The Night Before Color War

I loved overnight camp. I was a camper during my formative years.

At the ripe ol’ age of 15, I reached my dream. I finally made it to the coveted position of counselor in training (CIT). My ultimate goal was to rise to the position of counselor in the summer camp I so dearly loved.

And then, in the blink of an eye it was over. I lost it all.

No, I did not age out. I, and my entire bunk of 15-year-old CIT girls were not so politely asked to leave.

It all happened in the fifth week of summer camp.

It was the night before color was to “break.”

Color War: the camp is divided into blue and white teams. One camper is chosen for each team as the esteemed team captain. The teams compete in sports, songs, and a myriad of creative endeavors.

Unbeknownst to me, this act of rebellion would change my life in ways my most creative imagination could not dream.

What idiotic thoughts could have possibly been so important to us, knowing if we got caught, we would not be happy campers.

We absolutely had to find out who the color war captains were, and what teams we were on.

We planned for this event with the secrecy and precision of a country going to war (pardon the pun). We chose to keep our counselors in the dark. We did not want them to get fired, and more importantly, we did not want them to try and talk us out of it.

However, we were so proud of our idea we just felt a great need to tell someone. Our choice was a disaster. We trusted the 15-year-old CIT boys.

They could not wait to rat us out. They were probably jealous they hadn’t thought of this ingenious idea.

Our plan was to silently sneak out of our bunk in the middle of the night while everyone was asleep. With the greatest of care and, we hoped, in total silence, we would creep to the camp director’s office, crawl in through the open window, (the window to the infirmary was always open just a crack), enter the director’s office, check for the color war booklets containing the information we would go to all lengths to acquire, then silently sneak back to our bunks with our secrets.

Everything was moving along like clockwork. Or so we thought.

As we walked through the infirmary headed for the director’s office, we felt blinded (and blindsided) by all the lights. There stood the director, assistant director, and our counselors. In the director’s hands were the color war booklets.

“Looking for these?” asked our director. One of the girls immediately started to cry. One of the other girls shouted, “who told?” I, on the other hand, stood frozen.

There was no shouting, no recrimination. They just looked at us.

Our counselors walked us back to our bunks in complete silence. The next words we heard were our counselors calmly suggesting we pack our trunks with all our belongings.

The next day, while the rest of the camp was gearing up for the ultimate week of the summer, we were in the director’s office as he called each parent to pick up their humiliated campers and take us home.

Camp was over for us. The humiliation did not end that day.

We were told in no uncertain terms, we could not return to camp, we would not be hired as counselors. My dream to work in my beloved summer camp was shattered. However, there is a beautiful ending to this story. We will keep that for another shpiel.