I'd Appreciate It- Finding lasting value in a hard experience
It probably took me way too long to fully understand “depreciation” in the accounting sense of the word. It shouldn’t have, now that I think about it. What’s so confusing about a hard asset losing value from wear, tear, age or obsolescence? And then there is the whole idea of a new car losing 30% of its value just by driving it off the lot! Hard assets lose their value over time, plain and simple, even if that tool or car serves a greater purpose than it did the day you bought it. Conversely, hard experiences often appreciate in value over time. I think a camp experience can, and does, as well.
I don’t think my parents sent me to Camp Mishawaka to be miserable (12 year-old boy “misery”, mind you), but that fact that I was, at times, miserable, was what made it valuable and “sticky.” I don’t think I’d trade these experiences for all the gold in California. I have heard a lot of stories from alumni about the canoe trip that had rain every day, so often followed by the exclamation that it was the greatest trip of their lives. I see kids who arrive the first day in tears, overwhelmed by the thought of spending the next 28 days at Camp. With few exceptions, these are the kids who are overwhelmed by just as many tears on departure day, sad to leave Camp.
What happens in between that affects this shift, or redirects the source of tears from fear and anxiety to longing and absence? A whole lot of discovery, a fair amount of work, and consistent support; that’s what happens! In the simplest of terms, what happens is growth. Cliches abound to describe this: Ships are not built to stay in the harbor; We can’t become what we need to be by staying where we are, to name just two. Mary Jane Curran, our girls director, coined another one years ago, “If childhood is indeed something to be outgrown, we need to let kids inhabit it for a while, with all its messiness.”
A parent’s job is to project their child and provide for them until the day that duty passes hands, and the child, no longer needing such sheltering, becomes. Becomes any number of things, maybe even an accountant that calculates depreciation! But before this big, scary voyage- crossing the ocean of adulthood, it helps for a child to have sailed around the harbor a few times, maybe even flipped a boat, fought high winds, or just figured out how to sail! Camp is that harbor. Long time sailing counselor Charlie Westgate’s first advice for aspiring sailors? The pointy end goes first! Good advice when one gets turned around.
Camp experiences appreciate over time. They grow, deepen, and serve well beyond what might be reduced to the cold term “useful life.” And now, some 50 years later, whether its age, wear and tear, sentimentality, or simply fear of obsolescence, camp memories are some of the most valuable ones I have. I simply appreciate them, for what they have done for me, what they have allowed me to do for others, and the stories they’ve given birth to. And I take great comfort in knowing that I am not alone in this.
Camp is a gold mine of experiences, some of them hard. But there is also - friendships, sunsets, pop-liine and pizza. Growth. Every kid deserves an opportunity to mine their own, and I know just the place.
