Monday Funday

Well we are officially in the swing of things now.  Today held a full slate of activities, under sunny skies all day, no less.  I enjoyed getting out today and walking around to observe various activities.  I mostly love getting to talk with your boys and hear what they are doing.  One camper asked me today if I lived hear year round.  I said yes, pretty much.  He said, “So you mean you can do any activity any time you want?”.  Then he and his friends began discussing how amazing that would be.  They are right - this is a fun place.

Climbing classes acquainted themselves with our indoor bouldering barn.  With mattresses across the floor below all climbing surfaces and a height of only about 9 feet, no ropes are required.  Walls lean out at different angles to create various degrees of difficulty.  Climbing holds (of all different sizes and shapes made to simulate various types of rocks) dot the walls from top to bottom and side to side.  It’s a super popular activity right now across the country and quite a good work out.

Boys at Riflery learned about the parts of a gun, safe handling, sighting tips, etc.  Our program is run by Mike Fielder, a retired U.S. Marshall who makes his home in Mentone.  It is a well run and safe program and boys love it.

Minor Sports is a unique Alpine activity.  Today as I walked by colorful banana scoop throwers, with handles, were in hands to play banana ball.  Probably closest to lacrosse in real sport, this is a made up game, complete with imaginary back story, told by the Minor Sports counselors.  All of their games are like this, passed down from year to year (and even generation for a few games).

Team Sports divided up boys to play kickball and flag football when I was walking by.  Next time they’ll probably switch them up.

There are so many activities and I’ll try to give a sneak peak with my blogs.  If there are specific activities you’d like to hear more about, or questions you have about any one, post a comment to this blog with your question.  I’ll do my best to answer it.

In the end, with all of our activities, it’s the counselors that make it.  The activity is only as fun as the counselor.  The boys can only learn as many new skills as the counselor teaches them.  With that in mind, I’ll leave you with this essay written a few years ago by Jonathan Rogers.  Jonathan is a friend and all of his boys have camped with us through various summers.  He is a writer and professor of English.

Thanks for reading and good night for now,

Glenn

A Few Words About Alpine’s Counselors

by Jonathan Rogers

I witnessed a remarkable exchange the other day. A little guy–a hunter by the looks of him–was talking to his counselor over by the mailbox. “So,” he said, “you want to play checkers later?”

“Yeah,” said the counselor. “That sounds like fun.”

It was a small moment, but no less remarkable for that. In the eyes of a nine-year-old, a college-aged man strides the earth like one of the heroes of old. He is Achilles; he is Lancelot; he is Paul Bunyan. It was remarkable, I thought, that the boy would feel comfortable inviting such a figure to join him in as mundane and child-like an endeavor as a game of checkers. It was equally remarkable that the counselor so gladly accepted the invitation with no hint of reluctance or condescension.

Moments like that are happening constantly at Alpine. These counselors are pouring into your sons’ lives–talking to them, playing with them, teaching them, praying with them, and always having fun with them. You have never met a group of young men more impressive than Alpine’s counselors. Camp life requires that they give of themselves nearly every waking minute, in ways that college-aged men aren’t often required to give of themselves. You’d be amazed at how they rise to the occasion. These guys exhibit a spiritual and relational maturity that is truly rare. Part of it comes from the fact that Glenn and Carter and company do a great job of recruiting and selecting their counselors. Part of it comes from the intense staff training, in which the counselors are spiritually equipped for a long summer of serving boys. And part of it is the fact that this is an environment in which expectations are high, and the counselors are stretched until they discover that they can meet those expectations.

I heard a story of an Alpine camper who wet the bed every night. (This was years ago; the bed-wetter, no doubt, is a CEO or federal judge by now). Every morning when the boys left for morning watch, one of his counselors slipped back into the cabin, stripped the bed, put on dry sheets, and whisked the wet sheets away to be washed and dried. This happened every morning, for more than one summer. But here’s the astonishing thing: the boy’s cabin mates never knew he was a bed wetter. Those counselors dealt with his pee every morning, yet they never left any evidence behind, never let slip a snide remark. They were that committed to preserving the boy’s dignity.

That’s a picture of what cabin culture is like here. I don’t mean to suggest that the counselors are perfect. But you ought to know that your boys are seeing the love of Jesus modeled every day by young men whom they admire and look up to.