Leaving but I don't know where

Every time I leave The Cove, I do my Last Things. Last croquet lawn fireflies, last pond time, last time checking the mailbox, manically trying to get every last thistle in the garden eradicated as more sprang up overnight... but the crazy thing about this round of 'lasts' I did a couple weeks ago is that I'm leaving the place forreal. I'm sure I'll be back at some point soon, some Work Weekend or whatnot, but what I'm getting at is that I was saying goodbye to this place being my home. For the last two whole years, it's been home. A complicated home, certainly. A home that's been a constant rollercoaster of emotions and struggles and success, mixed feelings of wanting to flee and wanting to stay, heartfelt moments and heartbreaking moments, all of them mixed up together and pretty dang confusing. 

On my way out of Capon Bridge I took some time to sit in town at some familiar haunts. The River House, where I used my free drink on my punch card to get my usual (lavender oat milk iced latte in a for-here cup, lol). My weekly Farmer's Daughter burger (best burger in WV!) where the guys remember my name and remember how I don't like cheese on my burger. And a couple days before, I took my last trip to the food order company we use, Schenk Foods, to pick up a big order in the truck and chat with the guys who have been working there since the camp used a bus to pick up the orders (so like, a really long time). It feels good to be known, and to know a place and it's businesses. To be recognized for getting the same thing every single time. Making the same small talk, but in a good way. Heck, even the lady at the deli counter at the grocery store knew me by the end of this Spring. We joked about how much sliced ham and turkey I always bought. And when I left she said "see you next time" because I'd been so consistent. Instead of saying "no you won't I'm leaving for good," I took a sentimental pic of my lunch meat. Here ya go:

Now I'm sitting on a lovely porch in Pittsburgh after a day of huge thunderstorms. I have lit a couple fancy candles, the dogs are next to me, and I'm reflecting on familiarity, home, and feeling like a local. Even here, in a place where I know basically no one, it's been easy to have nice small talk with the neighbors, to get used to driving back to the house I'm housesitting so much so that I can turn the GPS off when I reach a certain highway. I am a regular at the pressed juice stand at the local markets because they take Venmo, so much so that yesterday the person told me that they're pretty sure I'd had that flavor of juice before. The mailman asked if I knew a person named Annie Cohen on Day 1, and today he chatted with me about the funky piece of mail I got. Familiarity. And for these two short weeks, it does feel like home.

Such yummy juice, I am hooked! 

I've been slacking on blogging in recent years. But this blog has been incredibly useful for me to look back on-- I only wrote during times of transition, reflection times, or times of huge processing. And this time in my life definitely checks those boxes. Leaving a home, searching for a new one, writing from a temporary one. And honestly writing this makes me feel a bit less anxious about what is next. I have not had to expend much effort to feel good in my temporary Pittsburgh home. To feel familiarity with things and to feel like a local. I still am continually tempted by the seasonal lifestyle. At this point, I don't think that is going to change. The thing that has shifted is that I am craving that piece of stability-- to have a routine and people at businesses who know me, to go on my walk with Rana and see the same people and exchange the same pleasantries. I want a regular order at some place other than Chipolte, ya know? I dunno, maybe I'm at the point of my bloggy where I should post a sentimental song quote? This Josh Ritter line rings true right now:

leaving, leaving, leaving but I don't know where

Leaving, leaving, leaving but I don't know where

Well I'm going to wrap this up because I'm not totally sure it has a conclusion. Here's hoping I can have a carefree and most importantly stress free summer after these last two years of... not that... 

But come Fall, I would love love love to find a place that can be my place. At least for a little while ;) Any ideas welcome! Ok, maybe I'll blog again about this ~transition time~, but no promises.  

who woulda thunk it

 

A year ago I was wrapping up my last course in Texas and then all of sudden... it was time to go into camp mode. March 2021 was full of confusion, imposter syndrome, interviewing new staff, goodbyes, and contemplative road tripping. Has it truly been a year since then?? It's got to be at least three years... so here is my attempt to lay out *parts of* this past year in the form of:

Things I never thought I'd do ever but it happened.

I'll try and make it a fun mix. 

Never thought I would....

...be in charge of an entire program during Covid. I really had the thought "Gosh I'm so glad I don't have to be in charge" SO many times during early 2020. Even when I came to the Cove to help Vini run the one camp session of 2020, I was very glad to be a co-plotter and not the final decider. But of course.. we were in charge of all those masking and testing and symptom tracking decisions this past year. And we still are.. dammit.

...actually enjoy hanging out with babies. A lot of people in my life had babies this year. And I shocked myself by really enjoying my time cooing at, walking around with said babies, and ooo-ing and ahhhh-ing at them eating solid foods. Turns out babies are pretty cute!

...be solidly in one place for a whole growing season. In April with the help of Scott and Eliza I turned the first beds in the garden, and in late November Jennifer and I put the last layer of hay on top of the freshly weeded garden so it can rest until spring. I loved every bit of having my own garden. Even when the ram pump didn't work and I couldn't for the life of me stay on top of weeding, being down there to see the huge sunflowers and troves of tomatoes brought me a ton of joy

...drive an old ford tractor. This is the tractor David has at the Cove to mow all the fields every fall so that they don't turn into forest. I had to learn to start it and stop it... neither of which are at all simple because 1. There is no starter, you have to touch two wires together for the correct amount of time 2. If it's too cold and you mess up on the said amount of time, you can't start it 3. It will only stop on very certain terrain because it barely has brakes.

   ...speak in front of 300+ people. Public speaking is definitely my least favorite thing. Vini always joked about how scared I was during my very first inspection skit as a wee 16 year old staff member where I got up in front of the entire camp and was visibly quaking... so maybe it was weirdly fitting that 14 years laster I stood up with my dear co-directors at Vini's memorial service and gave a speech. I sure as heck tried to not look at anyone during our speech, but was pleasantly surprised that I did not quake and in fact, it went pretty well. Here is us and the shirtless guy who kept circling on his bike during the service.

...help evac a camper from an overnight accompanied by two goats. There is just no way I could have every predicted that... I mean come on. It turned out to be our only good story of the summer. Like, when anyone asked for how summer was : "well... this one time..."

... haul a dead deer carcass from near the main lodge to a farther woods location. Just part of our duties as camp directors... I never knew! And I am definitely not looking forward to that part when I return to the Cove in a few weeks.

And surely there are a million other things that I can't think of, but I need to finally post a blog, so that's all I got! 

"How did summer go?"

What the… it’s already September?? I’ve been at the Cove for 5 months now, and the time warp is real. Has it sped by, crept along, is there anything else even happening in the world? I currently have a weird amount of time “off,” although you’re never really off when you’re here. There’s always something to clean, or it’s pouring rain so you have to squeegee the decks or else the lodge will flood, or you should respond to some emails, or write a reference, or weed the garden. But for the most part, I am enjoying some much needed relaxing time after an absolutely bonkers summer. Sitting here in my cozy cabin, I can’t even remember why the summer was so crazy—I’m so far removed now that summer was a whole two weeks ago, and I’ve fully caught up on sleep.

The other night in DC I sat at a beautiful Shabbat dinner where we went around and shared a theme from our summer. The first theme that came to my mind was emptiness. We are so used to having Vini’s voice eloquently or humorously explain something, and this summer we only had our three voices. Often it just felt as though we were stumbling along, going through the motions and probably missing a lot of nuance along the way. We would get to the end of a reading, or Final Circle, or Folklore Night, and say something like: “well, that went Ok, but it felt sort of empty.” At the same time we knew that we were still helping create the magic for the campers, and to them it probably didn’t feel all that different. For those who aren’t camp people reading this, there’s a common phrase most often said by Vini—“there’s no fuckin’ magic,” which refers to how life on the staff side of things is a lot of behind the scenes work to create each unique camp session.

Many people have asked me the “how are things going?” question. I’ve said something along these lines:

For the campers, this summer was hugely successful. They loved camp, they can’t wait to come back, and the magic was fully there. For staff, they worked their butts off, seemed to have a pretty good time, and pulled off a ton of magic for the campers, and I think there was some for themselves too. For us Leader Ladies, there were a select few times where we felt the magic for ourselves. I have one distinct memory of feeling really good—Jennifer and I finished serving firsts on burgers on the Bald to the camp session and we sat down on the edge of the group of campers and staff to snarf our own food before serving seconds. The light was gorgeous, all the people around us were happily shouting/ arguing about some fun conversation topic, all we had left to do was Final Circle and then walk down the mountain. I could see the magic happening, I even felt pretty proud of it all, but I was still on the periphery—not fully able to immerse myself in it because of all the other things on my brain of tasks to do and the evening to manage.

That’s not to say that there weren’t other good moments this summer. When I could get out of the office and spend time with campers, things felt good. I spent time in the tree canopy and did a few pickling workshops, got out for a couple games of frisbee, ponded when I could, and went on some evening walks. I spent a lot of time laughing about things with my fellow Leader Ladies too—this summer would have been a different beast if not for the amazing working dynamic we formed. We consistently were on the same page and had the same thoughts about priorities throughout the day, which to us really emphasized how incredible it was that we all were trained/ raised by Vini to know exactly how to approach the various situations that occur at camp.

I do feel really proud that we made it through this summer. The first Cove summer without Vini and during Covid was always going to be a huge and daunting hurdle, and now it is done. On the whole, we accomplished our goals:

• as many campers as possible at half capacity (achieved by 5 one-week sessions instead of 3 two-week sessions)
• as many staff working as possible (staff working less, but hiring as many people as possible)
• staff training because most staff missed a whole year of work due to Covid last summer (practice leading overnights and facilitating and teaching as much as possible, cramming all elements of a two-week session in)
• as far as we know, no Covid cases (achieved by lots of mitigation even when it felt absurd to mask in our “buildings” that barely even have walls)

So there's your mostly surface-level update on how summer was. Of course each day was full of small fires to put out and ridiculous events that are all a blur now, and I didn't have a moment to journal so they will forever be a blur or live on in the few postcards I managed to write during those two months. Now to answer: What's next? Prepping for Fall school groups (they start in less than two weeks), sleeping as much as possible, catching up with people by mail or by phone, maybe looking for a new car, and slightly dreading my 30th birthday coming up this month. I also just signed a contract for another year as Interim Director along with Jennifer. So, the Cove will be my home for the time being. In the winter I hope to bounce around and work remotely, so hit me up if you have any house-sitting, sub-letting, and especially dog-sitting needs!

Ok, the end. I have achieved three whole blog posts this year, so that's a success! Heck maybe I'll squeeze in another with some nice Fall tales, but no promises!

All I Really Need to Know I Learned at Camp

This post is a play on an essay that is frequently read at camp: All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarden. I've found that so much of communal living and parts of my job here are second nature to me, because of all my years at camp. I've unknowingly been prepared to be a sanitation/ composting/ recycling/ behavior managing freak. Hopefully in a helpful way....

Here is what camp super duper prepared me for:

How to walk alone at night without a light

How to use an electric percolator

How nice it is to clean out the percolator at night instead of in the morning right before you’re trying to make coffee

How to load a dish rack to go into a sanitizer so that a lot of stuff can fit in but everything gets clean

That a sanitizer is not the same as a dishwasher

Knowing that Simple Green degreases, Bleach kills germs

How to think/ cook for people with allergies

It's important to change the mop water often

Automatically knowing where every weird food item is stored in the kitchen, fridge, and dry storage areas

How to get a large group of people quiet quickly

How to deftly answer non-sequitor questions without losing my train of thought

The importance of planning ahead for lessons and gathering materials ahead of time Make a back-up plan and a rain plan

Do not go in the kitchen without close-toed shoes (though I have learned that better here)

Sometimes you can’t save every food item

If something has been in the fridge for too long, just chuck it in the compost and don't be sad about it

How to think on my feet and whip out a game for any situation

How to quickly respond to first aid incidents

How meat should be stored in the fridge

What can and cannot be recycled

How to manage a group of crazy children at a meal

How to have stimulate interesting table conversations but keep it from getting too rowdy
How to cook for mass amounts of people

and a billion other things.

MLIC (My Life Is Camp)

The end-o-summer transition away from camp is never easy. Sure, there's always bird count and there's always small camp reunions throughout the year, but nothing can compare to a magical summer at Cooper's Cove. However, this summer marks a new transition: leaving camp for good (wow, writing that was really hard). For the past two years, and I could go so far as to say the past eight years, my life has been camp. My summers there are a huge part of my identity. I shape my experiences during the entire year around camp. If I pick up a new skill or learn a new fact, I always think about how I can apply it to working at The Cove. I tell camp stories to anyone who will listen, and I tell them even if they won't listen, oops. I look through old boxes of memorabilia and read through old journals and look at pictures and reminisce about all the hilarious things that happened in the collective memory of camp. And then February comes around and I get to work on (or craft) the camp application and fully let myself get excited for another summer, because Spring is right around the corner and camp comes after that.  Camp camp camp, how many times can I write 'camp'?

And now, suddenly, my time working at the best place/job in the world has come to an end. I'm 24, and finally ready to acknowledge that I want to gain other experiences during the summer. I've started a new job in the environmental education field, and it's exciting.

And yet all I want to do I be able to return to camp. I want to take all of the activities and tricks that I've learned in training here in Georgia and apply them to my morning workshops at camp. I want to go back to the comforting schedule of Reflections before dinner every day, and an Inspection Report at lunch, the Bird List at dinner, and Ashokan Farewell at the end of Folklore Night. I want my hair to smell like pond, and I want to be able to recognize by sight which logs will definitely house a salamander (I can't do that log thing at this new place and it's driving me crazy).

Maybe those things are the exact reason that I shouldn't go back. I need to push my comfort zone, I need to grow more, I need to leave what I know to try what I'm wondering about. I grew up and became myself at The Cove, and I learned more than I could ever fully articulate in this blog post. I've learned enough to fend for myself elsewhere, I hope. It breaks my heart to not go back in the same capacity, and the last few weeks have been rough because of that feeling of loss/ of feeling lost. I think that as the season here gets busy and the end of summer gets farther away and hopefully new opportunities loom, I will have an easier time of it. But for now, bear with me on my continuing trip down memory lane.

Speaking of, here's a picture that Vini sent me today of young camper Annie, catchin' bugs. #tbt

2nd Session Highlights

Sometimes my schedule lends itself to frequent blog posts, and sometimes I barely have time to get all my postcard writing checked off. Which is more important? Postcards, duh. But I have been unable to share about each camp session fully in just a short postcard, so the time has come to bloggy.

I'll share a few pictures/ highlights from 2nd session, which ended about a week two weeks ago:

Perhaps even winning the honor of Best Nerdy Nature Camp Moment of the Summer, this was certainly a session highlight. To set the scene: It was the end of morning project time, and the table setters bell was about to ring. Suddenly a Barred Owl flew up the stream and landed in a tree, and few people saw and called out. They got the attention of everyone around the lodge, and one by one the entire camp gathered near the stream with binoculars and cameras and quietly stood admiring the owl. The bell rang (lunch for the day was Pizza Bagels, an alltime crowd pleaser) and no one moved. We all just stood and watched the owl. Many teachable moments were had-- nature nerd camp in action!

Another great event of 2nd session: Monongahela! Everyone at 2nd session goes backpacking here for 2 nights and 3 days, but in small groups. My group was named BEAKN'JAMMS, and then we all yelled THUNDER COUGAR FALCONS after our countoff because obviously that's what BEAKN'JAMMS spells! Our theme: Classic South North Blueberry Traverse aka we did it all! Great views, great poos, blueberries, relaxing on epic rocks, all the mud, all the farts, and rock club. I discovered that my new favorite trail in the Dolly Sods Wilderness is the Raven Ridge Trail. The mud is plentiful but the views and field-y spruce-y bits are spectacular. And we found a digging turtle.

Best turtle of second session: Mushroom Turtle (although digging turtle was a close second). We found Mushroom Turtle during project time. We were out by the stream searching for sweet mushrooms to paint, but instead we found this guy with mushrooms ALL over his face. Tell me, is there anything cuter? Nope.

Girls night with Cory 2k15!!! Ok I guess this was after 2nd session but it involved nail polish, sweet tunes, drawing, candles, and table dance parties while everyone else was off watching some movie. Our night was way better.

Getting heat exhaustion while doing the end of session burger cookout. Well I guess it's not a quite a highlight, but it's still something that happened. My advice to you: Don't stand over a really really hot fire for hours on a heat index day and then hike up to the Bald to do final ceremony and awards. It's terrible. Disclaimer: This picture is from the 3rd session cookout where there was zero heat exhaustion involved and I actually had to put on a sweater to serve burgers because it was so cool out.

Now third session is over-- it really took me almost 10 days to write this one blog post.  mark of how busy this summer has been! Maybe I'll post something again maybe.

Mushrooms and amphibians and cabins, oh my!

I moved to camp on Thursday, and by now I think it is safe to say that I'm settled in. At least, I have enough damp clothing and rodent-chewed fabric to show that I've been here a while.

I'm feeling lucky about quite a few things regarding my current living situation.

1. Free room and board-- always fun to have, and we eat quite well. Roasted turkey and mashed potatoes one night, baked chicken and fresh-picked morels another night... mmmm mmm. We took a couple of hours off from work to hunt for morels on the hills, and we found a good number of them.

2. Close access to salamanders. I can just turn over pretty much any log around and find them-- it's been super rainy and perfect for sals! Stay tuned for way too many pictures of salamanders.

3. Sharing a cabin with my friend Bridget. We live in Heights, aptly named for how it's the the farthest cabin up from the lodge. It's my favorite place to live at camp, because it has a big porch with a swing, and because I feel like I'm sleeping outside. We get lots of deer, spider, flying squirrel, and moth visitors.

My pet cactus isn't as happy about the living situation-- it had been super cold and wet-- not a good time to be a cactus. But tomorrow is May, so all hope is not lost.

Barbarians

I've spent the last few weeks in tandem. Part of my time involves living in a beautiful tent on the hillside above the field with a stunning view of Left and Right Ridge out my tent window, while the other part involves killing and poisoning things for a few hours a day. My job description actually says 'Destroyer'-- my duty is to tear out wineberry and barberry bushes. Taylor, my partner in crime, and I spend our days in various locations around the lodge, gloves on hand and loppers close by. We rip out wineberry, stuff our faces with berries, get covered in scratches, attempt to avoid poison ivy, jump in the pond, try to pull out every barberry plant, get more scratches, use loppers to cut down enormous barberry, sometimes dump borax solution on the roots in hopes of poisoning them, jump in the pond again, and take long snack breaks.

Here's a picture of the tent. I like it because I feel like I'm outside (I can see the entire sky), but I also am effectively inside (I have a real bed and mattress and everything!). We even have a guest room! For real.

And that just about sums up this past week! Next up: Monongahela and Cake for Lunch. 

Note to anyone who is reading this:

Sorry I've been failing at blogging. I meant to, I really did, but summertime just zips by with little time for things like computers and witty remarks. Which is why I did not write a long blog post-- taking a break from blogging and school has made me less able to write things coherently. Cheerio!

April salamanders

It would be too difficult to summarize my amphibian/children/friend packed week in a blog post, so here it is - salamander style.


Part 1: I was in Maine helping my dear friend Lucy with her amphibian camp. Many salamanders to be found!

We counted spotted salamander egg masses in various ponds and vernal pools on MDI

Caught stream salamanders (two-lined) in Mill Brook at the Cox property

Found two headless spotted salamanders...

We also found frogs. And on my last night in town Matt showed me some live spotted salamanders hanging around in some pools. What a relief! Spring without holding a real spotted would have been disappointing.

Part 2: Opening weekend at the Cove - could not leave until I thoroughly searched the stream for salamanders. Of all addicting pastimes, I feel pretty OK about this one.

Not sure what species- maybe dusky.

Northern red

Dusky

Long-tailed. My favorite- hands down.

Tomorrow I will begin my journey to lands with no salamanders, so I'm very glad to have spent some quality time with these guys this past week.

Next up: Reptiles in Arizona!

Pros and cons: Airport edition

I travel on planes pretty often, so you would assume that I am pro at airports and catching flights. You would be very wrong in this assumption. I seem to be incapable of having a smooth airport/plane experience. Either I get picked for extra screening, or I sprint around the airport with my frame backpack and act frazzled. Or there was that one time that I got on the wrong flight. Turns out I was waiting at the wrong gate, and there were two flights to Bangor at 9 pm that night. Why I so stupid??

This weekend I was traveling back to Prescott from DC and stupidly had a half an hour layover in ATL (never do this!!). The airport is huge and I had to sprint through two terminals only to easily get on my flight and wait around while other late people just strolled in. Then I almost missed my shuttle and got stranded in Phoenix.

But I still love flying because you get views like this:

And you get to be places that you love:

With the gimps that you've been missing:

It was a wonderful weekend with camp friends in DC, and we even squeezed in a trip to the Cove. Now it's back to school. I'll put on my teenage mutant ninja turtle hat and go to class now.

Happy Halloweeeen!

Salamanderz

I thought I should have some sort of nature blog post, since I do work at nature camp/ bug camp. Plus, I cicada nature!


On a slightly nature-related note, here is my favorite picture from 2nd session's final exam: The Great Race! Staph vs. Campers. We prepared for it with quite the rigorous training regimen (intimidation + lunges with biology textbooks + flexing zee gunz).

Pulling chara and WINNING!

Anyway, back to nature. Salamanders! I've been having a great time searching for them in our stream this summer after taking herpetology. 1st session I had camper projects about salamanders, and I am siked to teach about them at 3rd session as well.

This is a long-tailed. Except that you can't see the tail. But I swear it's there!

I believe this is a northern red, but a juvenile because it's not super dark yet.

This is not a salamander, but a pic of The Bald at final ceremony! It was a gorgeous night.

Stay tuned for more salamander pics! I maybe take too many. But they are sooooo cuuute!