No one sleeps much on leaving day. Myself included, i stayed up real late signing directories, laughing with friends, and talking in the dish pit. woke up bright and early to wake up call at 7am with a whopping 2 hours of sleep (which is more than other years for me) I slept on the floor of the lodge snuggling with Jean, a close friend from home.
I get up, hearing the voices of campers around me, and head to put my mattress back in my cabin, getting some good mornings on the why there, when I get there I take a second to say goodbye, swinging on our cabin swing for the last time this summer, and admiring our perfect views of the trees and kybos. I put my suitcase in the lodge the night before so there was no heavy lifting needed on my way back.
I finish up signing some directories, and then it was time for check in, We continue our camp tradition of singing “Look at what the light did now” at the end of our last meeting, which always gets to me, at the first strum of Christian’s guitar there were tears down my face, as I realized that this is the last time I get to be with these exact people, in this place, at this exact time, and my hearts breaks a bit, reminding me how much this place means to all of us, but they’re ultimately happy tears, because the fact I get to cry over missing something at all is heartwarming in its self.
After the meeting Javier played “Indiana” by Adrianne Lenker on the porch, I had been asking them to play it for me all session, since they played it so many times last year and it’s become a staple camp song to me. Then it was time for campers to start leaving, I’ve been going in circles trying to figure out how to write this, it’s a hard thing to look back at in great detail, for me this part of the day is filled with lots of hugging and crying, and I can’t say saying goodbye is a fond memory for me, but every beginning must have an end, and the sweeter it is, the more it can hurt, but saying goodbye is important, it helps put all the happy memories in a box for safe keeping. The first to leave were the campers heading to the airport, Christian played “Closing time” on the speaker as we gave tearful hugs and waved them off.
After that we had some free time before the rest of us left, I decided to head to the kitchen to spend some time with the staff, the kitchens always full of music and today lots of dance breaks. The staff were making boxed lunches for their long day of cleaning up the site, and I can’t say I didn’t steal a few chips. I went outside and saw lots of people sitting on Carl (our big rock) and joined them, we talked about how the session was for us, but not long after we were told it was finally time to head down the hill to get picked up, the first thing I did was head back to the kitchen one more time to say bye, since most of the staff won’t come down the hill, after a very long winded goodbye, Aubrie walked me out, I have to say I probably hugged just about everyone at least three times, Jody arrived and we packed our things and got in the car, waving out the window, we drove off.
I watched the trees pass by with teary eyes, as we start our trip back to Toronto, laying in Kaneya’s lap listening to “A month or two” by Allegra krieger. later we talked about camp a bit and then swiftly fell asleep, then we stoped at Olive Garden, I had never been before so I was very impressed, we ate in, and while eating me and Kaneya told Jody about last night’s staff skit which was, CRAZY. And we did lots of laughing as we told the story loudly, then me and K talked outside in the sun, waiting for G in the bathroom. The rest of the ride was filled with lots of sleeping and the occasional conversation, we got a little lost after a bathroom break (I drank 4 cups of lemonade at Olive Garden) and somehow wound up on lots of side roads, but made it back on track nonetheless, we crossed the border and made it back to Canada. After stopping for food, we filled up on gas, We realized we never ate any of our snacks, (oops) so the next part of the trip had lots of pretzels and Oreos in it, somehow we ended up talking about the nuances of veganism, then moved to what we were gonna do when we got home. As the GPS time got lower and lower so did the sun, and the trees slowly turn to building, the further we go the taller they get, I made it back home around 9.
There’s actually no one at my house right now, since my mom’s away with my dog, and my dad’s working on location, so I came back to a quiet house, it’s a little lonely at first, a big difference from being surrounded by campers 24/7 but ultimately nice to have space. I made some ramen and took a shower, lit some incense in my room and turned on all my fairy lights, listened to some music and looked at pictures from camp, opened up a letter an Oregon camper had sent me, and then snuggled under my blankets, turning off my lamp and going to sleep alone for the first time in a week.
-Jasper, camper