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July
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- Lenape seesaw
- a day inside this miracle
- another trustee visits
- the graceful new counselor
- Geronimo - in action
- session 3 faces
- leadership meeting views
- Blum Center plans now available!
- stars of the 00's return
- what CITs look like after an activity with Pokey-T...
- Checking out from session 2
- The Tilles/Nathanson/Shapiro nexus
- Debbie Reich
- Rock me, Wawa
- what Tacoma says on the last day of the session
- listen to the voices of Susky cabin 49
- observers
- Olympics redux
- Turrell Way
- 1909
- A team
- Susky!
- Olympics, behind the scenes
- trustee's happy grandchild at the Farm
- Olympic Day lunch (wave your flag)
- they made the 2014 Olympics possible
- Mikia Eatman visits
- Olympics!
- High Falls
- Devil's Hole and Brother's Hole
- grandmother day
- now Hemlock
- demonstrating what not to do
- flyfishing cottage
- is the sky here blue enough?
- when years later you run into a person you knew wh...
- banana sandwich, of course
- two unrelated Schneiders are back
- Morris
- Pokey-Totem is back from their overnight
- they will run the place in a few years
- pre-pre-Olympics hysteria
- Clara wins a Bud Cox shirt
- themed Challenge Night: 1980s workout look; 1960s ...
- late night at Sequoia
- K.C. is back, volunteering for a week!
- she wins a Challenge Night t-shirt
- MAC folk
- CITs: away they go
- two Toys
- photos from the last day of session 1
- Jon Cryer and his mom, Lalani
- Windsong
- CITs prepare for their long hiking trip
- first-day activity: untie the knot of the group
- Outpost will make a CQ fire, no matter the weather
- Biscuit Creek flowin' fast
- Sacker back
- trustworthy trustee help
- Brock/Kelcourse - back again
- Family Camp memories
- Simon Says
- Geron is back
- Zabriskie redux
- more on the triumphant return of Tucker/Gordon
- happy staff at the close of first session
- another alumna sends her child to camp
- the Schechters, a Frost Valley family
- Bud Cox: "Lion Hunt" once more
- the man surveys the scene
- counselor and camper reunion
- cool Pokey-Totem cats
- an extra pair of hands for the Lakota staff
- Moira Poe visiting
- What do you do if you are a CIT and waiting for ac...
- A.'s performance: affection flowing both ways
- hoopla: "The Hill"
- theme day in ascendency
- distance from Frost Valley is no obstacle
- 2014 Challenge Night t-shirt
- July 6th fireworks!
- what happens when people just like each other
- son of former camper and staffer
- Rick Kaskel on the absence of Fenn Putman
- self-image in this valley
- contorted and proud of it
- Forest cabin
- technology basket: put your cell phones here
- dear camp friends
- a whole village of painted staff
- another Zabriskie
- counselor outfit match
- Challenge Night look-alikes
- The Red Apple Rest: rest in peace
- what kids say (another installment)
- counselors are the kind of people willing to be pa...
- the A Team ready to go on the second morning of camp
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July
(97)
summer camp blog
about Al
why do this?
It seemed time to gather together photos and recordings. I'd always hesitated because I didn't want to imply that my own take was definitive. The blog--the medium of the blog--seems the right combination of diary-like subjectivity (blog readers simply know this is the blogger talking) and a communal forum for various perspectives and multiple stories.
Castle depicted in old postcard
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new at my blog
Wawayanda chapel in early July
Old Wawayanda
When I die let my ashes
flow down Biscuit River,
let 'em roll on in water
the color of sky.
I'll be halfway to heaven
at a New Wawayanda,
saying "Wawayanda spirit
it never did die."
flow down Biscuit River,
let 'em roll on in water
the color of sky.
I'll be halfway to heaven
at a New Wawayanda,
saying "Wawayanda spirit
it never did die."
in memoriam alumni tree
planted at September 2006 reunion
links
sunset at Friendship House
Al's hand-motion antics at opening campfire
Frost Valley
is a place where good things happen when people pay attention to each other. There’s endless beauty here - the high meadows, blankets of evergreens, and pristine brook trails – and you can meet nature in all its forms. But more than that, it’s a place where our ties to friends and family are strengthened. When a community of people came to the Catskills to build Frost Valley, they had in mind a place where you can sit next to someone you think you know, and then really get to know them. It also happens to be where the everyday light and shadow is enough to inspire artists; where American fly-fishing was born; and where today, a quarter million acres of green forests still remain “forever wild.” At Frost Valley, where we are does have an effect on how we treat each other. Here, a family can relearn what “family style” means as they share a meal together. The rose-gray river stones in the hearths and chimneys around camp reflect the colors of nearby Biscuit Creek and pull you into the surroundings. If you need more reasons why it’s so special here, we encourage you to explore citizen science activities during every season. But you don’t have to, because you might have more fun just learning silly camp songs. And by the end of your stay, when you your family and newly found friends are composting like pros together, everyone becomes richer, including next year’s butterfly garden.
after lunch, inevitably Dave King
...and if I could transport myself
not just back to this place, but to a certain moment in my personal history here, it would perhaps be:
end of lunch on any July day in 1968, and Dave King (our camp director) walks to the center of the dining hall, without microphone, and without introduction of any kind begins to lead one of the 25 or so camp songs we sang in those days. He is the maestro, waving one arm to the rhythm we are to follow and with the other arm, at turns, directing us to sing quietly or loudly or pointing toward some one camper who isn't singing or (rarely) is talking. And it's "Young Folks Old Folks" or "Zum Gali Gali" or "Deep and Wide" and I look down to the end of the table at my counselor and he's singing too, no hesitation, not too old for this, totally entranced and I myself turn my gaze back toward Dave....
Okay, I ache for that. Not being young again, not quite. More like being momentarily again part of such harmony.
end of lunch on any July day in 1968, and Dave King (our camp director) walks to the center of the dining hall, without microphone, and without introduction of any kind begins to lead one of the 25 or so camp songs we sang in those days. He is the maestro, waving one arm to the rhythm we are to follow and with the other arm, at turns, directing us to sing quietly or loudly or pointing toward some one camper who isn't singing or (rarely) is talking. And it's "Young Folks Old Folks" or "Zum Gali Gali" or "Deep and Wide" and I look down to the end of the table at my counselor and he's singing too, no hesitation, not too old for this, totally entranced and I myself turn my gaze back toward Dave....
Okay, I ache for that. Not being young again, not quite. More like being momentarily again part of such harmony.
save Frost Valley's Monarchs
ache
"The blog is awesome - I just went back through the whole thing again. I'll say this without shame - I ache for Frost Valley. I spend a lot of time and cerebral metabolism trying to devise a way I can get back up there for a session...."
waterfront 1961
looking in the direction of Wildcat Mtn. and the boathouse (which is off to the left)
definition of "Village Chief"
Village Chief \vil aj cheef\ n: An overworked, underpaid, camp official expected to be everything to everyone, including, but not limited to, Counselor, Mediator, Motivator, Programmer, Administrator, Police Officer, Caretaker, and Supervisor, all while maintaining good working relationships with parents, campers, counselors and support staff, and without whom any summer camp would struggle to function adequately.
Wawayanda flag raising
July 2006
Dot Conklin
is an original Catskills denizen. She has family scattered all across the region, she knows all the old stories about one-room schoolhouses, what this Claryville house was used for in the old days, and so on. Dot was the first recipient of a recent annual staff award, and when she received this honor everyone stood and applauded, tears in their eyes. Finally a chance to recognize a true community elder - hard working, honest, a kind & beautiful soul. [LINK]
