One of the Boys Part 2-Arrival Day

And away they go. So camp was finally here and it started with our first arrival day. Some of our staff headed to the airport to help pick up kids there. I personally love airport duty. You have to wake up very early but you get to sleep on the van and once you're their it's really cool. You get a badge that lets you go through the fast security line and you just run around picking up campers. For many of the campers you are the first staff member they ever meet and that is kind of fun.
If you are on camp arrival day is kind of strange, at least the beginning. Everyone wakes up pumped and ready to go. But nothing really happens at first. Arrival day morning is incredibly slow. Campers aren't supposed to show up until 100pm but some inevitably show up early. Because of that we have to be ready and all the staff has to be ready. Still it isn't many campers and there isn't that much to do. So it is a lot of awkward down time where you can't go leave to do anything, but there is nothing to do. When the first few campers do arrive it is hilarious and awesome to see the staff all immediatly start to work with those 2 or 3 campers. Each one has 3 staff just to himself.

However when the afternoon comes that quickly changes. In addition to a rush of campers coming with their parents there are a couple hours when we get busload after busload of campers from the airport. Usually in a span of about 2-3 hours camp goes from 5% full to 85% full. Then it becomes a crazy rush of meeting parents, helping with luggage, getting to know kids, doing paperwork and so many other things. On these days I can be doing a number of things. I could be assigned to the bus welcome area which is pretty easy and fun. I could be assigned to phone calls which is the worst. All kids not dropped off by their parents call home to let them know that they are here and safe. The thing that is bad about helping with this is names. So many of the kids remember you from the previous summer and of course your name, there aren't that many division directors. For you though you may remember them, but you can't remember every camper's name, there are 500 each summer. It can be incredibly awkward and you try hide the fact by pretending you only don't remember their last name and that is what you need. If I an ever doing phones I spend about an hour reviewing the yearbook from last year to help me with names.

This year I was pretty much just responsible for attending to my division and staff. I was there to greet parents and campers as they came to my division. The night before I looked through all the folders for my campers and memorized something about each of them. It was not particularly useful in helping me to get to know the campers though. They are too overwhelmed or excited to register things like that at first. What it did help me to do was learn the camper's names though I didn't realize this until later when I did not do it for Prep 2 (the second two weeks) and it took me way longer to learn everyones name. Probobly the most important thing I was doing was interacting with parents, arrival day is an important PR time for us. Most of the kids fly or take the bus but a number of campers, particularly the young ones which I have, are dropped off by their parents. It is important especially for the first arrival day that I am there to great parents, the model of the upstanding clean cut all-American young man that parents want to see in staff. I am also there to answer all the questions that many of the staff may not know the answers to yet. I enjoy the entire process actually.

If I had to define a moment in which camp has truly started it would be at the start of the first meal. Most of the campers are now here save a few later arrivals, usually from Mexico. Camp meals are one of the quintessentially defining aspects of any camp. The campers come and line up and because it is the first meal of the session me and Eric do pretty much all of the talking to the group. There is a surpisingly large amount to explain. What makes the first meal of the first session unique is that I am not only teaching the campers, I am teaching the staff. Much of what I say to the group during the first session even though it is often ostensibly directed to the counselorsm, is in actuality my way of conveying something to the staff. Before we go into the meal we explain how we line up, how we know when we have to be quiet (a staff member raises their hand), what we need to do once we are inside. I also say things line, "Your counselors are going to be explaining how ______ works as the meal is going on". Although I say it to the campers it is the counselors I am really teaching.

I am planning on doing a number of posts after I finish posting about Prep 1 that will be focused on an aspect of camp, one of them will be on meals so I won't go into details about how they work now. The first meal is always a little crazy but I love it. We welcome the campers to camp by singing the Camp Lincoln Welcome Song. Afterwards they go back to their cabins and have a little free time to finish unpacking and such. After that they have a cabin meeting. The staff go over expectations as well as doing 'get to know you' stuff. My role during this time is not particularly challenging. It is however tedious. I have to collect valuable envelopes (where the campers put any valuable items or things they aren't allowed to have at camp, i.e. cell phones, video games) and check them to make sure they have been done correctly (signed with the items inside correctly written on the front) and lastly to pull any travel documents to send to our office. I also have to collect some other paperwork and pass out treats for the campers. This is the first example of a long list of things which are the worst parts of my job. There is a general catagory of responsibilities I have which are not fun. They are simply logistical things that have to be done by someone so they are my responsibility. It makes sense and I am not complaining, but they are the least appealing things I do. Most of them present little challenge and could be done by someone who lacks my experience, acumen, or intelligience, though my work ethic does help. Lastly I just am around making sure what needs to be happening in the cabin is and supporting if it isn't.

On this first arrival day everything went rather smooth. Both of the cabins I oversee Gopher and Badger (the two youngest cabins in prep and therefor 2 or the 3 youngest in camp) were in bed with lights out by their bed time, 930pm. An auspicious start I felt. I finished my valuables and helped some of the intermediate DD's with theirs as they have more than I do. All and all a succesful first day for myself, my partner, and my staff.

Joey

Just Read: A Game of Thrones
Reading: Comanche Moon
On Deck: Shadow of the Giant.