Camp Green Lane Blog Post, August 11th

All the bags are laying outside the cabins.

Yep. This is that blog.

Not everything is packed yet; tonight is Cabaret, and I know there are special outfits that have been hanging in plastic all summer just for this evening. Cabaret is a dinner-dance event that’s held on the second-to-last night of the summer every year.

For decades, the Dining Hall has been rearranged for a buffet-style feast of party foods. The younger boys go crazy for the 2-liter bottles of soda on each table. The Greeks have been secretly working on the decorations for tonight all summer, so it’s a big night for many reasons.

It’s also our last dance of the summer. Tonight’s dance on BB1 is always the best dance party of the summer. I have lasting memories of being out there, dancing in the rain. No matter what the weather is (tonight is going to be gorgeous) the Cabaret Dance is your last chance to circle up with your best friends and dance and laugh and just be.

Tomorrow we have some special activities like CGL Idol and the Survivor Sing and we close the summer with Banquet and Firefly tomorrow night.

So this is good-bye for me.

Today was the last time this summer I went to Free Swim, the last time I came back to the cabin, and for this summer, it’s the last blog I’ll write.

It’s been a total pleasure to reflect on each camping day during Shower Hour with you. Thank you for all the great comments this summer, thanks for all the notes, the contributions, but most of all, thanks for sharing your kids with us!

Last night for Awards Night, I jotted down a few moments from the summer, and wound up filling 2 notebook pages of highlights from an incredible summer.

Between all of us, there were a million memories made here this summer. We carried on old traditions. We started new ones. We played. We competed. We beat Nock. We burned rope. Ate pudding and melon. We were Amazing. We overcame fears. We grew. We learned. We swam. We ran. We rode bikes. We jumped in the lake. We played pranks. We cheered. We laughed. We cried. And we laughed again.

We did it all here in a place that, if it wasn’t before, is now someone’s new Happy Place.

Camp is a happy place for a lot of people for a lot of reasons, as you’ve read all summer. Ultimately, camp is a happy place for us because of the opportunities it gives us to discover new friends, do amazing things, and discover exciting things within ourselves.

That should not end when we cross to the other side of the arches.

Every summer, my hope is that when all of our children return home and inevitably slip back into routines—even the ones that drive us crazy—that they do it with the confidence, care and compassion that they do things with here at camp. That they attack life with the same energy they run to BB1 for Color War or the Dome for Midnight Madness: full of confidence and excitement. And with a friend’s hand in theirs.

Camp makes you stronger. It makes you more independent. It teaches you to solve problems. To fix things when they break. It teaches you how to live with other people, how to compromise and how to show compassion. Camp can make you tough, but it can also teach you what heart and determination and good sportsmanship look like, too.

The world can always use more of that.

So my hope is for all these little people to bring a little piece of camp home with them.

And to make whatever place they’re in a happy place, too.

Get ready. We’re coming home.