My first time at summer camp was a defining experience for me at 9 years old. Camp was my first time out away from civilization for more than overnight; camp made me a better soccer player and better swimmer; I began learning some new skills, like sailing; I made some new friends, whom I've never forgotten.

Camp was a sexual turning-point, too. I "woke up" at Y-camp during those two short weeks, sexually. I knew before camp that I liked boys as well as girls. I demonstrated it during those two weeks - in particular, by playing a very overtly-sexual variety of water-tag, called "grab-the-weenie", with the other boys. And if things had gone differently with one boy, one night in the woods, I might have lost my boy-virginity at 9 y/o instead of 10. I wanted that. I was ready, and I was trying. But fate is a funny thing.

Another funny thing to me, is the way writing these memories makes me aware of their relative importance. As I write this, it's by far the longest story I've written about my childhood. I never realized how much I remembered about Y- camp at 9 years old - nor how crucial those two weeks were in making me who I am. Writing this autobiography has continually opened doors that I had kept closed. But going in, I had no idea that this particular set of memories would come out as it did.

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I went to summer camp for two different summers: between 4th and 5th grade, at 9 y/o, and again two summers later at 11 y/o. Same camp, both summers. It was run by the YMCA, and was located out in the woods on a lake, about two hours from the city.

I had a number of reasons I wanted to go to the Y-camp in particular that first summer: Several of my 4th-grade friends and neighborhood friends were planning to go, too; I liked going to different places (and my family were notorious stick-close-to-home types); Y-camp was primarily centered around sports (I didn't want to go to some camp where you just sat around and made wallets all day :)); and it was located on a huge lake, right on the waterfront. Water has always attracted me like a gigantic magnet. You could put me down anywhere blindfolded, then or now; and I'd know within seconds if we were near water, salt or fresh.

Another factor in my planning - minor when I was 9 y/o, major when I went back two years later: the Y-camp was all boys. YMCA camps, and YMCAs themselves, weren't coed back then, not in the South anyway. At 9, I liked the boys'-camp concept because I figured the sports and activities would be more fun. I still figured that at 11 y/o; the difference was that in the meantime I had learned all about how to play a new sport - a sport that only boys could play... But that's a later story.

The camp's proper official name followed time-honored American summer-camp tradition and featured a Native American name in the title. But nobody ever called it by its official name, except in camp songs and the like - it was always "The Y-camp" or just "Y-camp".

(By the way, there was a girls' camp on the other side of the lake. Of course there was a girls' camp on the other side of the lake. I've talked to dozens of adults who grew up going to summer camp, and I think all but a handful went to camps where the two sexes were opposite each other in this fashion. I conclude that it must be illegal in the United States for a boys' camp to be located anywhere except across a lake from a girls' camp. :) Interestingly, we literally never saw any girls - or any humans at all - over there the whole time I was at camp, both years. Perhaps it was a Potemkin village, a fake camp set up by the YMCA to satisfy that federal law. :))

The Y-camp wasn't a true sports camp, the way they have sports camps nowadays, with professional coaches and day-long instruction and drills. I don't recall many genuine sports camps at all back in the 70s. I'm sure they existed, but they weren't the big deal that sports camps are for kids today. The Y-camp was as close as you'd get to a camp in which sports were central - as close as you'd get in our income bracket, anyway.

As you'd expect, many of our activities centered around water: swimming (both serious-instructional and fun-recreational), sailing, canoeing, kayaking (not introduced until my second summer), and fishing. We could choose our activities; and I chose swimming, which always was (and still is) my favorite individual sport. We also played soccer. I had been playing for three summers by then, and was acquiring some good skills, so soccer was a must-do activity for me. In retrospect, I think the Y-camp was where I first developed the association of soccer, swimming, and sexuality that persists to this day for me. Those were by far my three favorite activities as a kid. :)

In addition to the water stuff and soccer, we could pick from basketball, softball, volleyball, and archery. For the less-athletically-inclined kids, they had badminton and croquet, and I'm sure some other stuff I'm forgetting. We also did arts & crafts - making ashtrays, coaches'-whistle lanyards, and these gold-foil plaque things that were supposed to look like bas-relief but ended up looking like somebody had pissed all over discarded aluminum foil. :) And - oh, yes - wallets. :) I actually made a wallet that summer. It was a wretched piece of work, resembling a mudpie that someone had accidentally baked in a waffle iron. Arts and crafts has never been Danny's strong suit. :)

Even before that 9th summer, I had been interested in Y-camp. Lots of my friends were, too. Some of us were members of the Y (I wasn't); and most of us went there from time to time to play basketball or swim (I did). I remember seeing the colorful brochure in the rack next to the front desk, with a big title that read Camp _______: A YMCA Camp for Boys from 8 through 16 Years Old, over photos of kids playing softball and canoeing; and thinking, "Wow - I wanna go there!"

I don't remember asking my mom about going to Y-camp the summer I was 8 y/o. If I did ask, I didn't press it. That was a busy summer, anyway; it was my second season playing soccer and the first that I was on swim team, and I had increased household chores, too. But over the course of the following school year, 4th grade, I got significantly more interested. That was my first year at my new elementary school, and there were a number of kids in my class who were planning to go.

Along about April or May of my 9th year, I asked my mom about going. You never knew about things like this with my mom. Sometimes she'd say "No", without discernable reason; sometimes she'd agree without a murmur; sometimes (often) she'd just not answer you. I was a little surprised in this case when she agreed without discussion. Maybe she was ready to see me gone for two weeks. I'd developed the habit of getting on her nerves by that age. :) (This was also around the time I took the family car for a joyride - maybe she had a point. :))

The Y-camp ran a bunch of different summer sessions, each lasting two weeks. I picked the last session, which was essentially the first two weeks in August. We went back to school around August 25th every year, so that was a grand finale to the summer. I picked that session mostly because three of my friends were planning on attending the same one. As it turned out, one kid couldn't go at all, and another had to switch to an earlier date. That left me and another school friend, Phil, together that summer. No biggie - I was disappointed my old buds couldn't be there with us; but making new friends was always fun, too. I didn't know Phil really well before camp, but as you'd expect, we bonded over the course of that two weeks.

I guess my mom took care of the prep work, filling out medical forms and all that - at that age I wasn't aware of the bureaucratic aspect. I do remember getting the checklist of stuff we needed to bring - 20 T-shirts, 3 pairs of sneakers, stuff like that. My mom left me the task of assembling the stuff. I don't remember the quantities (and if I did, I wouldn't list them here - there is such a thing as too much trivia in these memoirs, believe it or not. :))

Some of the stuff on the list struck me as unnecessary. For example, pajamas. I'd been sleeping in just my underwear since 6-7 y/o, and I thought it was silly to get PJs just for camp, so I didn't. The number of sheets, blankets, and towels seemed inordinately large, so I ended up taking just a couple of each - which turned out to be twice as much as I needed. (Three years later, my brother went off to Y-camp, and he developed a concept that eliminated the need for sheets altogether - he just slept in his sleeping bag on the bunk bed the entire two weeks. It seems completely obvious now - and in fact, when I became a counselor at another camp years later, sleeping bags were the officially-specified sleeping gear - but he was apparently the only kid in camp who thought of it then. The more I think about that, the odder it seems, actually... but life can be odd, huh? :))

Two other requirements relevant to this story: We were asked to bring two swimsuits, and we were required - in CAPITAL LETTERS - to bring a bar of IVORY BRAND soap. I complied with the swimsuit request and packed both of mine, but I remember wondering why we needed them - the male-only YMCAs of the time allowed nude swimming in the pool, and I knew from talking with friends that Y-camp was no different. As it happened, swimsuits were a good idea. Rec swim (i.e., recreational swimming) was swimsuit-optional, but we had to wear suits if we signed up for instructional swimming (I did). And there were other water sports, of course. We also went sailing and canoeing, and those took us to far corners of the lake, where ordinary people, and girls too, might be encountered. (As it turned out, I never saw another soul the whole two weeks other than those affiliated with our camp.)

The reason behind the IVORY SOAP requirement was simple to understand, once I got to camp. No showers - bathing was in the lake. And if your soap didn't float, you weren't going to bathe after the first day. :) (I doubt the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency would have approved - and I doubt any camp can get away with soap-baths in the lake today.)

We also were required to bring a backpack - the overnight, aluminum-frame type. Most kids rented theirs; so did I. It was the first time I'd had one, and that was kind of exciting, like a rite of passage: "Hey! I get to carry all my stuff around with a real backpack!" :)

I don't recall a big anticipatory build-up to the day we left for camp. I was busy with other stuff. I do recall talking to Phil about how cool it would be. We both had our activities all picked out. For me, swimming and soccer, naturally; and I was also eager to try sailing, which I'd never done before. On land, I wanted to play softball and volleyball in particular. Phil also wanted soccer and swimming. He'd never played regulation, just backyard kick- soccer. And he wasn't a strong or experienced swimmer, and he wanted to improve. His interests were more dryland than mine; I think he wanted to do all the land-sports, even croquet. Our big divergence was basketball. Although I played it with friends, I have never been overly fond of basketball; it was Phil's primo sport. I told him that once he played real soccer, he'd never look back. I told all my friends the same thing, repeatedly. I was a soccer evangelist. :) At any rate, Phil didn't need much convincing; by camp time he was getting up some real enthusiasm for the game.

The Y-camp - wisely, in my opinion, then and now - told parents they weren't part of their kids' camp experience. Parents were welcome on two days only: opening day, and then only long enough to drop off their campers; and closing day, which was "Family Day" with picnics and such.

If your parents didn't drive you to camp, you had another option: they ran several buses from the downtown YMCA out to camp on opening day. I was excited about that bus trip. My mom wasn't keen on driving me; and besides, the bus trip sounded cool - great potential for having fun before you even reached camp. Phil was planning to ride with his dad, but I convinced him to tell his parents that the bus would save them gas money and hassle. They bought the argument, apparently. :)

I want to describe Opening Day of camp in as much detail as I can remember. It's a lengthy description - it takes up the rest of Part 1, and all of Part 2. If you'd rather not read the whole thing, here's a summary: I rode the bus to camp, arrived, got settled in at my cabin, played kick-soccer with new and old friends, ate dinner, watched movies, and went to bed - getting to know a bunch of new friends (and one annoying kid) in the process. But I hope you'll read it. You want to know about that annoying kid, at least, right? :)

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Early in the afternoon on Opening Day, Sunday, we gathered around the front entrance to the Y with our backpacks and sleeping bags and assorted miscellaneous camp stuff. I got there before Phil. There were already about 10-12 kids there waiting. A few were talking to each other, but most were quiet, seemingly shy, looking away from each other. Looked like a job for Danny, the social worker. :) I've always made friends easily, and I had a good method for doing that in my pocket: a deck of cards. I'm not the world's smoothest card shark - I have a good memory, but for some reason my memory doesn't extend to remembering what cards have been played during a game... But I like cards, and I have met very few boys who don't.

This day, I got out my deck and approached every one of those kids about a game of gin rummy. They were without exception happy that someone came up and talked to them. :) Some didn't know how to play. I said I'd teach them (gin rummy is an easy game to pick up). All but a few were willing, and pretty soon we were sitting cross-legged on the sidewalk, playing cards and yakking like we'd known each other forever.

I miss that about boyhood. Nowadays, as adults, we have to go through all those little "get-to-know-you" rituals; back then, you just said, "Wanna play with me?", and the other boy said "Yeah!", and within a few minutes you were playing with each other. It worked that way with cards, with soccer, with most things you did for fun. Sex, too. Sex was a natural, healthy extension of that childhood fun, to me. I got the same enjoyment out of introducing my friends to sex that I got out of introducing them to kick-soccer or gin rummy. I believe they accepted and enjoyed all those things in the same way, too. It's sad that as we grow older, sex gets freighted with adult complexity and emotion. Soccer and cards never stay just soccer and cards, either. Instead of pure fun, you keep score and you argue and you take it seriously.

Back to the sidewalk. Somewhere in the midst of a hand, Phil showed up, and of course I dragged him into our circle. I loved introducing old friends and new friends to each other, as much as I loved making friends. I don't know why that made me feel so good, but even today it really gets me on cloud nine. Phil enthusiastically joined in. We all got so involved that we didn't notice at first when the buses rolled up. (It's a good thing nobody decided to take our backpacks and stuff - I'm not sure that I, for one, would've noticed.)

After the buses pulled up, the counselors got off and started rounding people up. That took a while; there were probably around 40-50 kids by that time. I recognized one of the counselors, Flip - a 17-18 y/o guy from our neighborhood. He saw me about the same time I saw him, and said, "Oh, God, not Danny!" (I had a not-undeserved reputation in the neighborhood as a smart-ass kid. :)) He was a good guy and I think he actually liked me a lot, although he always acted like I was a big pain in the butt. Toward the end of camp, I heard that Flip told his cabin that his mom said I was "headed for either the White House or the jail house". Gee - nowadays a kid can grow up to do both. :)

One bus was for the 8-12 year-olds, the other for the 13-16 year-olds. We got out stuff stowed underneath our bus, climbed on and took seats with our friends. I sat next to Phil, and in front and behind were kids I'd gotten to know on the sidewalk. The bus was about three-quarters full. We were all talking at once, naturally. Envision a bus loaded with 20-30 boys, all between 8 and 12 years old, all on their way to two weeks of summer camp. Can you imagine that bus being anything but deafening? Me neither. :)

The ride was a big blur for two hours. I guess we went through some pretty scenery - the camp was in a picturesque area. But we could've been riding on the Jersey Turnpike through downtown Newark for all I noticed. :) The two kids in front of us, Tommy and Chuck, and Phil and I all wanted to play soccer, as it happened. Both Tommy and Chuck had played on teams before, though not as much as I had. Even better, we all wanted to play complementary positions - Chuck was a defender; Tommy played midfield; and I liked striker forward (good ol' Danny, always wanting the glory position - hey, I was good at it!) Phil, being newer to the sport, was a logical utility guy. So we quickly agreed to try and get assigned to the same team. (As it happened, Y-camp rotated players among all teams - actually good sports-camp strategy, as I now realize; but we were a little bummed to find out, after all our best-laid plans...)

We sang some camp songs on the bus, led by the counselors. I guess that was our first camp-socialization experience, so to speak - learning common rituals and bonding through them. I have a lousy memory for folk songs like that, for some reason... I have been trying to remember those songs, and I've forgotten most of them. That's even sillier when you consider that I taught campers those songs when I was a counselor at 16 and 19 years old... oh, well... But I remember two songs we sang on that bus ride, and later at Y- camp. One was that neverending classic, "99 Bottles of Pop On the Wall". Of course we sang that song; and yes, of course we all knew it was really "Beer" and not "Pop" - but you couldn't sing "Beer" at the YMCA.

"Follow the Drinking Gourd" was the other song I recall. Something that fascinates me now about "Follow the Drinking Gourd": It was originally a folk song from the Underground Railroad before the Civil War, and was sung by escaped slaves to remind them of how to find their way to freedom. The "Drinking Gourd" was the Big Dipper (or Plough to Europeans), a constellation that lies close to the North Star. The slaves could follow it northward at night - out of the South, through Kentucky, then Ohio or Indiana, to get to Michigan, then across the river to Canada and freedom. At the time I was too young to realize it - but it was probably pioneering, even radical, for Southern white kids (very few campers were black or other races) in that era to be singing a Northern abolitionist folk song. I'll bet two things: (a) It probably came from a national YMCA songbook; and (b) campers five or 10 years earlier weren't singing it. I'm happy I was born during a time when we could do it.

We pulled up in the camp parking lot. As soon as that fact penetrated the excitement, we were all out of our seats, ready to charge off the bus and explore the place. Of course, the counselors and adults had other ideas. Before they opened the bus doors, we were informed, we'd be told what cabins we were assigned to, and then as soon as we got off, we were supposed to gather around the counselor holding our cabin's sign. They had obviously done this before. It took a few minutes to read off all the kids' names, and we were almost climbing the bus walls by the time he finished. The very last cabin announced was mine and Phil's, naturally.

Phil and I were pretty sure we were going to be in the same cabin - we'd requested that on our signup forms. But we didn't know which cabin, nor whether anyone else we knew on the bus was going to be with us. I knew a lot of kids on the bus by now, but not their names - kids don't do names until there's a reason, you know? - so the assignments being read off meant nothing to me. Tommy and Chuck were in one of the first cabins listed. They had requested to be together, too. They cheered when their names were read off, one right after the other. I listened for Phil's and my name, and was disappointed when that cabin's list ended without them. After the counselor had moved on to the next cabin, Chuck turned and said, "Hey, are y'all in our cabin too?" I said, "No..." All four of us were disappointed that we wouldn't be together. (The odds were against us, of course; but we didn't think of life in terms of odds and probability. We believed in magic.)

When at last the assignments were doled out, they opened the doors, and we charged off the bus like coiled springs. We milled around, a seething mass of laughing boys, scanning the signs being held high overhead by the counselors. I remember some kids being confused about which sign to look for. They hadn't spelled the cabin names for us, and some of them, the Native American names in particular, weren't very easy to understand. Ours was straightforward enough, however: Cabin W_____ (named after a major financial supporter of the Y-camp, I later found out).

Phil and I found our sign, and gathered with the other kids and our counselors. I knew two of the eight other boys already, from the card game, but the rest were "strangers". It didn't matter. I didn't acknowledge the concept of strangerhood among other kids, then. We all got to know the kids around us, in that easy, osmotic way that kids form instant friendships in circumstances like that. We were all in the same summer-camp boat, and it was a damn good boat, so far.

Our counselors introduced themselves to the group - Counselor Hal, the guy in charge, and the other counselor, whose name I've forgotten. Our cabin was home to 10 boys and 1.5 counselors. I say "1.5", because we had one counselor, Hal, who was there all the time, and another counselor who was supposed to be there all the time but disappeared quite frequently. I don't think he slept in the cabin but a couple of nights the whole two weeks. I have no idea what he was up to. Maybe sneaking out to meet girls from the other camp. Or maybe sneaking out to meet boys from our camp. (Highly unlikely; but who knows?)

Counselor Hal was pretty cool. He was an old guy - maybe as old as 18! I know he was in high school. He kept warning us over that whole two-week period about how tough school was after you left elementary. He said it was really, really hard, and you could expect to get a lot of D's and F's on your report card. I got the impression Hal was having trouble with school.

Hal went through some more announcement stuff that I've long since forgotten (if I even heard it). The main thing I remember was the schedule for the next few hours: take our stuff to our cabin, get settled in; then after all the campers had arrived, we would gather back at the main quad near the entrance to go for an orientation walk. Hal told us we'd have some free time, since campers riding with parents would be showing up over the next several hours. He said, "Listen for the big brass bell. That's your signal to gather - just follow the sound. Until then you can do whatever you want..." Zing! My thoughts went immediately to swimming and that big lake (which we hadn't even seen yet!) But Hal wasn't quite finished with the sentence: "...except two things - don't go out in the woods away from camp, and don't go down to the lake."

I said, more to myself than anyone else, "Aww, shoot." Hal heard that, turned to me, and said, "We don't want anybody getting lost or drowning the first day." I said, "But I'm a good swimmer!" He said, "Maybe you are, but there are some kids who don't even know how, and we can't watch everybody today." Dang - my first argument with an authority figure, and I'd only been there five minutes. It wasn't an argument, though - all good-natured. I ended up getting along with Hal really well, in fact.

This is a good place to pause and describe camp geography. Y-camp was arranged in a sort of irregular L-shape along a bend in the lakeshore. The docks were near the center of camp, almost in the right-angle of the shoreline. If you stood on the swimming dock with your back to the lake, looking up at the mess-hall and quad at camp's center, you were facing northwest. Uphill in front of you were the community buildings and places - the (aptly-named) mess- hall where we ate, with the gym on the upper level; the camp store where you could buy candy bars and postcards and camp T-shirts and shorts; the arts & crafts building; the building that housed the camp "medical clinic" and "library" (neither as grand as the name suggests); and some other buildings I can't recall, none important to us kids.

To the left of the mess-hall/gym was the big quad, with rows of benches, where we had morning assembly, Sunday outdoor church, evening assembly (vespers), and any other all-camp outdoor stuff. The parking lot lay some distance from the quad to the northwest, and beyond was the road out to the highway and civilization. Off to the north of the quad were the softball fields; the soccer fields and volleyball areas were to the right, north of the mess- hall/gym. Archery was off in the woods somewhere, but I can't recall exactly where.

Archery, incidentally, is one of the sports at which I truly sucked. I'm good at most sports, but when I suck, I suck seriously. There's an old theory that people with brown eyes are better at reactive sports, while blue-eyed people are better at sports requiring steadiness and aim. I don't know if that's a general truth, but it describes me and alot of people I know. My reflexes are great, my aim is fair, and my steadiness is... let's just say it's a good thing I didn't decide to become a surgeon. Penalty kicks have always been my worst aspect of soccer; same for basketball free-throws. I'm a lousy golfer, too.

I have to say a quick word about the Y-camp "library". As I've mentioned, although I like to read, I have dyslexia and I've always been a slow reader. I remember the moment during camp orientation when they pointed out the "library" (actually a room somewhat bigger than a closet, with maybe 100 books total). My thought was, "Ha, ha! That's one place I won't need to know about! I didn't come here to read a damn book!" Well, the laugh was on me. It rained steadily for two whole days in the middle of the two-week period, and many activities had to be canceled. Some kids had brought comics or books of their own - not me. So the first rainy evening, I found myself in the library, glumly looking for any old book, alongside several other dripping boys. I ended up grabbing a book more or less at random. And when I read it, it turned out to be one of the best books I ever read as a kid! The title was Owls in the Family, and it was a true story about a boy in prairie Canada who raised two baby owls he rescued. Who would've thought? I read a damn book at camp, and loved it.

Back to camp geography: The cabins were strung out in two rows, forming the two legs of the L. Remember, you're on that dock with the lake at your back, facing northwest. The 8-to-12 y/o's cabins were arrayed off to your left, all looking eastward over the lake; the 13-to-16 y/o's were to your right, facing the lake to the south. Both rows fronted dirt pathways that joined at the quad, and across from each cabin, smaller dirt paths led down to the lakeshore. There were eight cabins for the 8-to-12 y/o's; I'm less sure about the older boys, but I believe they had eight also. There were six sets of bunk beds in each cabin on our side - i.e., 10 boys plus two counselors in each cabin.

Behind the row of cabins on our side, we had two field latrines, with room for six guys in each. Twelve toilets for 96 guys seems really limited to me now, but I don't remember any traffic jams. (I suspect a lot of boys did what I did, after the first day or two - peed in the lake while swimming or bathing, peed behind trees, etc.) Aside from the toilets, behind the cabins we had woods... and only woods, deep and dark, for what seemed like miles and miles. We never went too far back in the woods, other than on organized group hikes over marked paths. I think we were all a little nervous. I know I was. We were all city or suburban kids, and being out in the woods this far from civilization was a different experience for most of us.

So, back to Opening Day in the parking lot: When all the kids had found their cabin assignments, we lined up to get our stuff from underneath the bus. That also took a while. You'd be surprised how many kids owned navy blue Coleman- brand sleeping bags. I owned a Coleman sleeping bag, except mine was red. Although I didn't realize the fact for several more years, I'm colorblind. I knew my bag was "red or green or brown or something like that". I honestly thought all those colors were about the same, and always wondered why people made a big deal over the differences... Fortunately, I had no trouble telling it from navy blue. My sleeping bag was even easier to spot for another reason - the strings that kept it tied in a roll had unaccountably vanished, so I had an old belt cinched around the middle - very distinctive.

We hoisted our backpacks, helping each other as needed, and set out for our cabin, with Hal leading and the other counselor in the rear. We went down between the quad and mess hall on our left and the library/clinic on our right. Somewhere in between the two, I caught my first glimpse of the lake. The afternoon sun was more or less behind me, and the lake was deep blue, calling through the sun-struck green trees. That first glimpse made me catch my breath, literally. I had spent some time near lakes, but not enough. This was two weeks of Nirvana.

We straggling lines of boys laughed and pushed our way down the short slope to the path, and strung out along the path toward the cabins. Various lines peeled off and entered their respective cabins. It was all new and
different to me, and
utterly
miraculous -
the fathomless flat surreal
lake to my left, through a thin screen of pines; the row
of stained-wood-colored cabins with large
screened windows to my right; the path in front, filled with
excited kids - blond, red, brown, and black hair,
mostly-white T-shirts,
constant flux -
a living serpentine figure
down the dusty trail...
I was to see the same boy-snake follow that progression many times subsequently.
Kids weaving down the path in the purple twilight after evening assembly,
flashlights tracing a hundred unconnected arcs through the gloom,
high-pitched voices within the great dark cathedral stillness,
the lake reflecting last dying daylight like the shimmers of a vanishing ghost,
the protective tree-canopy sheltering us overhead.

It lives on forever, the cycle of truth and sweetness.