ave you ever had that one regret that you wish you should have done
something when you did not? The year was 1979. The place was Camp
Talcott: Just outside of Port Jervis, New York. My parents had sent me away
for summer camp. At first, I really did not like the idea, but let’s just say,
it grew on me. I learned a lot about swimming, arts and crafts, and camping. You
know, the bare essentials for a spunky young teenager to learn growing up in Brooklyn.
The whole camp was composed of boys and girls aged from twelve through fifteen. All the boys inhabited the cabins on the east side of the lake, and the girls inhabited the cabins on the west side of the lake, during the day, we would all partake in coed activities. As mentioned before, this would consist of water sports, artistic crafts, and outdoor activities. And, we all followed the strict daily schedule of the camp, from the beginning of the day at 7:30 AM to lights out by 9:30 PM. This sounds all nice and dandy for the brochure for mom and dad to read, but one can imagine a camp full of adolescent boys and girls, what some of the activities that would occur. There were rumors that the cooks sprinkled Salt Peter in the food to deter any type of mischievous activity.
One of my cabin mates, Glenn Bennett, managed to find himself a fling friend who inhabited one of the cabins on the other side of the lake. One night, he had managed to schedule a meeting with her at precisely 10:30 PM. I was supposed to journey across the lake with him, to meet her. And, if luckily enough, she would bring a friend also.
We calculated everything to the second, and I remember my heart thumping a mile a minute as we planned this throughout the day. Our counselor usually fell asleep pretty quickly after lights out at 9:30. We were then going to proceed out of our beds in pre-dressed dark clothing and sneak out into the night. Glenn had purposely misplaced a canoe on this side of the lake a quarter of a mile up the path. All we had to do was to walk around the campfire that the counselors-on-duty huddled around; the "night watchmen" as we called them, to get to the canoe. By this time, it should be 10:00. We were then to canoe across the lake and dock on the other side at 10:15. And, then walk to the secret site where we were to meet them at precisely 10:30. And, then it would be "make-out-city."
I chickened out at the last minute. Glenn was always pissed at me after that.
| Home | Archives
| What This Is | Intro | Comments |