Camp Wawona, Part II

Thursday night we had a rodeo here at Camp Wawona, and that was a wonderful amount of fun. I wound up painting kids' faces, and even doing the makeup for one of the rodeo clowns, which turned out looking even better than I had hoped. The activities for the rodeo included a barrel race with the horses, hay bale races, tug-of-war, and potato sack races. The wranglers all looked sharp in their American flag shirts, and they put on a good show.

I was astonished to wake up the next morning and discover that I was already 25 minutes late to work. I made it there in an epic record, 8 minutes--fortunately, my boss has already picked up on the fact that this is not normal behavoir for me and just to not let it become a habit. The day got better from there; I spent the afternoon at the corral with my new friend Ashley, one of the staff kids. She taught me a lot about horses I didn't know before and was incredibly curious about. That evening, I finished the hike up to the top of the hill for campfire and, as I arrived, was handed a costume and became a part of the passion play for that evening. It was a powerful piece, and it affected me deeply. Obviously, it did some good for the campers, too, because when Pastor Elden invited them to sign the "book of life" they've had running at the camp for the last few decades, most of the camp came up.

Sabbath offered a nice, relaxed day, even if there was still a little bit of food prep to do. After lunch, I went with the campers on their hike to the Wawona Falls. It was wonderful to get to converse with the kids, to interact with them and their counselors. After dinner in Indian camp, we got to witness the baptisms of some of the campers, one of whom had been giving me a lot of cheek earlier in the week. The last campfire for that group was very entertaining, with a variety of acts--chin puppetry and the like.

Yesterday, one of our kitchen staff showed up to work sick, and we had to send her home. It could take six days or six weeks to cure, and doesn't sound like fun. We turned camp in preparation for the group that is here now, all of us earning overtime. We performed our play again last night, the costumes looking better but many of the lines lost, alas. There will be better weeks.

Some of you have become preoccupied with how to contact me. All the contact information for the camp is at campwawona.org, and I can be reached by any of the means listed there. If you wish to visit, that's great, but please check in with the office in Oldtown before coming and trying to find me. If no one is inside the office, pick up the phone outside it and tell Teresa that you're here to see me. It's camp policy, sorry.

My apologies that no pictures have appeared on the blog; it turns out that I brought my camera, but not the cable for it. I will take care of that as soon as possible, and in the meantime, I will start furnishing past entries with pictures that have just come in. Thank you for your patience.