still me) girls.