Valley Girl

Figgy is leaving for Frost Valley YMCA sleepaway camp in the Catskills tomorrow morning! Moey and I are driving up together to deliver our girls.

Tiny but Mighty
In the spring of third grade, Figgy came home begging us to go to FV. Her friends E. , D. and Y. were going for the first time. E.'s older brother had gone the summer before and really liked it.

No way, I said to her in our breakfast nook, when she was having an after-school snack. You're not going to sleepaway camp! You're too young. I could not picture my little rumpled redhead away from us at camp. We were so close! She was only 8! And a session at FV is 13 days and 12 nights.

But H., who had gone to sleepaway camp for two weeks a couple of summers, thought Figgy would really like it. They wore me down. But boy, was he ever right.

So off she went, determined and happy, with a set of twin sheets, some towels, new socks and underwear, PJs, shorts, tops and a swimsuit. It wasn't until years later that she revealed that she and D. had cried so much that first night. They couldn't remember what their kitchens at home looked like. But D. could remember ours, and Figgy could remember D.'s, so together, they found the comforts of home. They learned to be resourceful and lean on each other for help.

The Kleenex Brigade
Maybe not that first year, but every year after that, Figgy would get into a funk when she had to come home. She'd cry and sniffle in the back seat of the car, or sulk. She wouldn't talk to us.

It would take a while, and then all the stories would spill out. The tales about the castle, the opening campfire, the closing campfire, the waterfront, the pita pizzas, the ghost stories, the overnight [where they all sleep outside], the hash browns, how much water the counselors make them drink, how Figgy ate five apples one day, spaghetti night, the dance, and a game she loves called ultimate sicko ball, which she says is like capture the flag.

You don't understand, she'd say in a pitiful little voice from the back seat of our car. I will probably never see some of these people again in my life. [True. Her counselors have come from all over, including Holland, Ireland, Cape Cod and California. And I gather that the bonds that are forged, the secrets shared, the fears confronted during those two weeks can be life-changing.]

This is Figgy's seventh year in a row, and her last year as a camper. This is not a pretty picture. She will apply to be a Counselor in Training [CIT] next year, but we hear the competition is thick.

I'm warning you now, she said yesterday, That I might sulk for twenty-four hours, because I'm going to be so sad.

You Go, Girl
Dear Figgy, go forth and be happy. We will hold down the home front, and let's all cross our fingers that Grandpa will be okay. I am so delighted for you.

I can't wait to go home, she said to us tonight. Home meaning Frost Valley. And Dad said from his hospital bed [day 6] today, I want to get out of here. I just want to go home.

Seventy-three years separate them, but the wants overlap. The 14-year-old girl will go home to pure fun, to jump the fences of regular life. The 87-year-old man will go home, we hope soon, but will be fenced in by the limitations of being older and weaker.

May they both travel safely, the wind ever at their backs.

P.S. I heartily recommend FV for kids of all kinds. They even have special programs for campers with Down syndrome, kidney problems, and more. The website is frostvalley.org. The camp is located in Claryville, NY, about a 2.5 hour drive from Montclair. It's kind of in the middle of nowhere, except pretty mountains. I was sold on the place when Figgy was 8 and I stopped at the pediatrician's with her health forms. Dr. Rigtrup told me he had been a counselor at FV!

P.P.S. The photo above is so lovely; check http://www.rapha.cc/part-4--frost-valley. I know it shows a tree in fall, but this is Figgy's fall in her span as a camper.