A friend sent me this in an email. I thought the sentiment was so on target that I am posting it here. I am not sure who the author but she is a wonderful writer/observer.
I went to visit a world last summer and re-discovered a fantastic place of
family traditions. A world where people sit down and eat three meals
together every day, serving their food from platters and talking with one
another throughout the meal. A world where 15 year olds set the table and
take all the dishes back to the kitchen without complaint; a world where 13
year olds don't play video games every night , nor do they watch TV or sit
in front of computers. In this world I saw 11 year old girls walking
together and holding hands as they walked back to their cabins- right out in
the open. No girls there send mean instant messages to one another; they
don't I.M. at all. Instead they sing. When they are making their beds( yes,
they do that every day) and sweeping up, they sing together spontaneously
with no adult leading them.
They aren't even the most fantastic things I witnessed. I saw a world where
19 and 20 year olds spent hours of time swimming, diving, and playing ball
with 11 year old boys and they all seemed to enjoy it equally. When play
time is over they the boys hang out with the young adults and ask them
questions. They also walked to dinner together, sometimes with smaller boys
hugging and hanging on the bigger boys who don't tease them or seem annoyed.
Even more amazing, at the end of each evening the 20 year olds sit with
older adults and listen to them tell stories about their lives. The young
ones aren't sarcastic or dismissive - they seem eager to learn from their
elders, night after night.
As you've probably guessed by now, it is a summer camp I am describing! It
had been 40 years since I had last attended one myself, and I was struck by
how rarely I see children engage in these activities anywhere else; not in
school, not in neighborhoods, not in families. It made me wonder if summer
camps are one of the last places that kids can learn so called "family
values" that hard pressed families no longer have time to teach.
"Fun and friends" are the two most important things that parents say they
want their kids to get from camp. And though the children I saw were having
fun, I don't think that was the core of the campers' psychological
experience. From my viewpoint, three elements dominated the campers' days.
They were living in a multigenerational community, they were following
hallowed rituals that were universally respected, and they had a lot of
downtime. The rituals started early with reveille; ritual surrounded every
aspect of meal time including songs; and everyone, no matter what
their age, participated in and respected the camp traditions, right down to
lights out at night. Despite what parents say, I don't think that families
send their children to camp for just fun.20They are sending them away to get
something more fundamental. It may be painful for parents to confess that
they send their children away to have some family life that they cannot
provide at home.
After all, there can't be too many family dinners when you're driving your
children to the 90 game schedule required of 13 year olds on the select
travel teams; you can't have much of an evening ritual when children are
watching TV, or are on the computer all the time; and there isn't much
down time in a family where all the children are in music lessons, tutoring,
martial arts, sports, SAT prep courses, etc., etc., etc. The only place a
child from a high-pressure family can enjoy some peace and quiet is away
from home .. at camp!
Children don't develop because they are pushed and prodded; children don't
develop because of town teams or because their parents went to a "good"
college. Growing up is what kids do, because development is their biological
and psychological imperative. It is the job of adults to create environments
where they have the time, freedom, and safety to grow up at their own pace.
At camp, I was struck by the fact that a summer camp seems to provide
something that is in short supply in our fast paced worlds; respect for
ritual, time for the generations to get to know something from each other,
and of course the time to take a nap or read a comic book after lunch every
day.
I hope that camps will be able to maintain their traditions in the face of
the frantic, competitive zeitgeist of modern America. I'm suddenly worried
that they will all become specialized and driven) learning camps, teaching
Division 1 sports skills or computer skills. I hope not. I'm planning to go
back next summer and do some singing. I don't seem to have time for it
around my own house.
