Dear CSL,
You could say that Camp Seneca Lake has been a tradition in our family. My mother was a CSL camper, many years later I went, along with my younger brother. Many of our cousins (on both sides of the family) attended camp, including Renee Schuls Jacobson, who now sends her son, Cal, and Aaron Cantor, who is the current Associate Director at the camp.
My first experience, however, was not my best one. I was 8 years old, away from my parents for the first time. I was incredibly homesick. I cried. I whined. I ran away. I walked right down Camp Road, heading for….? OK, I might not have planned things out too well. I was eight. I was retrieved by my counselors, and eventually my parents came to pick me up and take me home to Syracuse.
After spending the following summer at home, I was convinced by my friends and my parents to return to camp. I went back the next summer, and for the next six summers that followed. I attended CSL through my Senior Camper year in 1982.
If I never returned I would have missed out on so many amazing experiences. The memorable Mass Programs, the fire-circle Shabbat sing-alongs, swimming across the lake, our Senior Camper trip, and of course the friendships.
Who knew that that one summer ending in tears because I wanted to leave would lead to many summers leaving in tears because I didn’t.
Larissa Maloff
CSL Alumni
