Camp!
Last week I got to enjoy one of the perks to being clergy on the Island - I got to be the camp chaplain for a week! The diocese owns a camp on Thetis Island (across from Chemainus) and runs various week long camps through the summer. Clergy from the diocese can volunteer to come and be a chaplain for one of the camps. I had not volunteered, as I thought it would be a bit much to start work, and then immediately ask for time away. However, the chaplain for teen camp had to have surgery, so they asked me.
It was a lot of fun - and very similar to the church camps that we used to go, except with the ocean instead of horseback riding. There were 40 campers between 14-16 staying in cabins. I was in a cabin too, but I was alone, and the cabin was the only one with plumbing. The camp directors are new this year, and are English. They were pretty funny, and easy to work with. I had to lead the daily devotion/worship time, and the program director had given a theme for the week and for each day, so I was able to work within that.
Being the chaplain was cool - outside of the devotion times, I didn't have anything set to do (except get ready for the next day), so I was able to be with the campers most of the time. I didn't go swimming though, much as I wanted to. I decided that it would be good to have a time when I could tell the campers that I was free if they wanted or needed to talk about anything, so I sat on the beach and watched them swim and tube. I also helped out with some of the chores. Usually through the summer they have a crew of 14-15 year olds to help with dishes and the various things, but they were all campers this week, and there was only the crew leader to do it all. I helped him dig a trench for a wire to the pumphouse.
The food was good, and the staff were nice. I re-connected with an old friend from Victoria that I had not seen in years, and met several others from Victoria. The camp cook was from Yellowknife, but had only lived there for a few years, and didn't know any Bromleys. I had so much fun with the staff that I stayed for one extra night after the campers had left.
It was a lot of fun - and very similar to the church camps that we used to go, except with the ocean instead of horseback riding. There were 40 campers between 14-16 staying in cabins. I was in a cabin too, but I was alone, and the cabin was the only one with plumbing. The camp directors are new this year, and are English. They were pretty funny, and easy to work with. I had to lead the daily devotion/worship time, and the program director had given a theme for the week and for each day, so I was able to work within that.
Being the chaplain was cool - outside of the devotion times, I didn't have anything set to do (except get ready for the next day), so I was able to be with the campers most of the time. I didn't go swimming though, much as I wanted to. I decided that it would be good to have a time when I could tell the campers that I was free if they wanted or needed to talk about anything, so I sat on the beach and watched them swim and tube. I also helped out with some of the chores. Usually through the summer they have a crew of 14-15 year olds to help with dishes and the various things, but they were all campers this week, and there was only the crew leader to do it all. I helped him dig a trench for a wire to the pumphouse.
The food was good, and the staff were nice. I re-connected with an old friend from Victoria that I had not seen in years, and met several others from Victoria. The camp cook was from Yellowknife, but had only lived there for a few years, and didn't know any Bromleys. I had so much fun with the staff that I stayed for one extra night after the campers had left.
Labels: camp, island life
posted by Will at 4:30 PM
8 Comments:
I would have probably spent my off-hours sleeping in a hammock. Did you have to wear vestments at camp?
No vestments. There was a formal night for the last supper, so I wore my collar, but with jeans.
Dress: Casual clergy
I was just imagining you with a clergy tan, your neck half tan and half non tan from sitting on the beach with your collar on.
I was picturing sitting on the beach with no traffic noise or lawnmowers. I want to go to camp.
I wouldn't have survived more than night at camp. Mom and Dad would have woken up to find me sleeping outside the front door, after walking home in the middle of the night.
You would have been a bit damp if you walked home from this camp. It's on an island.
I would have made it somehow
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