Camping

Last week, The NY Times ran another one of those delicious dudgeon-inducing, gorge-elevating articles on what rich New Yorkers do to spoil their kids. This time it was ferry them back and forth to camp in Maine on private jets.

I’m not going to take sides here, other than in my head. But reading about those experiencing the de lux side of summer camping, did bring to mind my own meager experience as a camper. Which was a lot more Little Lulu than Rollo the Rich Kid.

Camp was one of those things that, as a child, I mooned over, in much the same way I did boarding school and horseback riding. They were things I read about in the dopey girls novels I devoured, or saw occasionally on TV.

Yes, indeed, I wanted to be one of those Breck-girl pretty Protestants with a gleaming blond page boy who saved the day for Camp Windchime at the big swim-meet by leaping off my death-bunk to anchor the relay.

Instead, my summers were spent hanging around in back yards playing Clue and Monopoly, running through the sprinkler, seeing how many times in a row I could bounce a birdie off of a badminton racquet, and walking down to the bookmobile when it made it’s weekly stop at Bennett Field to check out more dopey girls novels.

But the summer between fourth and fifth grade, just after my sister Trish was born, I got to spend a week at Brownie and Fly-up Day Camp. (A fly-up is a girl in transition from Brownie to full-fledged Girl Scout.) The other girls from OLA who attended were my classmates Carol and Mary A, Carol’s sister Joan, and her friend Kathy. Carol, Mary A and I were fly-ups. Joan and Kathy were still Brownies.

The camp was held at Leicester Junior College, and part of the thrill was that we were picked up by a bus every day. Although it wasn’t the yellow school bus I would have wanted – riding a school bus was another one of those Leave it to Beaver experiences I craved -  there was still the thrill of standing on the corner of Apricot and Main, lunch sack and towel bag in hand, waiting for the bus.

On the first day, we wove newspapers into cushions called sit-upons. One day, and camp was already yielding a lifetime skill! If only we still had newspapers around, I could weave us all up a bunch of seat cushions. I also met another girl named Maureen – always exciting – as well as some girls who were actual Protestants (even more exciting, even though they weren’t of the Breck-girl pretty, ritzy-ritz Protestant variety; such girls would have been at Camp Windchime, not a some mingy Brownie-Fly-up camp that cost $10/week (if that)).

Beyond the sit-upons, we didn’t do much by way of crafts. We didn’t even make gimp lanyards. (What a bust!)

Most days we played circle games, swam in Stiles Reservoir, just up the road from Leicester JC, and hung out and gossiped. After Day One, however, we did spend some time each day rehearsing for the “talent” show that was going to be the culmination of the week.

Somehow, my “talent” was dancing the can-can with a very nice Protestant girl named Nancy. I was chosen because I’d raised my hand when asked if anyone had anything at home that even vaguely resembled a can-can skirt. What I had at home was a wide, white and blue striped skirt with a pattern of stage-coaches on it, and plenty of material to shake in can-can mode. Better yet, as my sister Kath had a matching red and white number, I could supply two costumes.

By Thursday, as Nancy and I rehearsed in our shorts, gamely pretending that we had all sorts of oo-la-la skirt and crinolines to flash, I began to have slight twinges of volunteer’s remorse.

This was going to be stupid and embarrassing. Not much fun, and certainly not much of a display of talent.

Come show time on Friday, I pretended I had a stomach ache, and, in my stagec0ach can-can skirt, went to lie down under the big pine tree where the fly-up girls hung out. I have no idea whether Nancy performed, but I suspect she was a gamer, and the show must go on…

The other highlight of the last day of camp was when the counselors and the lifeguard took off behind one of the buildings and made s’mores for themselves.

I remember Kathy crying because they wouldn’t give her one.

I didn’t cry (I was a fly-up after all, not a Brownie), but I was plenty miffed. It would have been my first s’more, and I remember how indignant we felt that the big-girl counselors had snuck off to indulge themselves without one iota of consideration or concern for us little Brownies and fly-ups.

To say that I was happy to disembark from the camp bus for the last time is a gross understatement. I could have been no happier if I’d been flown home in a private jet.

Besides, there were better things in store for us that summer.

My Aunt Mary and Uncle Ted and their kids were coming from Chicago on a visit, not via jet, private or otherwise, but in their un-air-conditioned sedan. Between the Dineens’ five kids and our five kids, there’s be 10 kids under our roof for one heavenly week. What bliss! Who needs camp?