A mother interviews kids about camp

FERN SWEDLOVE

While in Winnipeg for the recent holidays, my 24-year-old daughter talked about how she found an Israeli dance group to join in Montreal, a love she had cultivated while at Camp Miriam, the Habonim Dror camp located on Gabriola Island, B.C. I thought, how cool is that – something stuck from all of those years of going to camp! And, this will be the first year that my 22-year-old son will not be returning to Camp Massad, a Hebrew immersion camp located near Winnipeg Beach, having completed his move through the ranks of camper to staff.

I started to wonder about what all those years at Jewish summer camps were about, besides dancing and getting away for the summer?

Both of my now adult children spent their summers attending Jewish summer camps across the country. After trying out a few, my daughter eventually settled into attending Camp Miriam until she was 17 and my son found his second home at Camp Massad.

For my daughter, Rachel, Camp Miriam forged her political views and activism, with which she has carried on throughout her university years. The camp is structured like a kibbutz and Rachel described Miriam as being the place where she got to experience “socialism in action.” I remember her incredulous reaction to her first-time experience doing chores at Miriam when she was eight years old. She looks back fondly on the camp’s communal structure and, although religion now has little place in her life, her memories of Shabbat at Camp Miriam are vivid and kind of dreamy sounding.

“I remember Shabbat as being a beautiful, spiritual time of the week,” she said. “On Shabbat we made challah and for dinner we set up the tables so the whole camp sat together as one big family.” On Friday evenings everyone in the camp would hike to the point, a rocky precipice at the end of the island, followed by Israeli singing and dancing, which she loved.

My son, Eli, initially told me that camp was just about getting away for the summer and having fun. Nothing more than that, he assured me. But when I asked if that really was it, he told me that camp was also about community. “A lot of the time, the only thing that was connecting these kids was that they were all Jewish – that was what brought them all together to camp,” he said.

The children’s backgrounds captured every possible slice of life: private school, public school, native born, immigrant, rich, poor, Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, raised Jewish, raised in a mixed religious household, not raised Jewish, English speaking, Spanish speaking. And, at camp, all of these Jewish children were integrated into one universe. My son tells me that the children could ignore all that was different between them and focus on what was the same – being Jewish. Without question, for Eli, lifelong friendships, as well as unforgettable experiences, were formed.

Were these summers attending Jewish camp halcyon years? Golden, flourishing and carefree? Given that both children looked forward to camp each year, plastered their bedrooms with pictures from camp and still have that little spark when they start to reminisce, I would say so.

Fern Swedlove is a Winnipeg freelance writer.

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