First Official Week

The campers arrived one week ago today, and they have been keeping me busy with sleep disorders, homesickness, bunk changes, camper/counselor issues and fist fights. There are two girls bunks in particular that seem to be taking up most of my energy. I really had no idea that summer camp could ruin your entire childhood but apparently, I was wrong. What is funny is that I get some of the same arguments here for why life is terrible as I did in residential treatment, where kids were physically restrained if they tried to leave and I had to dish up their condiments. I guess twelve year old girls will bring drama with them wherever they go. I am the lone wolf in my department, and no one wants to join my wolf pack, which is understandable, as none of them choose the profession of being emotionally pooped on except me. Speaking of which, I had a can of crazy opened up on me by a mother, who essentially told me that I was a terrible therapist, and that I don't view kids as individuals because I told her that it was unseasonably hot, and our kids were exhausted, which may be playing a part into why her daughter feels like she wants to come home. Don't worry La Europa peeps, I did an Arbinger brush up before camp started, so I didn't loose it, but I did call Chris and sob and drip snot all over the phone for twenty minutes. This post may be more negative than usual, as I was awoken last night to nausea that refused to let me sleep until I released the contents of my stomach an hour later. Which may have had something to do with the snot I left all over my receiver.... I am feeling better now, and was able to take it easy the majority of the day, and most importantly catch up on trashy television. Seth will be here on Friday night, to kick off my first official day off in three weeks. I am so excited to sleep in, and eat in a restaurant that isn't filled with kids. Well, I just received a call from a parent worried about letters home, and now need to go investigate, so until next time, Lilah Tov.

I should be telling you what these pictures are...

But instead I am going to tell you about the fun-filled evening I had last night. Just as we were sitting down to dinner, we got a call on the radio that there was a tornado warning, and that we needed to head to the office. We marched to the office, and were instructed that the tornado touched down in Madison, which apparently is not far from here, and we needed to go to the basement. We all stood around in the basement for a while, or right outside watching the very angry sky dump it's fury on us. We ended up having dinner in the office, because they weren't sure if the tornado warning was going to start up again. One of the Israeli scouts poked her head into Edana's office and said , "This is so exciting, just like the movie". "Which Movie," I asked "The one where everybody dies?" She just squealed and ran out. At least they don't require much to impress them, just a destructive act from God will do the trick. The English were speculating that it had to be the second coming of Christ because "Touchdown Jesus" (a statue of Jesus coming out of a pond in front of a church located just outside of Dayton) was struck by lightning the day before, and now he is just a couple of metal poles protruding out of the ground. The pictures are pretty apocalyptic. So after all of this settled down and we were free to leave, I went home and watched a very enlightening show called; "I didn't know I was pregnant". Apparently, there are enough women out there having babies on toilets that they have devoted an entire half hour of programming to it. I figured I would turn in early, because the campers were arriving the next morning, and I wanted to be bright eyed and bushy tailed. So I climbed into bed and started reading, I was getting drowsy, and about to turn off my light when I felt something move near my head, and out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of gray. That flash, turned out to be a mouse. THAT RAN ACROSS MY FACE. I yelped, which was futile, because I was the only one in the house, everyone else was in the office. So I radioed over to see if there was anyone that was available to help me catch a mouse. Edana came over with Binny, and Paula (the facilities director who lives at camp year round) and her daughter Aerial, and her friend Chloe. It took all six of us 30 minutes and multiple devices to catch the TWO mice we found living under my bed. That's right, I was sleeping on top of a mouse family. The country girls were saying we should suffocate them a plastic bag, but they decided instead to dump them into a giant water jug, and think of some more creative way to implement their torturous plan. One of the mice got away in the process, and they carted the other one off in the jug and left it on the front porch of the office. I secretly released him on a mercy mission this morning, but with the understanding that if he came back, I would go medieval on his little mouse ass. I couldn't have a mouse death weighing on me, I'm a vegetarian.

Photos III

Photos II

Photos I

Here are the much anticipated photos from camp I'm posting for Marni. There are quite a few of them so they will be posted in a few installments. Enjoy.

Staff Week

Ahhh! It feels as though I have been at camp for an entire summer already. I am not saying time is dragging, it is just that our days are filled from 8 am to 12am or so. This is a schedule that, as evidenced by my previous posts, I am not used to. Last week our internet was down, quite literally the sattelite dish fell over, and so I had no cell service, and no internet. This would not be a problem except that I told everyone to email me if they needed to get a hold of me and I could call them back from the land line at camp. No dice. Obviously internet has been restored, but now I can't access my gmail account from my laptop. Which leaves me filled with a rage that I cannot express with words.
I have been feeling pretty homesick the last couple days, which is hard because the international staff have been in the same boat, so as I talk to them and try to focus on the postives, and make sure they feel supported so that they will stay, I am secretly thinking, "That is a good idea, we should go to the airport together. "I am hoping that this is just a temporary phase, and 16 year old Marni would kill me for saying this, but I really miss Utah. I know that this is going to be a great experience for me, and that I could never learn the things I am going to learn, or meet the people I have met and will meet here if I never left, but I am starting to feel the sting of being away from the people I love most in this world. Not to mention the Mexican food.
The address for the camp is
Camp Livingston4998 Nell Lee Road Bennington, Indiana 47011
(In case the above paragraph inspired enough sympathy from you to motivate you to send me a letter, or a present......)
I actually have some pictures to post, and Seth will be out here this weekend, so he can take them back to Bloomington and upload them there, and then I can type up a narrative. This is a process that is 3 steps longer than should be necessary, but it appears that it will just have to make due for the summer. Well reader, I am off to prepare for another Shabbat. Erev Tov.
(Did I get that one right, hebrew scholars?)

Camp: Arrival

I can only upload pictures from the hours of 2-7 am, so it might be a while before I post any, not that I have had time to take them anyway, but that is besides the point. We have satellite internet here, which is a technologly I didn't know existed, and that is because, no one uses it unless absolutly necessary. But enough about the wonders of the interent, let me tell you about camp! The GPS could not find the address I put in for camp, so we just set it to the town where the camp is located and found our way from there, turns out I typed Neil Lee Road, when I should have typed Nell Lee Road, but I made it here in one peice eventually. I am living in a house with three other staff members, the assistant camp director, the program director, and the arts/music/judaics director. I have my own room, with air conditioning which I promptly kissed upon arrival, because it would have been a loooonnnnggg summer without it. I am typing to you from my very own office, the first of my social work career, although I always pictured it with less Israli flags. We have been in trainings the last few days, and I have been doing my best to remember the few hebrew words that I have learned so far. Boker Tov is wake up, and it was a tough one this morning, I kept jerking awake last night in fear, after hearing tales of a racoon that ATE through two doors in the kitchen, he didn't break the lock with his nimble fingers, he just ate a hole in the door, and then, he ate a bag of pancake mix. The thing is ferocious.

Everyone on the Administration staff is great, and I hope that by the end of the week we will all be buds, I am still homesick, even with things to do, and being at camp makes me miss the fellowship something awful. I am really excited to have campers, and get to work.
UPDATE-
I typed the above entry yesterday, and it feels like a week ago. I am about to experience my first Shabbat, albeit altered for camp. I got into a discussion with Benny the Judaics director last night about the rituals that define Judaism, and in his opinion, you can be Jewish without ever actually professing a belief in God, but just by going through the rituals. I am not suprised by this, as I think it is human nature to be drawn towards familiarity and routine, there is comfort in ritual, it is tangible. I cannot remember the last time where I felt so out of my element than here, and I love it. I am hoping that this experience changes me and helps me grow in more ways than I expected. (and I hope I get plenty of pool time in as well....)