When my oldest granddaughter went to her first Summer Day Camp, it was provided "free" by her school I thought about my summers.  This was the first times she had been on a half hour big yellow bus ride from home - alone.  I have to admit she is much braver then than I ever was.

And seeing her off reminded me about my firs fateful day at the YMCA Camp Hollybrook.  I was a bit older than Violet because the age limited started at ten, she was six.  But everything for kids today starts earlier than the sheltered days of the 50's when I grew up.  And going took a lot of coaxing from my mother who thought being with other kids would be good for me.  I have to confess I never had a baby sitter.  Nanny would be there with me or Mom would go out.  The kids in my neighborhood were a few years older and refused to play with “baby Cal" like me.  And I was a baby until I was 10 or so - that’s for sure.

So, I spent my long summer days entertaining myself.  Finally, after much cloaking I relented and said I would go to the YMAC camp.  There were three two-week sessions and only the "rich kids" went to all three.  Mom paid $10 bucks (which was a lot of in 1953!) for the first session and said if I like it, she get the next two.  The fee covered the cost of lunches and arts and crafts materials.

And so, the day arrived, and I walked to the corner a few blocks away like a prisoner on way to a final punishment.  My palms were wet.  I had never been on a bus without my mom or Nanny.  It rumbled up billowing diesel smoke and I clambered on.  The bus was packed with kids, and I found a seat in the back.  There was a "Junior Counselor" in front of the driver and he gave us an overview of the rules of the camp.  Then we sang the Hollybrook Theme Song.  Lots kids were camp veterans and knew the words. I listened and sweated more.  After the song the 20-minute ride into the woods that bordered our town was a cacophony of laughs and shouts by the "happy campers".  I just sat silent and worried – what if we had a thunderstorm… what would do for a whole day until we piled out of bus in front of the "lodge".  The lodge was a one size fits all building where we would eat and spend rainy days according the Junior counselor’s orientation speech.  Across from the building in big field there were a ton of other campers from ages 9 - 15 waiting for the festivities to begin.  A young man in a Hollybrook tee-shirt with a name "Chief Bob" on his chest shepherded all the boys 8 years old together from the group and a the girls were gathered by a woman dressed the same.  Chief Bob announced to about a dozen of us guys (I didn’t know any of them) that we were the proud Cherokee Tribe, and he was our Chief.  He said we would learn lot about the ways of the Indians, nature and history. (Each age group had an “Indian” name - this probably would not be the case at the now abandoned camp ground – indigenous Native Americans  would be hard to say for 8 year olds and the tribal name considered stereotypical – the times have dramatically changed since my camper days long ago).

    My first day went like this:  We marched to the "Chapel in the Pines" (remember this experience was sponsored by the Young Men's Christian Association and was before the advent of the YWCA - but girls and boys both attended the "Y".  The camp was built by the "Wise Men” the adult men's club that were builder and benefactors of our town's beautiful building that housed a full basketball court, games rooms and meeting rooms for the individual clubs - but that's another story.  The chapel was on a sloped area with a podium made out of pine logs with a cross carved neatly into the front of it.  On the hill were rows of spilt logs to sit on and the campers were quietly seated.  This place was a sacred place I would come to find out.  The Head Chief of the tribes (the director of the Y) welcomed us, explained some more rules and then read a bible verse and we all said the Lord's Prayer.
    Next Chief led us deeper into the pines where we were introduced to our Wigwam.  A large round and tall "tent" made of canvas and painted with our name and some pictures I recognized from watching cowboy movies at the Saturday matinee.  He instructed us that here was where we would always return after events and also where we would change into our swimsuits.  Yikes I forgot about swimming - but swimming lessons were a big part of our day here.   And then the shocker - we would sleep here during our once a week "overnight"!  Mom didn't tell me about any overnight!  Now I was sweating again.
    Our next activity was a "nature hike".  We visited all the other wigwams and were warned about the older boys who sometimes played tricks on little kids.  Next, we went back to the lodge as the temperature started to rise and I wished I had brought a hat.  I was roasting already and it was only 10:00 AM.  At the picnic tables behind the lodge we met "Miss Pat" our arts and crafts teacher. (Pat would go on to become a nationally noted artist known as the "Marsh Painter" - with her sunset paintings hanging in galleries all over the world.  Many times, I look at the sun setting and say, "Ah, we're seeing a Pat Witt sky tonight".)  My first project was to braid a "lanyard" of colors of our choice - a task that every camper the world over gets to do.  After a few tries a produced an orange and blue one (our high school colors) which I know 7 decades later still exists because my mother kept it along with a myriad of other hallmarks of my life that she thought would be destined to be housed in the Memorial Cal Museum when I became famous!  I found arts and crafts to be a welcome break to everything else that day because it was held under an umbrella of oak trees with a nice breeze coming off the namesake "brook" down the hill to our "beach".
    Lunch was next in the big room.  We had American cheese on white, family style bowls of chips and fruit punch served in ice cold metal pictures that were sweating a much as I was.
    Now we rested on army cots at and around our wigwam for exactly an hour because swimming instruction - I dreaded the afternoon to come.
           (To Be Continued)