The perfect inverse of the picture in the previous entry: not summer but winter; not looking at Reflection Pond from Biscuit and Pigeon but from the pond to the lodges. (Courtesy: Ken Nathanson.)
Reflection Pond, this summer, as seen from across the road, standing between Biscuit and Pigeon Lodges.
The other day Bud stopped by where I was working and dumped on my table about 500 sheets of old old Frost Valley half-letter-sized stationery. I remember loving this retro look; it seemed retro even at the time it was designed! Of course I noticed the old address: Oliverea, NY 12462. Now we are Claryville, NY 12725. Oliverea is still on the sign as you turn off Route 28 in Big Indian: "Big Indian / Oliverea." And the old Oliverea post office is still standing--but it's a private residence (of the Van Baren family).
Yes, another daughter of a former camper and staffer is here this summer. Rachel Eisenhauer, a counselor in Sacky and before that longtime camper here, is the daughter of Steve Eisenhauer and 1960s/early 70s lifer (and alumna activist from the late 80s to the present) Sue Ettelman Eisenhauer. Everyone from the 1971-73 era or so will remember Sue for her intense involvement in what I'd very positively call "Girls' Camp culture," something that might sound--as a phrase--trivial but was definitely a deep thing. One of those moments when you just "had to be there" to understand its effect. Here's a photo of Rachel I took yesterday along with her brother-village buddy, Remy Bernstein. Below is a photo of the Ettelman/Eisenhauer clan taken a few years ago at the Geyer Hall dedication. Sue is at bottom left.
The just-mentioned (in the previous entry) closing campfire staged another return of the appropriately beautiful and sentimental song to FV's traditional farewell event. (I credit Kam Kobeissi and Emma Conniff for urging this restoration of quiet feeling to the campfire--a really important way, for some young people, of pondering an actual turning-point.)
1960s closing campfire favorite makes a return.
NBC Today Show producer Kim Cornett visited today for much of the day. She interviewed our fabulous CEO Jerry Huncosky (see photo).
Any former camper or staff member who spent time here between 1961* and now will instantly (or almost instantly) know this scene: yes, it's Sunday morning at the Wawayanda chapel. The shot was taken as I walked up the steep path to the chapel through the woods, while the morning reflection was already in progress.
At a thrilling Lenape/Tacoma Challenge Night last night, one of the challenges was this: the camper most likely to pass as a counselor. These kids really do know the standard staff member's accessories. There's the carry-everywhere coffee mug. The hat strung on the neck, ready for any period-long dose of hot sun. The backpack full: clipboard, bag of lozenges, extra weekly schedules, flashlight, bug spray. Oversized sunglasses. Odd combination of colors and clothing types. In fact the Tacoma girl at far left was already wearing--as it happens--the dress of a counselor from another village. (Huh?) Of course the older you are around here the more likely you're genuinely going to confuse a teenaged camper with a JC. Of course the real difference is in the head and heart. The most camper-like JC assigned to Pokey-Totem--looking perhaps younger than any of these four--turns out to have the sophistication and nuanced sense of responsibility of many another American 40-year-old. That's true.
A few minutes ago I ran into my dear pal Ellie Kane who asked me to help her pack Lakota's overnight. So I did and it gave me my first close look at Out-trip in its new setting and mode. Click on the video and you'll get a quickie tour: yes, Out-trip is now in the back of Smith, formerly the dialysis unit. Perfect spot for it, I must say. And Ellie herself lives this summer in the old paymaster's house (sometimes known as the "Flyfishing Shack," so named because for maybe three or four summers it housed flyfishing equipment and was home base for a little-used summer program), so she's often nearby.
Serenading campers arriving at Hird closing campfire, session 1 - rehearsing our three-part harmonies for "Four Strong Winds." Photo by Sandy Shapiro Bohn.
Have you visited our Farm Camp? No? Holy cow, why not? It's utterly remarkable. Click here for much more. Meantime, here's a message that went out to all the FV staff this morning from John Chartier, the director of the farm program:The farm campers dug 150 pounds of potatoes this week! I am putting about 20 small bags of them in admin for you to buy. The rest we are going to either use at the farm or sell to parents at check-out.
In case you didn't know the money from farm produce/egg sales are used to fund the Farm's partnership with the YMCA of Madagascar. The YMCA of Madagascar offers agricultural programming to help the farmers there adapt more sustainable and productive agricultural practices. We have supported this partnership out of farm camper revenue the past few years and would like the $1500 that we send them this year to be 100% supported by veggie and egg revenue. Coming soon there will be sweet corn! I hope that you all enjoy the kid-grown local food.
Ah, but before I go back to Sunday/Monday's Olympics, let me first present this priceless pic - of a Pokey girl at breakfast yesterday, the morning after Olympics. She was not unhappy (I spoke with her at some length) - just tired and not quite ready to move on. By the end of breakfast, you'll be pleased and not surprised to know, she perked up and was skipping out of the DH with her buddies. Clean up, wake up, see what the sunshine brings. That's the post-O mode.
The 2009 FV Olympics are covered amply on the Frost Valley summer camp blog here. Check out photos of the team shirts and video of various of the teams in action, including Chile which won the coveted spirit award. I'll be back sometime today, I hope, with a longer entry presenting my particular p.o.v. on the fab event. Which is to say: this year I asked to be on one of the teams rather than the host country. The program director, Mike Obremski (kudos to Mike and Megan L. and Matt on putting on such a great show), suggested that Wales might use me to advantage so it was to Wales I went. W-A! L-E-S! Wales is the best.
Jake Kerr is featured in a news video on the war in Afganistan. Jake, the son of Leslie Black and Doug Kerr, grew up at Frost Valley.
Abdou from Senegal is not just a kindly and wonderfully skilled counselor (in Pac this summer) but he's become a popular figure with a huge fan base. No joke. People are so instantly delighted with him that his very presence ignites chants of "Ab-DOO! Ab-DOO!" as he makes his modest way through camp. He's always smiling. He's infinitely polite. Two days ago was his birthday and yesterday I walked into lunch only to see him dancing to a sweet flowy sort of song playing through the speakers. Gee, he must have danced like that - a fluid-motion sort of funky dancing - for several minutes as everyone smiled and clapped. A few of the Mac Boys joined in. I took many pictures of this mesmerizingly happy moment and here are two.
Olympic mania begins anew. This afternoon it begins. Teams gather for the afternoon and evening - and, my oh my the weather is perfect: sunny but breezy and cool. Tonight the opening ceremonies, tomorrow the "games," tomorrow evening the pageant. Maybe all of it outdoors this summer, finally, after a stint of rain-hampered festivities. Yesterday, there wasn't quite yet lots of buzz, but here and there yes. On some kind of bet or dare, the program director sought experimentally to name someone in the FV administration a Head Coach...and found Jim Tisch, our CFO, who really actually truly will lead the team from Wales. (This I want to see.) And then there was the buzzy presence in the dining hall yesterday of Matt, the crackerjack new assistant to the program directors, who wrapped himself (literally but also by now figuratively) in the Olympic flag.
Steve Cornman (camper & CIT, '70s) --> Helen Cornman (camper, counselor, VC, director, '80s) --> Dan Weir (counselor, VC, director, late 90s/'00s). I've remarked here and there in this blog over the months and years about this FV family. Happily, since I like them all. I'm particularly a fan of Dan this morning, after his superb presentation yesterday to the FV Board of Trustees who met for our annual at-camp meeting, under a tent set up at Reflection Pond. Dan's younger sister Liz is in camp this session, so Dan's family gathered at the beginning of the session. That's when the photo here was taken.
Yesterday, Hird flag raising, run by Windsong with Pac looking closely on. There are three alumni kids in Windsong/Pac and you can glimpse all three here: Amanda Tilles (speaking at the moment I took the shot, in white top), Sam Nathanson (bearded, dark shirt, center of the pic), and my daughter Hannah (yellow top, backpack).
This summer I've been telling a story called "The Six Legends of Bud Cox." I won't say any more about the story here, but most readers can fairly well imagine what it might consist of. There's a t-shirt that goes along with the story, and here is Willie, VC of Outpost, modelling it. In Wawayanda black and orange, it says: "ask me about the six legends of Bud Cox," with an image of my own W-1 patch inserted in there. Tonight I'll drive to the farm, arriving at 8:30, to tell a story there. I always love the story-telling atmosphere there: a road almost no one travels, so it's quiet; a great open field with a fire-ring and (tonight, anyway) the stars above; super-attentive kids, exhausted and ready to listen after a day of weeding, tending livestock, cooking produce, etc.
Windsong-Pac Challenge Night last night. A distinguished panel of judges: Kam Kobeissi, Jeff Daly, Dan Goldman, Megan Lawrence, and Kelly Hupp. Since there were five teams, the judges sent up a rep--Kam--to fill out the bracket in the Hunker Hawser competition. The proud winner of the FV History Quiz won a cherished prize: a mint-condition staff shirt from the 1960s. (Can anyone tell me the exact date of the shirt?)
Photograph of the Castle looked at from the east-side garden. The rose gardens have just been put in. The picture was made not long after the building was completed in 1916. Today those gardens are gone (others--on Memorial Island--remain, though) and the spot is now a soft lawn of green grass, bordered on the back by perennial flowering bushes put in by Diana Larison and others in recent years.
Some Hemlock counselors and campers were walking past Reflection Pond yesterday, on their way to the Castle. They noticed that one of the logs had come off its mooring on a carved-out stump. No one said a thing. They wordlessly knew the little project ahead. Together they lifted the very heavy hemlock trunk and put it back in place, and then continued on their way. The counselor--responsible for the good communal attitude of these boys, I think--is Chris Young. Came to us from another camp last summer, Penn State University student, and all-round good guy.
I joined a cabin in Forest for breakfast this morning. Counselors are Sam and Dave. Dave - David Sedden of England, and an avid reader of this blog - is the Village Chief, second summer at that position. (My instinct is that Dave is a future leader around here if he sticks with it.) Anyway, I was chatting with the boys and eating my cereal (Raisin Bran from the cereal dispenser, with some granola sprinkled on top, 0%-fat milk - but also a breakfast sausage and a few potato nugget-like thingies - and a mug of my own very strong coffee made at home) when suddenly Dave says to the group: "Okay, who's the waiter this morning." One boy raises his hand. "Well, then, you lead the toast." We all stood up. Raised our glasses of apple juice - I my mug - and the young man made a toast as follows: "I hope we have a healthful day." After we sat again, I asked Dave about this. He explained. I made an audio recording, so hear his reasons for the innovation. I like it.
The thing about this project--this place, this idea, this somewhat planned and somewhat accidental legacy--is that people learn how to risk failure in order to have some free and even wild fun. In a word (is this the right word?) venturesomeness. Challenge Night is hardly the best instance of it, but it is an occasion where I at least can put forward the idea that failure is necessary to growth and success--that it's okay to fail. Etc. Simple stuff. I've been running Challenge Nights for the various villages this week (and will again next). Each one has a different flavor and cast. But the free-to-fail spirit pervades all. I mentioned this in a recent posting about Challege Night; take a look. I've made my usual Challenge Night t-shirts and give them to my volunteer VIP judges but also occasionally to a camper or staff winner. Here is a Forest boy proudly displaying his Adult Small "Al's Challenge Night" t-shirt, with the epigraph on back. Click on the image to enlarge, and read.
On the first day of every session, all day long, villages meet the program staff at the Olympic Circle for what's called (I think) specialty split-up or specialty sign-up. It's quite a system. One program staff person from each specialty area steps forward, in turn, and presents (in excited terms--"ballyhoo") what fun you will have at this or that particular program area. Then the kids decide which activity to choose, whereupon they go every day for four or five days.
Here's Nikki, a longtime camper, now a CIT, getting a last drink of dining hall water before she and her colleagues leave on their long backpacking trip. Yesterday. It was a cool, sunny day--perfect for the first day on the trail for these future counselors.
Rafik has been briefly visiting, along with his wife Kathy; their daughter Katey is a counselor in Sacky this summer. Readers of this blog will remember the Rafik was a 19-year-old Egyptian international counselor in '76 and came back as VC in '77 and '78, maybe '79 too. Now an eminent liver transplant surgeon based on Houston and L.A. We were walking on this gorgeous first day of the session and ran into Sara, a staff member who works in Arts & Crafts. Sara and her sister are from Egypt. Next thing you know an animated conversation in Arabic is taking place on the Olympic Circle.
A bit later we visited the dialysis unit, of special interest to Rafik, whose interest in medicine (and trans- plantation in particular) was ignited here in the early days of our kidney program. We are hoping Rafik and Kathy will return for a whole week next summer.
CIT Point, Thursday night. Sky had partly cleared, Kam Kobeissi, Hird's director, kept adding big logs to fire. It roared and the campers and staff started into it, looking out over the quiet lake at dusk. They were asked to come in quietly, and did. Amazing. Session 1's CC isn't always the most sentimental. But this one had its many moments. Kam paid attention to a few key solemn details and it worked. Yes, it's true that the Hemlock staff did a skit-like song, in which, at each chorus, which was something about how we were going to do something "once again," two of them ran to the lake and jumped in (cold!). But even in this antic contribution, they finally all stood in the water, arm in arm, singing the chorus. Even the craziest non-CC-style stunt had its sentiment. The girls of Windsong, all of them in their final year as campers, sang a song by Youth Group called "Forever Young" (not, to be sure, the Dylan lyric of that title--also apt for CC). If you click here you can hear a recording of this good moment. Afterwards, the Windsong and Pac campers and staff went up to the old Wawayanda chapel for a vespers during which many of them spoke individually about the big transition ahead. Good stuff. It makes you want to be forever young.
Yes, tonight was spaghetti night. Most kids on this night eat without utensils--quite a tradition. Anyway, an "vegetarian alternative" is soy meatballs. This Susky counselor tried her hand at one, but then gave up in semi-despair. Her facial expression tells it all.
