This has really been the week for filling in wherever needed! I love my role as a camp director, able to be all over camp seeing what’s going on and also stepping in different places. This week alone I filled in for our kitchen manager, for Rambo for morning Lifeline, for Zoom (camp’s photographer), and today I spent the entire day teaching horseback riding in place of an instructor who wasn’t feeling well. You never run out of something to do around here, and pretty much all of it is fun!
Yesterday I was pondering one of the best activities at camp- porch sitting- as I was sitting on the porch with a bunch of campers around. The rocking chairs are often left facing each other, in a circle, or dragged over to other places on the porch when people get up to go to the next thing. I love seeing that because it means community has been happening! I wish there was a way to let everyone see it. Imagine your kid, at any age, sitting alongside other kids, counselors, adults (directors and nurses), maybe making a friendship bracelet, talking about everything under the sun. Real engagement is happening because no one has a phone or tablet.
Sometimes a few get up from the rocking chairs to play a game of four square together, or to bounce a ball while they keep on talking. Sometimes there’s a camper or two reading a book, in the middle of others, sociable, but doing their own thing. Campers choose “outdoor lodge,” as we call it, for their free skill period at the end of the day for the community it provides. I think of my younger days, before every person had a glowing rectangle with the individual entertainment and ability to zone out that comes with it. My own kids have commented when people their age do engage in conversation, it often fizzles out because in a quiet (possibly awkward) moment of silence, everyone in the group defaults to their phones.
We pray daily that the Lord’s work is done here and that kids go home different in the best possible ways. I hope they’ll think back to porch sitting at camp, love the time they spent rocking and talking, and do it at home with their family and friends!