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January 23, 2004
Nurturing independence
Parents hope that their children's letters will fill them in on
life at camp, but they usually get "Camp's fine."
ERICA RAUZIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH BULLETIN
Our eldest daughter is nearly 21 now, and is very independent.
This has been true since she first went to summer camp. She deeply
wanted to go to camp, even the first time, but she may not remember
her initial few minutes there. I, on the other hand, will never
forget them.
She was nine. We drove her to camp, took her to the sign-in desk,
deposited her trunk and duffel bag under the big oak tree in the
luggage area, hugged her, kissed her, told her we loved her and
left.
Leaving was the hard part. She waved wanly, briefly clutched a porch
column and then walked up the wooden steps. I blew kisses and kept
smiling until we drove out of sight, around the bend on the lakeside
road. Then I got weepy.
I spent most of that summer trying to imagine her activities. Waking
up to the sound of the bugle, making her own bunk, eating kosher
meals in the mess hall, swimming in the icy mountain lake, riding
horses, learning nature crafts (the world needed more lanyards),
singing around the campfire and writing letters home. Especially
writing letters home. I figured that if she wrote to me the very
minute we drove out of sight, I should get the letter two days later.
I wasn't sure I could last that long. Then I got the letter: "Dear
Mom, Camp is good. Love...."
We could only hope she was having a great time; we knew she was
equipped with great stuff. As is probably still true, the camp issues
a list of items for kids to bring that would equip an army unit
for six weeks active duty in Borneo. Sleeping bag, flashlight (she
took five), hiking boots, riding boots, sneakers, sandals, swimsuit,
thick socks, thin socks, jeans and shorts, T-shirts, beach shirts,
sleep shirts, hair brush and toothbrush, soap and shampoo, hankies
and blankets and more.
Each year, the preparation almost did me in. Every item had to be
chosen with care and labelled with precision. My daughter took the
camp's list completely literally. Because the list said 12 T-shirts,
neither 13 nor 11 would do. We counted every sock and sweatshirt.
Her attitude was that once an item had been identified for camp,
name-tagged for camp and placed in the camp trunk, it was absent
for all other practical purposes.
The following dialogue, and others on a similar track, took place
innumerable times in the weeks before camp:
Daughter: "Mom, I need a bathing suit."
Mom: "There's one in your trunk."
Daughter: "It's for camp."
Mom: "Camp is in three weeks; it'll be dry by then."
Daughter, patient, weary: "It's for camp."
Mom, patient, weary: "Swimming in it today won't make any difference
in being able to use it later. Go ahead, wear the suit."
Daughter: "It's for camp."
Once items went into that trunk, they clearly occupied a parallel
universe, a netherworld, removed from ordinary access. They became
science fiction items: visible, touchable, but totally useless.
My daughter stayed innately calm throughout the entire process,
packing her stuffed rabbit as matter-of-factly as her pre-stamped,
pre-addressed postcards. Her serenity was sometimes pierced by moments
of panic; my (internal) panic was sometimes pierced by moments of
serenity.
As carefully as we nurtured wings as well as roots, independence
as well as identity, it remains hard to see her grow up and fly
away. We wanted this, we parents. This large transition to separate-personhood
is necessary and natural. And we can handle it. I think.
I always hoped that her letters would fill us in on her life at
camp, but what we usually got was "Camp's fine." In reality,
she knew the rich details of the camp piece of her life, but we
did not.
That first summer, when she was nine, I knew she was still young
enough to sit in the car at the gates of the camp and proclaim tearfully,
"You just think I'm going to get out of the car. I'm not going."
But I didn't know she was old enough to dry her eyes, kiss her grandparents,
walk with me to the porch, and go.
As we drove off, the small figure in the lavender shirt and the
new overalls waved goodbye, released the porch column she had been
clinging to and walked up the steps, climbing into a life entirely
her own.
Erica Rauzin is a freelance writer living in Florida.
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