Returned from Judson, I'd like to go back

Well, I guess it’s time I share with you about my week of camp. Let me start by saying that while things never change, they never stay the same. It was the same old camp, with the same old activities, and a new set of campers. Many of the counselors this year were people I had gone to camp with three years ago, so it was like I was back where I belonged. Of course, that feeling is always attached to Camp Judson. It feels as much like home as home does. Only at home I never get out of breath walking from where I eat to where I sleep. But that’s beside the point.

What really bears sharing are the differences. This week I was in charge of seven soon-to-be freshmen girls. Let me just say it bluntly: 14-year-old girls are insane. I’m sure there are exceptions, but for the most part they’re all insane. Don’t get me wrong. I love these girls and we had a lot of fun times together. But I will never fully understand them. They spent most of game time flirting with the cabin 20 boys who were on our team, and felt the need to put on makeup for the 4:00 am sunrise hike up Mount Baldy. And why is it that every camper and half of the counselors felt the need to wear flip-flops? I will never understand the desire to wear flip-flops at camp. That's just asking for a broken toe. Now, under that pink plastic surface, these girls do have good hearts. I could see it in the way they supported each other. And what little on-topic discussion I could get out of them in cabin time was good stuff, it just didn’t last long. They got distracted so easily it wasn’t even funny. So this week I was really brought into a firm reliance on prayer at I tried to affect these girls. On Monday night I prayed for each girl specifically and then the camp as a whole after they had all gone to bed. Insomnia is great for prayer—at midnight there are no other distractions. I also met with Polly, Kelsey and other counselors to pray for our campers before evening cabin time. By the end of the week I was feeling frustrated (well, I’d been frustrated from the start…) at the thought that my girls were, for the most part, unaffected by the lessons of the week. I felt like I had failed as a counselor. But four of them came forward at the blessing service Thursday night, and on Friday one of them told me she had accepted Christ for the first time. She made the decision on Wednesday and hadn’t felt like telling me until I asked her to get the card filled out, but she made the decision all the same. That was definitely a God thing—I had nothing to do with it. And a girl from another cabin, who I didn’t even meet until the sunrise Baldy hike decided to attack herself to me. She came forward to be blessed and made sure to sit by me for every meal after the hike. She may turn out to be just as much a challenge as the other girls, but she’s such a sweetie. So maybe I didn’t fail. The most important results of this week at camp may not be apparent for quite some time. I know God spoke to me, even though I was preoccupied by my girls. Actually, quite a bit of it was powerful to me only because of my girls. I just might want to try this again next year. But, of course, that depends on many other things like my summer job and cash flow. Darn money.

Okay, now for the silly side of camp. Driving out with Polly and Steve was great, and it was good to be out there a day early. The staff was a bit thin, so they asked for some of us to help out in the camp store. So I did. Now I know how things operate in there, and maybe I have my foot in the door to work out there next summer. I don’t even know why I didn’t apply this year. Oh well. Judson has go-karts now, with a dirt track on the property across the road. It’s a muddy experience, and so very fun. I only got to drive one for a little while, but it was great. Most afternoons I had to wander off by myself to keep my sanity. The day we drove go-karts I joined a group going to Horsethief Lake, and after swimming in my clothes to get the mud off, I hiked back alone. That was a good time. And there was mud later in the week, too. We had mud pit tug-of-war. And it was an impressive mud pit, let me tell you. It was about ten feet long and half as wide. When I finally went in, the mud itself came nearly to my knees, and the water went well above that. See me in person for some great pictures of that. Oh yeah, and my major injury for the week happened Tuesday night during our brilliantly-design night game. In attempting to get a piece of masking tape off the back of one of the larger male campers and make him relinquish his glowsticks to the counselors, I tripped on a birch branch and tore up both legs and both elbows. I have the distinction of being the first patient to see the camp nurse that night. Mark, the nurse, actually called the game off early because so many people were coming to him with poison ivy or stinging nettles. And the next morning we had three girls hobbling around camp on crutches. At least it was all in good fun, right?

Hmm, I can’t shake the feeling that there was something else I wanted to say, but I can’t think of what it could be. Oh well. I’m finally working on my story again and the bears are calling for me to return.

Today is my parents’ anniversary. Happy 26th, Mom and Dad!

-Kim