Tuesday Tales

First the important news: what we ate today

We walked to the dining hall smelling bacon wafting from the kitchen (you really smell it around camp, it hits me when I walk out of the office in the morning headed to breakfast).  So of course, the French toast was piled high when we got there.  Bananas, cereal, OJ and milk accompanied it, along with the granola/yogurt bar.  On french toast days the granola bar is usually almost empty, if that gives you any indication of how good Mrs. Gail’s french toast and bacon are.

Lunch was a traditional feast of turkey and dressing, complete with gravy, mashed potatoes, green beans, rolls, and cranberry sauce.  She doesn’t do it often but we love it when she does.  The kind of meal my grandmother would have been proud to serve!  Just an ordinary Tuesday for these ladies!

Dinner was a Taco Buffet complete with salsa, cheese, sour cream, tomatoes, rice, ground beef, lettuce, and tortilla chips.  Delicious!  After going through the line boys picnicked on various lawns around the Dining Hall.

I thought I might give you an inside peek into a typical evening at Alpine.  After the last period in the afternoon we head back to cabins for shower period.  Donning towel and flip flops, boys are called to the shower houses cabin by cabin.  Soap and shampoo are the required tickets for entry.  Two counselors sit just outside each shower house to ensure order and check off each boy as he comes out.

Smelling clean and fresh our next stop is Retreat in front of the Dining Hall.  This is a camp tradition, dating back all 57summers, and really beyond from Dick’s camping days.  We line up by cabins, have announcements for the evening and say the Pledge of Allegiance as the flag is lowered.  It’s usually cooler by then and the sun is beginning to fade over the roof of the Lodge, a nice backdrop for the flag pole on the front lawn of the Lodge.  Traditionally a different cabin each night gets to claim spot as the “flag lowering and folding cabin”.

After dinner a bell rings calling for Glee Club.  This is a time of singing in the gym.  You might think that several hundred boys would be extremely disinterested in singing “camp songs” in the gym.  You would be wrong.  First, they are not your typical camp songs.  All are popular tunes, rewritten with Alpine lyrics.  Boys sing at the top of their lungs and have a big time.  For the first few nights all campers and staff attend.  After a few days Richard announces that it’s optional.  But there are incentives!  A tribe point and a trip to Camp Desoto to sing for the ladies over there serve as pretty strong pulls.

After Glee Club each age group participates in some sort of Night Game, such as Capture the Flag, Spotlight, or Slaughterball (Alpine’s version of dodgeball).  Tonight the Brave age group (rising 8th graders) have ventured out into the woods for a campout.  They have cooked hot dogs and S’mores over an open fire and are probably settling down for a night sleeping in fresh air under the stars.

Each night is finished with a cabin devotional from the Bible, led by one of the counselors in each cabin.  It’s a great way for boys to get to see their hero, the cabin counselor, open the Bible and share a short nugget of truth.  Those devotionals are ongoing as I write this.  Before long, if not already, many tired heads will hit pillows, drifting off to sleep.

Thanks for reading and good night for now,

Glenn