John and Kristin’s excellent California adventure

My first summer camp experience, nearly 50 years ago, is indelibly etched upon my memory, partly for the fun of the whole endeavor but mostly because of how it ended.

Cursed by environmental allergies pretty much from the cradle — grass, trees and everything else fun in the world — the odds of me making it through a full week in the great outdoors without an allergic meltdown were slim at best. My mom was rightfully hesitant to let me go, but I begged, pleaded and swore that “no matter how bad things got,” I would make it through Outdoor Ed with the rest of my sixth-grade class.

I made it to day three before the raging sea of pollen in which I’d been swimming finally pulled me under. Our principal, Mr. Smucker, called Mom and offered to deliver me back home that evening. I rode shotgun in his big, brown Impala, intermittently painting the roadside ditch the entire distance from Wilmot to Orrville. It was not the homecoming I had intended.

Years later as a college student, I made a triumphant return to Outdoor Ed as a counselor, and having outgrown my allergies, I had the time of my life leading sixth-graders from my very own alma mater.

A great camp experience is certain to live near the top of anyone’s list of favorite memories, and the thought that our youngest child, Sylvia, is making a career out of camp life thrills me beyond words. That her position might offer me the chance to revisit the whole camp experience hadn’t even entered my mind, but as fate would have it, a little dose of camp life was waiting down the road for Kristin and me as we drove westward to deliver Sylvia to her new camp in California.

Three-thousand miles is an awfully long way to travel, only to turn around and go straight back home. So once the two of us had committed to the trip, we coaxed Sylvia into asking her new bosses if her parents could flop at camp for a few nights before flying back home.

“They don’t take up much space, and they behave reasonably well most of the time,” she wrote. “Besides, they’ve barely been out of Ohio, and it would be nice to give them a chance to see the sights.”

Although not particularly flattering, Sylvia’s concise description of us does ring true. Fortunately, it seemed to resonate with the camp powers that be, and with kid campers not scheduled to arrive for a week or two, permission was granted for Sylvia to bring her parents to camp.

“They said they’d have a space for you,” she told us. “I’m not going to press it any further. This is my first time working with these people. I’m not going to be a pain.”

Our “space” was the camp infirmary — a spartan, three-room cabin in the center of camp complete with a matched pair of sway-back bunk beds that looked like they’d been purchased “as is” from a 1950s juvenile correction facility.

Kristin quickly called “bottom” and grabbed the mattress from the top bunk to double up, a move that saw her essentially swallowed whole in a Venus flytrap of blue vinyl as the sagging springs stretched to the floor. I opted to pull both mattresses from my own up-and-down and pile them on the floor. At least with that setup, I didn’t have to fight my way out of the thing to take a leak in the middle of the night.

The camp folks had no idea the gift they’d given us with these accommodations. We laughed ourselves to sleep each night. The potential for hijinks was limitless. This was one camp experience that most absolutely would not be cut short. (More on John and Kristin’s excellent California adventure next week.)

Kristin and John Lorson would love to hear from you. Write Drawing Laughter, P.O. Box 170, Fredericksburg, OH 44627, or email John at jlorson@alonovus.com.