Times Are Changing?
We are preparing for the final Shabbat of the July Session
with things closing out for good on Sunday. Hobby Culmination was last night
and the smoke is still clearing from Fight Song earlier in the week. We are in the
final stages of preparing tomorrow night’s Closing Ceremonies, including Tusc’s
Final Banquet. Then intersession begins before doing it all over again with the
August session. It’s exciting and hectic.
Remix.
Intersession is now. The Final Banquet was on Tuesday. Hobby
Culmination was on Sunday. August Session begins the day after tomorrow. And
yes, the smoke is still clearing from the most extraordinary Fight Song evening
we have seen just six days ago. Feels like so long ago, blablabla.
The time flying phrases get thrown around on a regular basis
around these parts but we are now in a brand new world where we have no idea
how things work. After decades of the 4-week July session and 3-week August
session, we are in a new era of time equality. Two 24-day sessions. July
session is in the bank with August on deck. Yeah, it feels weird. Twenty-two
years of green vegetables only to wake up and see blue vegetables, or maybe
they are red. Time will tell.
It is time for my annual apology for not having written
enough in this space. And I should have written the day the campers left (apparently
the day before yesterday), 134 of them not returning this summer. And about
that many will return either on Sunday or Tuesday for August Session. The ones
returning Tuesday are still together – the 54 Tusc campers on their
extraordinary five-day trip to Mars. This usually leaves this coming Monday and
returns Friday. 2+2=5.
I may have a good amount of time under my belt at camp and
should be very well-versed in now my sixth Summer as Program Director, but the
fact of the matter is that this summer has felt quite strange. The person who
is supposed to know every inch of camp hasn’t felt that way this summer. Not
necessarily in a bad way. Camp may be the most familiar place to me and the
many who come year after year, but the intimacy we feel seems to come from
something far deeper than just basic acquaintance and time spent. Yes, camp has
changed a lot as you have heard me say and undoubtedly observed yourselves. But
it is still our camp. And It is still our home.
The first 24-day session since August, 1993 is now in the
books. And we are about to commence another one on Sunday. Early returns are
very strange, though certainly positive. Lots of records set and milestones
met, both quantifiable and not. We had less homesickness than I have ever seen
at camp. We had fewer two-week campers choose to leave after two weeks than any
of my sessions as Program Director. We all got a half hour more sleep each
night with breakfast moved to 8:30 each morning. We all got to specialty areas
25% more with a fifth period added to the daily schedule. But we spent 15
minutes less at most areas each time there (except Waterfront and Ropes). We
had more rain than any session in the last ten years. We (therefore) had more
canceled Waterfront than any session in the last ten years. We had an earlier
Mass Program. We had more major programs sooner and closer together than
previous July sessions. We had no Visiting Day. But we still hosted over 3000
visitors a day on this very blog. We had more campers cry on the last day of a
July Session than I have ever seen despite the fact that we have more
two-session campers than any year in camp’s history (since the two-session
format began in the 60’s). And of course we had more campers in July than any
session in camp’s recorded history, at least until Sunday when the August
Session smashes that record.
So what’s it all add up to? Camp does not appear to be about
the amount of days one spends there. There I said it.
Across nearly all of the tangibles and intangibles, CSL July
2014 was phenomenally successful. The fact that it was 24 days long, while
strange, does not really register when thinking about it. I believe strongly
that making two balanced sessions of longer than three weeks will bring
enormous benefit to CSL and am looking forward to seeing the full picture
materialize over the next month. The enormous population of two-session campers
has furthered our efforts to differentiate the program of each session – for
better or worse, July and August are strikingly different from one another, but
the length of time is now the same.
In case you missed anything or want to relive it, there is
tons of content on this blog and on Vimeo (www.vimeo.com/campsenecalake),
Twitter (@csl_official), Instagram (@csl_official), etc. Gone are complaints
about not knowing what is happening, replaced with concerns about there being
too much content. Don’t worry, it’s all going to be fine. Or rather, it all is
fine. Better than fine. Even with breakfast at 8:30 and 24-day sessions.
The only advice I can give – just don’t leave.
See you soon.
Sincerely,
Ari Baum
Program Director
1992-Present
