Camp is MY favorite!

I love camp and camp loves me. Madeline had her dorm sing "we love Linda yes we do" every time they saw me. I earned swamping bruises on my legs, canoed solo for about a mile, paddled through lilies just after sunrise and kayaked for the first time. A night, I stayed up giggling with the councilors after the campers went to sleep, sitting around the fire even though it was hot and muggy out. The salt grass around our launching site cut up my legs, so when we had some spare time, Diana and I took a machete to it. The park rangers warned me not to "go Rambo on it", so we were careful, but there is a picture out there of me threatening Mr. Weston with it. Besides all that, highlights include racoons cleaning up camp after dark, armadillo by the bath house, "You spooked me like a horse", "For the sake of your sanity, go take a shower!", "Hello, and what's on your face?", 'scary' stories, fish running into the canoes (what do you call a fish with no eyes?)

Summer's been going pretty great so far. My cavalier died a tragic death when the radiator fan broke and tried to take the radiator out with it. I have a new car now - a blue cobalt with purple metalic shimmers in the paint. It's pretty. Oh! and the windows roll up and down. I can have drive-through food again. And go through tolls without looking stupid, and enjoy pretty days while I drive. Camp starts on Sunday, and I'm way excited. Riding up with the Devers, and then working with them and Diana and sleeping out at night AND it's been arranged with kitchen staff that I get real food every night instead of 3 nights of hotdogs in a row. And I think marshmellows might have been mentioned. There were fireflies and beavers and bluebirds and racoons and all kinds of pretty wilderness last time. And mosquitos, but that's to be expected.

I'm teaching swim lessons, so I had to have someone take over for me - just when we were all getting in the swing of things, too. I really like the kids, so I'm a bit sad that I'm leaving them, but I'm sure I'll see a bunch of them next session when I come back. All my tots rather dislike my aide, Brandon, and he's the one taking over that class for me. They bonded some on Thursday (by finally agreeing to let him teach them things instead of saying "no... I want her to teach me. I don't like you... etc.") They're brats, but endearing ones, and it makes me feel loved. On the first day, when I told them to climb out and go to their parents, one turned around with HUGE sad eyes and told me, "but I'll miss you." Awww. And I'm finally teaching older classes. Like... I have 11 year olds. The oldest kids I taught last year were 5. We learned Fly yesterday, and it was harder than I thought to slow it down enough to let them see how it's done. Work is a blast. I love it. My co-workers are great, and I'd put up with alot from the patrons to be around them all day. One of the guys had a day off but had nothing to do, so he ate lunch with us and hung around for an hour or so in the guard shack. Between lessons and open swim we have a pick up game of water basket ball or shower off and wash our hair with the hose or get one of the guys to flip us in the water. Last year, he flipped the daughter of one of the ladies we work for and got her to do 2.5 rotations before doing a faceplant in the water. We've tried, but the rest of us are too weak to flip him. On breaks, when we aren't cleaning and such, we play dominos and eat ice pops or come up with really stupid games to play.

In other news, I found an amazing climbing tree in some woods near my house. I didn't climb up too high 'cause it's been forever since I've done any serious climbing and yeah, I'm a little chicken. But, I did walk out on one of the branches like 10 feet out, and it barely moved at all under my weight. Pretty sweet. I also found wild grapes growing all over a couple of other trees like Kadzoo. They're sour with thick skins and a ton of seeds, but it still made me happy. How often do you just randomly find wild grapes?

Ballad of the Silver Cavalier

The Cavalier, the Cavalier
fun to drive, a joy to steer
The Cavalier, the Cavalier
running over highway deer

Warning lights are turning on
anti-freeze is almost gone

The silver car, the silver car
drove real long, drove real far
the silver car, the silver car
the driver's window is ajar

Takes me to church and then back home
has tires of rubber and heart of crome

The Cavalier, the Cavalier
the A/C's cold and the windows clear
The Cavalier, the Cavalier
outta gas, but never fear

Threw the keys in the trunk
closed the lid with a thunk

The silver car, the silver car
a pretty car is what you are
The silver car, the silver car
'though dings and dents your bumpers mar

Radiator fan broke its bracket
car now makes quite a racket

The Cavalier, the Cavalier
Wave goodbye, give it a cheer
The Cavalier, the Cavalier
It is gone, don't shed a tear.