Revenge of Camp Stories: Thursday, July 22.

The real downside to keeping an account of an action-packed adventure like this is having to choose between writing/reflection and rest.  Today, due to rain, our outdoor activity time is replaced by an extended rest period (the announcement of which was met with loud cheers from pretty much everybody).  Even with the extra time, I'm in a rush to get caught up so I can put the pen down.  Between this project and the draft of Whompy's novel that I've been reading, I may not finish any of the books I brought on this trip. (On the plane I began Let's Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste. It's an examination of the appeal of Celine Dion, written by a music critic who can't stand Celine Dion but is determined to figure out why she's so popular. I'm fascinated and itching to get back to it.)

It was raining when we woke up this morning, and has rarely stopped since.  I'm well prepared with hiking boots, rain jacket, and nylon pants, but most others are not.  Both my classes meet outdoors, so we have to scramble for indoor meeting places.  It's an uncomfortable but interesting change of pace.

The rain is finally done by the time rest period ends.  Campers stretch and proclaim how rested they feel.  Awakened mid-REM cycle, I do not.  I take Whompy's book out to read during free/swim time, but as so often happens here, interesting people keep sitting next to me and saying interesting things.  Kate, daughter of a kitchen staffer who is perhaps 9 years old, provides us with entertainment and pestering by turns -- "us" being whoever happens to join me on the bench swing.  Mostly it's Alex, a very patient camper with a homemade didjeridoo that baffles Kate, and Gavin and Joe, two male counselors who egg Kate on to ever-greater feats of feistiness.  Kate challenges a younger female counselor to a fight, then hops around with her fists up, unsure how to proceed.  Finally she kicks the counselor in the shins and runs away.  Later she plays us a song on the guitar (she's quite good), then shouts furiously at an apparently random camper (male, very tall and completely confused) to come and fight her.  It's absurd and, I have to admit, very entertaining.

I chat with Alex, Joe and Gavin, and also Roger the Cowboy.  Roger is the real deal, no rhinestones.  "This is the year of the fence," he tells me wryly, when I ask him what he's been up to.  Fencing an open corner of his pastureland has turned out to be a sizeable project.  We talk about property taxes and the purifying properties of wood charcoal on the digestive system.  I get absolutely no reading done, but I wouldn't trade this.

The evening's activity is Capture the Flag, a well-loved camp tradition.  I'm neither very speedy nor very strategic, and have honestly never cared for the game.  I stand around talking to Whompy about his novel through the first round, defend the flag through the second, and bail completely on the third. By this point so many other people are tired of it that it's a little tough to tell if there's even still an official game on.

All the campfire sites are still waterlogged, so devo is held in the Lodge, an ancient log structure with a screened porch overlooking the creek.  It's muggy and stuffy with a hundred people in there, warm and dimly candle-lit.  Perhaps as a result of this, the songs draaaag.  (This is a Church of Christ camp, which means that all devo songs are sung a capella. Also, there aren't songleaders so much as song-starters, so it's easy for tempo to decline over the course of a song.  But it hasn't been too bad until now.)  Every song slows to a plod, drained of vitality by limited oxygen and the mysterious allergy WCYC has to syncopation.

I can't take it.  I retreat to the bathhouse, more for the walk than for the toilet.  "Well, I hope you like it," I remark to God en route.  Of course I know he does.  I wish I could hear what he hears.

I return quickly so I don't miss the speaker, hoping for evidence to support my theory that we're done with the sin-oriented devos of Monday and Tuesday.  But there is no speaker.  Hmph.