scouts

What is a Counselor?

Somewhere between adolescence and adulthood there occurs in human development an age which is physically and psychologically impossible. It is that unfathomable stage known as the camp counselor, a creature undefined by psychologists, misunderstood by camp directors, worshipped by campers, either admired or doubted by parents, and unheard of by the rest of society.

A camp counselor is a rare combination of doctor, lawyer, Indian, and chief. She is a competent psychologist with her sophomore textbook as proof. She is an underpaid babysitter with neither television nor refrigerator. She is a strict disciplinarian with a twinkle in her eye, a minister to all faiths with questions about her own. She is a referee, coach, teacher, and advisor. She is the example of womanhood in worn-out tennis shoes, a sweat shirt two sizes too large, and a hat two sizes too small. She is a humorist in a crisis, a doctor in an emergency, and a song leader, entertainer, and play director. She is a idol with her head in a cloud of wood smoke and her feet in the mud. She is a comforter in a leaky tent at night and a pal who has just loaned someone her last pair of dry shoes. She is a teacher of the out-of-doors, knee deep in poison ivy.

A counselor dislikes reveille, waiting in line, inspection, and rainy days. She is fond of sunbathing, exploring, teaching games, and nights off. She is handy for patching up broken friendships, bloody noses, and torn jeans. Good at locating lost bathing suits, fixing ax handles, playing the guitar, and building fires in the rain. She is poor at crawling out of bed on rainy days, remembering the salt, and getting to bed early.

A counselor is a friendly guide in the middle of a cold, dark, wet night on the long winding path to the suz. She is a dynamo on a night off, exhausted the next day, but recuperated in time for the next night off.

Who but she can cure homesickness, air out wet bedding, whistle “Dixie” through her fingers, carry two packs, speak Pig Latin in French, stand on her hands, sing 37 verses of “You Can’t Get to Heaven”, and eat four helpings of Sunday dinner?

A counselor is expected to repair 10 years of damage to Suzie in 10 days, make Ann into a woman, rehabilitate Nancy, allow Barb to be an individual, and help Cindy adjust to the group. She is expected to lead the most prized possessions of 16 adults much older than she. She is expected to lead them in fun and adventure … even when her head aches; to teach them to live in the out-of-doors … even though she spends nine months of the year in Chicago, New York, or Boston; to teach indigenous activities … when she can’t even spell the word; to guide youngsters in social adjustment … when she hasn’t even reached legal age; to ensure health and safety … with a sunburned nose, a band-aid on her thumb, and a blister on her heel.

For all this, she is paid enough to buy the second textbook in psychology, some aspirin, some new socks, and a new pair of tennis shoes. You wonder how she can stand the pace and the pressure. You wonder if she really knows how much she is worth. And somehow, you realize you can never pay her back enough when, as she leaves at the end of August, she waves good-bye and says, “see ya next year!”

What is the tie that binds us, friends of a long, long trail? Just this … we have shared the weather, we have slumbered side by side, And friends who have camped together can never again divide.

The canoe gives a sense of unbounded range and freedom, unlimited movement and exploration, such as larger craft never know … it is as free as the wind itself, can go wherever fancy dictates. The canoe man can camp each night in a different place, explore out-of-the-way streams and their sources, find the hidden corners where no one has ever been.

~Sigurd F. Olsen

No servant brought them meals; they got their own meat out of the river, or went without. No traffic cop whistled them off the hidden rock in the next rapids. No friendly roof kept them dry when they mis-guessed whether or not to pitch a tent. No guides showed them which sites offered a night-long breeze, and which a nigh-long misery of mosquitoes; which firewood made clean coals and which only smoke… The eternal simplicities of wilderness travel were thrills not only because of their novelty, but because they represented complete freedom to make mistakes. The wilderness gave them their first taste of these rewards and penalties for wise and foolish acts every woodsman faces daily, but against which civilization has built a thousand buffers. These people were “on their own” in this particular sense.

End of Camp

It’s never good-bye when a summer camp ends. You just inventory your good times and friends, and store them away in your memory marked “keep”. Then, through a long winter what pleasure you reap … remembering.

Be glad of life, because it gives you the chance to love and to work and to play and to look up at the stars. ~ Henry Van Dyke

You never really leave a place you love. Part of it you take with you, leaving a part of you behind.

Your travels are beginning once again to a faraway land filled with new adventures, excitement, and the opportunity to grow. Your journey will be successful, for you have the courage, the desire, and the ability to discover beauty around you and within you. I send you on your way with my love …

For years I have been told with some regularity that by walking out and away I am “escaping from reality.” Why are people so ready to assume that chilled champagne is more “real” than water drawn from an ice-cold mountain creek? Or a dusty sidewalk than a carpet of desert dandelions? Or a Boeing 707 than a flight of graceful white pelicans souring in unison against the sunrise? Why, in other words, do people assume that the acts and emotions and values that stem from city life are more real that those that arise from the beauty and silence and the solitude of wilderness?

~Colin Fletcher

As August wanes, our old forgotten sense of urgency awakens once more, as we realize summer may actually be as short as spring. Sunshine, warmth, and the long days must not be wasted. It is a temptation to lie in the sun during the day and stay awake half the night, watching sunsets, moonrises, and northern lights, listening to the calling of the loons, or watching some storm with its jagged shafts of lightening between rising thunderheads. It is almost a pity to miss a single sunrise or the mists of early morning over meadows and valleys. There is so much to feel and see, the days and nights are never long enough. There is no waiting for tomorrow, for tomorrow may never come.

Summer means promises fulfilled, objectives gained, hopes realized. The surge of doing and achieving, of watching and enjoying is finally replace by a sense of quiet and floating and a certain fullness and repletion, as one cannot absorb anymore. Then one day, lying on a path, there is a tiny leaf of aspen, bright yellow with a border of red along the veins. This is a sign, and I look at it with disbelief. It cannot be true. It is far too early, for the dark green and fullness is still around, with growth moving swiftly as ever. My eyes refuse to accept what they have seen, but memory overrules. I pick up the leaf, and twirl it between my fingers, they lay it back again on the trail.

~Sigurd F. Olson, from “The Hidden Forest”

It’s time to leave … our beginning is coming to a close

and so we look toward tomorrow …

But let’s look back at yesterday and today.

We arrived here alone and began our adventure slowly, carefully.

Not sure of what was expected or what we wanted.

But during our time together we gave up our loneliness and insecurities.

We gained new friends, confidence in ourselves,

And a special feeling which cannot be defined by words.

We leave so much stronger for what we have shared deeply.

I look at you all and smile … for you are my friends.

~tears and pebbles in my pockets

I meant to do my work today

But a brown bird sang in the apple tree

And a butterfly flitted across the field

And all the leaves were calling me.

And the wind went sighing over the land

Tossing the grasses to and fro

And a rainbow held out its shining hand –

So what could I do but laugh and go?

~Richard le Gallienne

Last to Go

Why am I always the last to go? Is it because I want more sorrow, more tears, or can I preserve the memories by standing a minute longer in that one unforgettable spot with people I love.

~Nancy Franz

We shall not cease from exploration and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.

~T.S. Elliot

We’ve taken the first step toward discovering and understanding the wilderness. The contrasts, comparisons, and relationships will become increasingly evident and will occur more rapidly even as our new awareness forces us to slacken our exploratory pace. We will begin to hear sounds, see shapes, and sense the moods of the wilderness more quickly now, and we will move more slowly, cautiously pausing to listen or see things we have walked past all our lives…

Where lies the magic of camping? It can be different things to different campers, but it weaves a strong spell. It is the little things half remembered that come flooding back in future years: the glint of sunlight on still water, the scent of pine forest or wood smoke, the endless eternal canopy of night stars. There are some who would measure the worth of a camp by the cost of its operation. But, the true values of a camp are not for sale. Can anyone buy pride in accomplishment, close friendship, or joy? Deep in the heart lies the precious spirit of adventure and it is the warmth of this spirit that grows with camping. Who can measure the silence of deep woods, the peace of the out-of-doors, the spirit of brotherhood that dwells in such surroundings?

Summons

Keep me from going to sleep too soon. Or, if I go to sleep too soon, come wake me up. Come any hour of the night. Come whistling up the road. Stomp on the porch. Bang on the door. Make me get out of bed and come and let you in, and light a light. Tell me the Northern Lights are on and make me look. Or tell me clouds are doing something to the moon they never did before, and show me. See that I see. Talk to me till I’m half as wide-awake as you, and start to dress wondering why I ever went to bed at all. Tell me the waking is superb.

~Robert Francis

Nostalgia

My eyes are weary of brick, of steel and stone,

My ears are weary with the noise of crowds.

A longing fills me just to be alone

Where there are only trees, and grass, and clouds.

The city chokes me with its heedless rush;

Its ruthless buildings reaching toward the sky

Stifle my dreams; I want to feel the hush

Of evening, and to watch a lone bird fly

Into the sunset. Just to know again

The hills and meadows of my former days,

To hear the patter of summer rain,

To wander idly where a brooklet strays.

What has the city to compare with there? –

Where else the peace, and where the strength I find

In the benign companionship of trees?

Here is a solace for the tired mind

Not all the city’s varied attributes

Can offer. Let me feel again the spell

Which in my inmost being strikes its roots –

The magic of the land I loved so well.

~Elizabeth Virginia Raplee

As long as I live I’ll hear waterfalls and birds and winds sing. I’ll interpret the rocks, learn the language of flood, storm, and avalanche. I’ll acquaint myself with the glaciers and wild gardens, and get as near the heart of the world as I can.

~John Muir

I am glad that I shall never be young without wild places to be young in. Of what avail are 40 freedoms without a blank spot on the map?

~Aldo Leopold

So why do we do it?

What good is it?

Does it teach you anything?

Like determination? Invention? Improvisation?

Foresight? Hindsight?

Love? Art? Music? Religion?

Strength or patience or accuracy

or quickness or tolerance or

which wood will burn and

how long is a day and

how far is a mile

And how delicious is water and

Smoky green pea soup?

And how to rely on your self?

~On the Loose

Now I see the secret of making the best persons, it is to grow in the open air and to eat and sleep with the earth. ~Walt Whitman

Failure is not falling down, but rather remaining where you fell.

We are, all of us, umolded and remolded by those who have loved us. No love, no friendship can cross the path of our destiny without leaving some mark upon it forever.

Contentment is not the fulfillment of what you want, but the realization of how much you already have.

The Lake Isle of Innisfree

I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,

And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made;

Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honeybee,

And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,

Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;

There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,

And evening full of the linnet’s wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day,

I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;

While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,

I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

~William Butler Yeats

The better part on one’s life consists of his friendships. ~Abraham Lincoln

The world is so empty if one thinks only of mountains, rivers, and cities, but to know someone who thinks and feels with us, and who, though distant is close to us in spirit, this makes the world for us an inhabited garden.

~Goethe

But, after all, the very best thing in good talk, and the thing that helps most, is friendship. How it dissolves the barriers that divide us, and loosens all constraint, and diffuses itself like some fine old cordial through all the veins of life – this feeling that we understand and trust each other, and wish each other heartily well! Everything into which it really comes is good.

~Henry Van Dyke

A friend is a person with whom I can be sincere. Before him, I may think aloud.

~Emerson

By friendship you mean the greatest love, the greatest usefulness, the most open communication, the noblest sufferings, the severest truth, the heartiest counsel, and the greatest union of minds of which brave men and women are capable.

~Jeremy Taylor

Blessed are they who have the gift of making friends, for it is one of God’s best gifts. It involves many things, but above all, the power of going out of one’s self, and appreciating whatever is noble and loving in another.

~Thomas Hughes

The great thing in this world is not so much were we are, but in what direction we are moving. ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

Man is distinguished from all the other creatures by the faculty of laughter.

~Joseph Addison

Change is an easy panacea. It takes real character to stay in one place and be happy there.

~Elizabeth Dunn

There will be only one of you in all of time. That identity is cancelled if you are not always fearlessly yourself.

These are the things I prize and hold of dearest worth;

Light of the sapphire skies, peace of the silent hills,

Shelter of the forests, comfort of the grass,

Music of the birds, murmur of little rills,

Shadows of clouds that swiftly pass.

And, after showers, the smell of flowers,

And of the good brown earth, -

And best of all, along the way, friendship and mirth.

~Henry Van Dyke

I do not follow in other’s footsteps. I make my own path and fall in love with the beautiful things they have missed because they have traveled the same paths for too long. I am a wanderer, and I forgive them when they laugh, for they do not know what it is like to live, and love, nature.

A canoe glide through long stretches of white water, its paddlers tired by hard travel. They swing precariously near to subsurface reefs, scanning always the rock-bound shores with anxious eyes for a spot to camp. But it is rugged country and campsites are none too numerous … Now an island looms before them, bearing all their heart’s desire. A campsite … their kind has bee here before. All the labor of the day is forgotten. Aurora is dancing in the north sky, meteors streak the heavens, a wolf calls in the distance; the campers add fuel to the fire – life is too full for sleep. Wrapped in blankets they watch the embers, burning red-orange …Then – where the night went, they never knew, for in an instant it is dawn, and another day upon them.

~Sam Campbell

I am so glad that my thoughts can rise above the cloud, look upon truths more solid than matter, sense the cause back of all effects, and the joy in eternal sunshine, though my feet still rest in shadow. I am glad that I am not afraid to dream.

~Sam Campbell

The men who try to do something and fail are infinitely better than those who try to do mothing and inevitably succeed.

The purpose of life is not just to be happy, It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

Let me be the first to give a friendly sign; to nod first, smile first, speak first, and – if such a thing is necessary – to forgive first.

Life is a journey, not a destination.