Camp Daze

'Tis the season to prepare for summer-camp programs.  <groan>

My mother used to send me to a camp sponsored by the Salvation Army.  [I was a "Sunbeam"].  My brother was never sent to any camp-program, but I was.  I hated it.  It felt like I was being shipped-out, so they could be A Family without me.  I'm sure my mother thought I would enjoy being with a bunch of girls my own age, and away from my brother, but in my mind, I was being pushed out and away.  I hated camp, and I hated how my brother  - their natural son - got to stay home.  When I think of "camp", I think sad lonely thoughts of wanting to go home, and not being wanted by the people who called themselves Family.

While it's true I may not have been sent away more than twice, (two years in a row), I do remember crying each time, each day I was away from my mommy.  I remember there being a policy of "no calling home", but I must have been in a real state of hysteria because I remember being allowed to make one phone-call to my parents.  I remember begging and crying to go home... and being told I had to stay.  I hated being at camp, and I hated not being taken home right away.  I hated that my parents weren't willing to stop whatever it was that they were doing, just so they could rush to find and hold me.  They never came back to get me.  They left me among strangers, and I was told to make the best of it.  I tried my best, but I was miserable and sad, and no one seemed to care how lost I felt.  The way I saw it, my parents were content with my being away, and "toughing it out", so they didn't rescue me when I needed rescuing.

I'm sure there are kids who like to go to sleep-away-camp.  I'm sure there are kids who can't wait to get out of their living situations, and be at a place where there are lots of other kids and really nice grown-ups.  I'm sure there are camp programs that make life worth living for some kids.  I was never one of those kids, and it seems my kids are just like me. 

I never told them about my Camp Daze, because it's still too sad for me.  Yes, I may be a real big baby, but the loss I felt, being sent away by my own mommy... is still raw and real in my heart. 

My kids have no desire to go away to any sort of camp program.  The closest they get to "roughing it" is playing army in our backyard, with a tent hub-man bought once, thinking one day it would be fun to go camping. They each have sleeping bags, and they use them all the time on my bedroom floor.  Camping to them is sleeping at the foot of mommy's bed.

That's where my babies belong each season of the year; home, with their one and only mommy.