The Willow Glen Resident

Summer camps are wasted on the kids

By Sue Fagalde Lick

Far away from home, the campers don't bother showering every day. What for, when there's a river to play in? They shriek at the cold water going in, but soon find the warm streams in the center where they can float, play catch, swim and sing show tunes.

Show tunes? Well, some of the campers--OK, two, my friend Jackie Levy and I--bobbed in the Gualala River last month singing "I Could Have Danced All Night," "76 Trombones," "I'm Just a Girl Who Cain't Say No," and every other musical number we could think of. We weren't necessarily in tune, and we couldn't remember all the words, but it didn't matter. We were grownups at camp.

California Coast Music Camp wasn't all about river games. We were there to improve our singing and guitar playing and work on a few other instruments. Which we did. Three classes a day, plus workshops before dinner, concerts, song circles, dances after dinner, and jamming until far past our usual bedtimes gave us plenty of music. But we came home with folders bulging with new songs.

Most of us were baby boomers, somewhere between 35 and 50, but it didn't matter. Running around in our matching CCMC sweatshirts, shorts and tennies, we could have been 12. In fact, for that week, I think we were 12.

Mom and Dad were far away. We could break all the rules, staying up all night, playing the blues right outside somebody's cabin at 1 a.m., and no one shushed us. With no grades to worry about, we could skip classes or not to do our homework, and our teachers would say that was fine. You'd never hear that at a regular school.

For one week, we didn't have kids, dogs or employees to take care of. We weren't doctors, lawyers, teachers or engineers; we were musicians. All we had to do was play music and try not to get poison oak.

Even the teachers got into the spirit. Sure, they knew more than we did, but it was like kids showing other kids something they know how to do. "Come here, let me show you this guitar lick I learned. It's really cool."

At the end of the week, we put on a show. Of course. What camp doesn't? Except instead of singing 20 choruses of "John Jacob Jingleheimer Smith," we poured our hearts into performances worthy of $40 tickets at Villa Montalvo.

At the break, we stuffed down pizza, despite the spaghetti dinner we had eaten a few hours before and the heartburn that was bound to follow, then sat back on our pillows to watch the rest of the show, which ended at 2 a.m.

On the last day, we rolled up our sleeping bags, ate pancakes with hot peaches for breakfast, packed sack lunches for the bus ride home, said goodbye to our camp buddies who had driven cars and got on the bus.

Late that afternoon, we landed in a sweltering parking lot in Los Gatos. Our husbands, children and grandchildren waited to greet us and take us back to reality. We went home to bills, phone messages and the headaches of everyday life, but all we had to do was remember standing in the Gualala River singing "Some Enchanted Evening," and we were kids again, without a care.

It was great to be 12 again. Camp shouldn't be wasted on kids when grownups are the ones who need it. It doesn't matter where the camp is or what the theme is--grab a backpack and go. Your inner child is aching to jump in the river.

Does anybody know all the words to "76 Trombones"?

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