From The Past: May 28, 2004

Summer Camp: To some people these two words immediately bring back happy memories; they give me the shivers.

My first summer camp experience was wonderful. It was called 4-H camp. We learned some new songs, went hiking through the woods, boating, swimming, put on skits for one another, had dances, etc. I don’t remember the year, but it was the summer that the song Morning Train sang by Sheena Easton was popular. It was a fun filled week and I was sorry that I had to return home so soon.

Once I did return home, I told mom about everything we did, in detail. She seemed impressed until I told her about the shower situation. The shower area was really a shower room. Lined up on two walls were shower heads. There were two, more private areas that had curtains. This is where I showered. Anyway, I told mom about these twin girls who were taking pictures in the shower. They told everyone, “Our dad says that if we take the pictures, he’ll develop them for us.” You can imagine the look on my mother’s face when I told her that. I made sure that I wasn’t in any pictures, but some of those girls were posing and others were screaming because they didn’t want pictures taken. There’s no telling whatever happened to those pictures or the twin girls for that matter.

I think mom made up her mind right then and there that I was never going back to 4-H camp. I had the time of my life that summer, but I would never be returning because of the shower incident.

My second camp experience came when I was in the sixth grade. I’m pretty sure that I had just finished sixth grade and upon returning to school would be in the seventh grade. I have to tell you something about myself right here. I was a big girl. I don’t believe that I was fat; I just blossomed early. I started wearing a bra in the third grade and my menses happened when I was in the fifth grade. I was bigger all over than the other girls. When I was in sixth grade, I easily passed for someone in 8th or 9th grade.

With that said, mom wanted me to attend the church’s summer camp for a week. I did not want to go. I distinctly remember that. Maybe I had a premonition of what was to come. I was in a cabin with about six other girls that were all younger than me and the size of fourth graders and here I was looking like I was their counselor or something. I have the pictures to prove this. As a matter of fact, I still get embarrassed when I see those pictures because I was so much bigger. There wasn’t one girl in my cabin that was my age.

There was no swimming pool either. We had been told beforehand that there was a lake that we could swim in. At the time, this sounded terrible as I was not an expert swimmer. I still depended on an edge to hold on to and knowing exactly how deep it was going to be. I shouldn’t have worried because we were never allowed to go to the lake to swim anyway. I don’t remember the reason given. It was just another thing to add to the ever-growing list of things I hated about that place.

I remember when I first got there, I was thirsty. I had been in a car for over an hour and it seemed like it was over one hundred degrees. I asked the guy checking off names if I could have some water. He informed me, not too nicely either, that a human could go several days without a drink. I remember thinking to myself, “You’ve got to be kidding me.” I didn’t want to be here and now I couldn’t even have a drink?!

The whole place was a joke. There were no activities planned. They would run out of things for us to do and then we would have to play Duck-Duck-Goose (that’s REAL fun for a sixth grader). The only structured activity was church. Ah yes, at church camp, you go to church. It was a little white building with no air conditioning and wooden benches – just like Little House on the Prairie days. We would sit in there for hours it seemed and sweat the sin right out of us. It was not a good thing. I couldn’t wait to get back home and tell mom what a horrible time I had had. I honestly don’t remember what her reaction was. She probably said that I never had to go back; I really don’t remember.

Jump to just a few years ago. Mom and dad thought it would be a good experience for Andrew to go to summer camp. They were willing to pay and Andrew was excited. I knew that he wouldn’t like it, but it’s better to keep your mouth shut sometimes. Andrew spent one night at camp and then his Papaw went and picked him up and brought him back home. He said that it was just too hot and he couldn’t handle the bugs. I could have saved them a lot of money, but I didn’t want to shatter their expectations.

This year we are at a new church that goes to a different church camp (Lord, I hope it’s a different church camp). They’ve asked me several times if Ashley was going and then got very disappointed when I said NO and looked at them like they were crazy. First of all, Ashley doesn’t have any desire to go. Her worst nightmare is sweating AT ALL. The child hates to sweat. And secondly, she’s only seven years old! They actually thought that I would send my seven-year-old to camp? No, never, nada. It’s not happening people.

It may sound as if I blame my mom for making me go to a bad camp. I blamed her at the time, but now I see that I would have done the same thing in her situation. The naked picture thing freaked her out, so she says to herself that next time it will be a church camp. She had no way of knowing how horrible it was going to be.

My decision for Ashley won’t change. I’m sure there are some great camps out there, but if she doesn’t want to go, then I’m not forcing her or talking her into it.