Summer! Camping

By Jane M. Bailey
Summer and camping go together… like love and marriage. Or is it horse and carriage? Ah, fond memories of my first
overnight camping experience. Camp High Rock on Staten Island. Bunk beds, bugs and bug juice, hikes and pranks,
campfires, s’mores, and mail call! On each of the five days (an eternity to an eight-year-old) I’d hear, “Bridget! Linda, Amy, Susan…” I waited, desperately, for “Jane!” The call never came. I sat in my bunk, letterless. When pickup day arrived, I got in the car to the tune of Mom’s chirpy “How was camp?” “Why didn’t you write to
me?” I answered. “Uh, we just live down the hill and camp was only five days,” Mom sheepishly replied. She was clueless to my plight. Mail call, or lack thereof, overshadowed whatever fun had been had. This summer my ten-year-old grandson, Rhys, went to his first overnight camp, a fishing camp on an island in the middle of a lake, for five days. All I remember packing for High Rock was a few shorts and tops, some underwear, a bathing suit, and a toothbrush. It all fit into a small overnight bag. Not so for Mr. Fisherman. The camp provided a full page of
directives for what to bring. Two fishing rods and reels, bait, tackle box, lures (very specific lures), extra line, sleeping bag, pillow, shorts, pants, raingear, toothbrush, and chair. Oh, and snacks! Wait a minute. Chair? Snacks? Is this glamping or camping? For camp drop-off, the car was filled with fishing gear, duffle bag, sleeping bag, pillow and of course a backpack stuffed with snacks. There was barely room for the camper. Upon arrival it
took three of us to get everything to the departure dock. Now multiply that by 26 campers and you get the picture. The kids were happily bragging about what and how many snacks they brought. I was simply thinking, they’ve enough bait to attract a sleuth of bears. The mound of paraphernalia was lumped together on a pontoon boat to be taken to the island camp. It looked just like a barge leaving Staten Island with its famous dump trash to be buried in some top-secret place. I looked at my daughter. “Any chance we’ll get his stuff back?” “Not a chance,” she replied. The campers boarded their assigned boats and we tearfully waved goodbye. Now the role was reversed from the good-ol’ days. There was no mail service on the island, so instead of campers having mail call, it was the families on shore waiting for the daily texts of pictures and news from the counselors. Even on arrival day pictures of kids with fish, big fish!, started coming in. The picture of Rhys showed him holding one poor fish that looked more like bait. Rhys looked as unhappy as the fish. Pictures arrived daily. On day one my daughter noted, “Aren’t those the shorts he wore when we dropped him off?” And day two she said, “Aren’t those the shorts he wore yesterday and the day before?” On day three, she once again questioned, “Aren’t those the shorts he wore yesterday, and the day before, and the day before that? Mom, do you think this means he also hasn’t changed his…” “Underwear?” I finished for her. “Yes, I think that’s what this means.” But that’s the day, his eleventh birthday, a picture arrived of Rhys happily holding a 6.23-pound largemouth bass. Clearly the lucky shorts worked their magic. Pick-up day arrived and the campers were already back on shore sitting with their gear. We could smell our way from car to the dockside mounds of stuff. There was Rhys, one sock on, one sock off. The shorts had finally been changed, though the
bathing suit he was wearing did not look familiar. That didn’t matter as much as the smile he wore. “I won the trophy! We celebrated and gathered his things, while taking inventory. Sleeping bag case, lost. Water shoes, lost. Chair, lost. Pillowcase, lost. Pillow, only fit for the dumpster on our way to the car. On the way home I reminisced about my camping experience and asked him about camp songs, None. Pranks? Nope. Hikes? Not a one. S’mores? No need. “So did you have toilets?” “Just an outhouse. And we had to use leaves.” This happy camper didn’t
need clothes, or toilet paper. Or even mail call. Just some fish please. Jane Bailey enjoys living in Litchfield and writing about the simple things in life. For more of her work, see www.JaneMBailey.com.