1. You never make any friends.
I’ve heard it said a thousand times that just one day at summer camp will turn strangers into lifelong friends, but that’s not true. Strangers don’t become lifelong friends at camp, strangers become family and there’s simply nothing even slightly comparable to 11camp family.
2. Camp is gross.
Say goodbye to flushable toilets, air 2.conditioning, and insect-free space. Camp welcomes you with the sweet smell of outhouses, the blazing heat, and swarms of mosquitoes. Over the week, you grow to appreciate this grossness. You grow to like not showering for 7 days. You grow to like the stickiness of bug spray in your hair and the smell of 2camp fire all over your clothes. The truth is, these gross things are just tangible memory triggers in the making. Many of my fondest memories from camp would not have been possible without this grossness. Being locked in an outhouse during a thunderstorm, scratching a friend’s mosquito bites, and cooling off in the river by pushing a leader off of the dock are all memories that I cherish today, thanks to the grossness that is camp.
3. Camp changes you.
No more acting. You can’t run, you can’t hide. At camp, you can be yourself because you don’t have to be anything else! Unlike some places, people will love and value you for being just that – you! You will discover more about yourself than you could have ever imagined and you’ll love you too!
4. Camp is exhausting.
The days are long. The nights are short. Bedtime is late. Wake up call is early and rest hour is simply never long enough. By the end of the week, your voice will be gone, you will be covered in bug bites, and the bags under your eyes will be bigger than the burrito you ate for lunch the day before. But really, the voice loss was caused by singing your favorite songs for days on end. The bug bites are mementos of camping out under the stars and more importantly, they helped create a fun game of connect the dots. The bags under your eyes, well those are just funny looking, but they go away. The camp hangover will consist of days worth of missed sleep, as well as possible drooling, with a slight chance of snoring. If you’ve ever made it home without falling asleep in the car, did you even go to camp? All in all, totally worth it.
5. Camp costs you.
Maybe you lost your only week of vacation. Maybe you had to go a week without pay. Maybe you worked overtime, or maybe you had to miss out on a special family event. Whatever you did to attend camp, it cost you. You spent the week chasing kids, leading games, chasing kids, giving campfire talks, chasing kids, washing dishes, chasing kids, and most of all, chasing kids. You spent weeks preparing for camp and days recovering. You sacrificed your time, energy, and talents. It was exhausting, but so worth it. You got to be a part of something so much bigger than yourself. You got to make an impact. You got to help change lives. You got to lead kids to the cross! In the end, that’s all that matters.
