Those of us with school-age children are preparing for a major transition. The extended dance remix of bedtime is winding down. Our alarm clock will revert to its mercilessly timeworn 5:45 AM setting. All of our clocks will lock into the tightly scheduled structure of the School Year.
Our summer of anarchy sheds new light on my mother’s choice to send me to sleep-away camp the summer I turned six. I liked the idea of going to camp, and spending the night(s) there. She didn’t have to work hard to convince me that camp would be more fun than hanging out at home all summer. It was a classic, “old school” co-ed camp in the country, with swimming, arts and crafts, tennis, campfires and sing-alongs. And Shabbat service every Friday night. In clean white shirts. Four weeks of Fridays, with their completely unfamiliar rituals of challah bread and candles and prayers to God in foreign tongues. At 5-and-11/12ths, I had been raised an atheist, among people of many faiths, none of whom behaved as observant Jews in my presence. We had friends and relatives who celebrated Hanukah instead of Christmas, but I had no sense of any Jewish traditions or rituals, or bible references, or Hebrew.
I guess my mother thought it would be good for me to have some exposure to our Jewish heritage. She had read the brochure. But I had no idea what I was in for. We packed “nice white shirts”, along with all the shorts, halter tops and tennis peds with our nametags sewn in, and shipped them ahead in a steamer trunk purchased at the local Army & Navy store. Those white shirts got hangers in our bunk closet, while everything else was shoved into cubbies. My shirts were not as plain as everyone else’s. My idea of “nice” was “fancy”, with lace bits and pearly buttons. So my shirts stood out. Along with the rest of me.
I was one of the youngest kids at camp. And one of the darkest. There were a couple of very dark-skinned girls in much older bunks. Too old for me to connect with in any way. They appeared to be well liked by other girls their age, and fell right in line with the Shabbat exercise. In amongst a few hundred savvy New York kids, I was the new little girl who isn’t even Jewish. I didn’t look the part. I didn’t act the part. I mumbled along with the prayers, and hoped no one would single me out for any candle lighting or bread breaking. Fridays were torture. In truth, they’re all I remember about that camp. I don’t remember any of the kids being unkind, or the counselors mistreating me in any way. And I don’t remember having made any friends there either. It’s a blur, except for that sea of white shirts, in the soft glow of candlelight, mumbling and praying to God over shiny, puffy, braided loaves of bread.
Mom and I spent the following summer together in a bungalow in the Catskills. And after that, we found an amazing, small, artsy, back-to-nature summer camp up in Maine, where I finally found the ideal respite from the city, and the structured school year, and the hot, sticky doldrums of the Bronx in summertime. And my mother, confident that I was happy and secure, was able to spend her summers traveling, and teaching part-time if she felt like it, and doing whatever single parents do when they find themselves able to focus on themselves for a change.
As a married mother of two pretty easy-going kids, with a husband who helps a lot with the child-rearing, I feel guilty paying a babysitter to watch the girls for a few hours at the pool, so that I may sit here in solitude and get this post done. But it’s late August, and I’ve been up to my eyeballs in kid-friendly activities most days, for weeks now. And my girls say they aren’t ready for sleep-away camp just yet. "Maybe next year, Mommy."
Maybe I should start researching now.
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