Welcome To Camp Hell

When I was a teenager, my dad and step-mom sent me to a Christian camp for a week, citing that my brother had loved his time there years ago and that I would have fun, too. A lot of kids from our church in my age group were going, too, but I don’t think my parents realized that I wasn’t really friends with any of them.

The week started off poorly when it turned out that the only bedding provided was sheets — no pillow or comforter — so I had to use about half of my spending money to buy a tiny and overpriced pillow to use. I have no idea how my parents missed that, as the other campers all had supplies, and I was never given any information beforehand outside of “You’re going; isn’t that great?!”

Days at the camp were filled with mandatory sports activities; anything that I actually found fun, like rock climbing or paintball, cost extra money per session that I now didn’t have due to the pillow problem. While I love being physically active, I hate being told how to be physically active, so I half-a**ed my way through the first day or two until life gave me a blessing.

Right on schedule, that time of the month arrived! I might have been a tad too gleeful telling the counselor that I wouldn’t be able to play flag-volley-fris-ball for the rest of the week, as they kind of squinted at me and asked if I was fine with telling everyone I was on my period, which I was.

The rest of the week, I was able to sit in the shade sketching, and I was only required to attend the daily church gatherings where over-excited twenty-somethings would tell us how important it was to make sure we brought all our friends to God so they wouldn’t end up in Hell. Fun for the whole family!

I finished up the week with a dozen sketch pages filled and a frown on my face as my dad asked me how my time was. I told him exactly what I thought about being sent to camp with no friends and people telling me to do things I hate all day. My dad got a thoughtful look on his face and then said, “Oh, yeah! [Brother] actually hated that camp! Sorry about that!”

While I didn’t commit patricide, I also didn’t get sent to camp again, so small victories, I guess.