Camp Rising Sun - Yes!

Camp Rising Sun – Yes!
By Sean Ross (Counselor, Red Hook, 2008)

Listen: I was a Pennsylvanian. My family resided in the piedmont of the Laurel Mountains since the Civil War era, long after LaSalle considered the Three Rivers – Ohio, Monongahela, and Allegheny –the main artery leading to the west.
Greensburg is a sordid podunk resting beside the Laurel Mountains. Few people heard of this place and I can’t think of too many natives who moved away as they grew older. The dreams of dreamers in this area are neither imaginative nor lofty.
I’m riding with my sister to school, my first day as a sophomore and her first day as a senior. As the small car winds along the continuous rolling hills symbolic of Western Pennsylvania, diving and swooshing into and out of the winding roads, I’m reminded of the past two months. What will Peter, Anna, Kim, Bobby, and Matt think of me? How will my teachers react? My parents don’t understand me and they raised me!
As we park behind the school, my sister ruffles me, “You need to cut those things off.” She grabs one of my dreadlocks, a souvenir of Camp Rising Sun. “They smell something awful. Did you wash your hair?” “Of course,” I mumble and stagger out of the car.
I grab my bag and walk inside. My locks were a souvenir by a stolid Scottish counselor, Sailor, his real name Ramsay. He entertained us campers with his catchphrase, “I dinnae ken where ye come from, laddie, but always say ‘yes!’” The last two words, when said rapidly, sounded a lot like ‘sailors’ in the Scottish accent.
Nothing can provoke me to cut my hair. Many of my comrades at camp, experiencing their first time away from home and free of its influences, buzzed their hair into Mohawks. I almost joined the craze. Sailor, one day before Council, tossed around photos of himself at my age, with long, tight locks. Camp was stunned. This older guy who mentored me with anecdotes of himself – a current Ph.D. student in Glasgow studying biochemical energy fuels who played professional soccer with the Scottish national team– and encouraged camp to do focus on their aspirations and always do what is right – the funniest remark he ever made came from Mark Twain: “Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest.”
I could express myself freely at camp! After I built up the courage from the back of my throat to nervously ask Sailor if he could do my hair like his, he beamed and said, “Of course, laddie!” He even bought the materials and spent a week’s worth of SST sessions, and a few Evening Programs, to turn my head into a forest of locks. Until my hair was complete, Sailor kept a beanie on my head to surprise me.
The last Saturday afternoon – “Everybody loves Saturday Night!” – before wisdom circles Sailor finished. I looked in the mirror, afraid of the results. “Everybody back home will never expect this!” I high-fived Sailor. “My gift to you, brother,” he said. “They will hold wisdom throughout your journey.”
My family would not figure me as one to finish the four day hike across the Catskills, its difficulty foreshadowed with the name Devil’s Path. Danny from Holland, Alan from NYC, Moritz from Germany, Enrique from New Mexico, Zach from Doylestown, Carlos from Peru, Jorje from Spain, Benjamin from Mississippi, and I formed the first hiking group. The first day, an easy four miles, put me in high spirits. We arrived at the lean-to early and spent the afternoon and evening talking.
Jorje and I discussed the current Tour De France. All my friends back home would have quickly and easily dismissed my interest in cycling. Jorje and I bet a box of candy against our predictions for the overall winner: I chose the Australian Cadel Evans and Jorge picked Sastre, a fellow Spaniard. With three weeks until the Tour’s completion, we had much time to debate and pull instant tomfoolery on each other. “Sastre is eyeing your box,” Jorje would walk in my tent, before tent check, and point at candy. “I’m afraid you’re mistaken, pal. Evans, baby, Evans.”
The middle of the second day on the Path beleaguered my willpower. With hip rashes from the hiking pack and sores covering both feet (after climbing only Indian Head) how could I climb Twin Peaks and Sugarloaf by day’s end? Of their own free will, and without a word, Moritz and Danny carried my belongings while Zach carried my pack on his foreside. Carlos shared the load by stuffing my cooking utensils and food in his pack. I felt guilty and ashamed, but with my comrades’ eager cheerfulness I forced myself to the Sugarloaf lean-to. I couldn’t believe we only journeyed seven miles on the 10 hour hike this day. This hike should be considered bouldering and rock-climbing, that’s how steep these mountains are. No one wanted to anticipate the third day for fear of nightmares, so we settled in to the lean-to peacefully, cooked macaroni and cheese in the dark, grew closer together by the stove fire (the rain during the middle of the day spoiled all hopes of a campfire), and fell asleep. Dreams of Wendy’s, our treat on the last day for completing the monstrous hike, filled our sleep.
The third day, thankfully, was only two mountains. Everybody felt the mountain gripping our energy levels, but we joked around and laughed to motivate ourselves and each other. “Can you hear that?” someone asked. “Hear what?” another asked in return. “I hear something calling my name, telling me to hurry up. And I smell something fresh, too!” “I don’t smell anything,” I said. “Me neither,” Moritz sniffed. “It smells like French fries and a milkshake from Wendy’s,” Carlos continued. We all cursed him, though it did make us hike faster.
We considered Enrique the group’s Superman with the way he flew over and down the mountainsides. At the final lean-to, a majority suggested Enrique could cook for us since he did not appear fatigued. “That’s my Kryptonite, guys,” he weaseled his way out of the chore.
The last day we looked across the spectacular, sublime Catskill Mountains from the Hunter fire tower, then rode back to camp. On the way we stopped at the magical restaurant we all desired and talked for most of the hike. Cheeseburgers have never tasted so delicious. And friendship, nay, my brotherly friends, has taken me to a greater height in achievement. I can and will do everything I wrote on my Vision Board! Write a novel, travel the world, get a Ph.D. in computer engineering, and stay in contact with everyone at camp.
Back at Camp Rising Sun, the thirty campers, my other friends, swarmed us around the van. They wanted the inside scoop on the hiking trip. “It’s easy. Don’t lose any sleep over it,” Danny lied. I looked at him in dismay. He whispered with a sinister smile, “Hey, that’s what the counselors told us!” He had a point.
That night the campers, excited to have the returned hiking group, put on an Evening Program called Earth’s Birthday. Jin and Jack dressed in their cultural Chinese garments, Angel and the counselor Daniel wore ponchos and sombreros, a few wise guys from the U.S. wore business suits, Ryo dressed in his faux-samurai suit, Umur wore his Turkish fez and caftan, and the Europeans all wore their National Flag colors. The second years made cupcakes and Guy’s Israel rock music grooved lightly as a backdrop. We learned how to sing “Happy Birthday” in each of the representing languages, and then had a customary, if unofficial, dance party in E.D. Hall. Everyone melted into one whole individual bouncing in unison.
I walked into my home room, with Anna and Matt. How could I tell them about all this and the Wisdom Circles and Council, where my camp mates spoke honestly and earnestly amongst each other to individually reflect and to learn about our deepest thoughts? Matt would surely laugh at me as if I was a fool and change the subject, and Anna would roll her eyes to show a lack of interest. Back to the doldrums of Pennsylvania, I thought to myself and laughed.
My family and friends may not understand my summer. But I have my bedroom covered with pictures of my summer – which blends my past, present, and future. I will always remember camp and my new extended family spread across the globe.
Listen: I will always be a CRS’er! Yes!

(Sastra eventually won the Tour, and I unenthusiastically parted with my favorite Reese’s Peanut Butter cups as its new owner Jorje ate them mockingly, yet fairly, in my presence.)