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January 16, 2004
While the children are away...
For parents, camp season is work – shopping, visiting and
worrying.
ERICA RAUZIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
If I told you about the year that two of my three children went
to camp, you'd think I had a pretty lazy summer. That would certainly
be your impression if you knew that kid number three, the oldest,
age 17, managed her own summer at her grandparents' house. I should
have felt footloose and fancy-free.
Well, I felt pretty free about the oldest. We talked constantly.
I'm in and out of Grandma-town often, and she was fine. But actually,
I stayed very busy with the two who were at camp. They were out
of sight, indeed, but they were not out of mind.
First, there was the mail. I watched the mailbox with intensity,
the fervor of a high school senior waiting to hear from Harvard.
On the flip side, I kept the post office busy. I sent daily (or
nearly daily) letters, often padded with small goodies. I sent packages
weekly. This required some shopping, planning and shlepping.
The children were glad to get practical things in their packages.
They did appreciate the batteries and the extra film. But, to them,
the reason for the packages is the junk food and candy. So far,
I have refused to mail actual bottles of soda, but gum, chocolates,
sour candies and tubes of chips – all kosher, of course –
have all found their way into the mail. This means that homecoming
will be a rude awakening. At home, we never have sour candy because
it is extra horrible for teeth. At home, we rarely have gum, because
I can't stand the look or sound of it. The rule at home is that
they can have gum only when they are alone in their rooms, or during
takeoffs and landings.
Every now and then, the kids send letters with requests that take
some extra effort: a magnetic dartboard, a new pillow, nails and
a hammer, and off I go questing to the store again.
Camp visiting days also occupied our time that summer. Our daughter's
camp simply closed for three days between the first and second summer
sessions, and because it is near the aforementioned grandparents'
home, we all went there for a swell reunion. Our son's camp, in
the middle of nowhere New England, had a 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
visiting day for which we happily travelled a full day before and
a full day after.
I have been busy ever since his visiting day sending him requested
items and replaying the whole day in my head. My knees are replaying
it, too, because we spent the day following the schedule of a 10-year-old
at sports camp. We went to watch him play basketball, soccer and
roller hockey. We watched him ride a mountain bike, climb a rock
wall and swim in a freezing lake.
I don't know how he had the energy to participate in all the jumping,
running, kicking, swimming, skating and climbing – just getting
to each activity wore me out. We also discovered an interesting
geological paradox: at this camp, everything was uphill. Nothing
was downhill, even when we were returning from uphill locations,
the path was still uphill.
You've heard of global warming; this uphill phenom is due to progressive
global tilting, I'm sure of it. My husband and I discovered a similar
phenomenon camping this year, the earth is not only getting warmer,
it is getting firmer – just try sleeping on it, and you'll
agree that we are also experiencing global hardening.
We also discovered that it takes a fair amount of parental attention
to solve problems that are happening (or that seem to be happening)
at camp. We had to be sure our allergic daughter got her shots.
We had to follow up after visiting day to ascertain that the unkind
bully on our son's sports team got some extra, shall we call it,
adult focus. It is difficult to get even the most willing camp unit
head on the telephone: such people are busy running around 500 acres
worth of ball fields and the secretaries are all 15-year-olds, and
nobody at camp, as far as I could tell, carries a cellphone.
In the city, we carry cellphones when we are going to be one house
away, down the street. At camp, they apparently have no way to fetch
someone who is in the back 40 acres except to run there, or to relay
messages through a stream of little boys (akin to playing telephone,
but less reliable).
I guess in a dire emergency, they'd take the lone golf cart, but
for routine messages, the slip of paper went in their office box
and you waited. This was probably the right approach. These folks
are at camp to do stuff with kids, not to pat anxious parents into
place. However, if you are not home when the call back finally comes,
you wait another 24 hours until the box gets checked again.
I have some certainty that while I was waiting, fretting and pacing,
doing my parent number, my children were swimming, running, hitting
tennis balls and shooting baskets. Oblivious, as well they should
have been, to how busy I was while they were at camp.
Erica Rauzin is a freelance writer living in Florida.
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