Little Girls Grow Up

When I was a sophomore in college, I left behind my best friends and new boyfriend (who would later become my husband) for a summer as a camp counselor in upstate New York. I have no idea, literally NO IDEA, how I ended up with this job. Sure, the camp recruited college students, especially scholarship kids, to work for them during the summer, but WTF were they doing at the University of Kansas. Every other counselor was from NYU or Columbia or England or Australia or somewhere else exotic and amazing. I was from Kansas. And it was my first real experience with the outside world as a Kansan.

“Have you ever seen a tornado.”
“Do you live on a farm.”
“Oh, Dorothy! Right?!”
“You’re not in Kansas anymore…hahahaha.”

Bad jokes aside, it was my first real summer away, and though I never returned to Camp Pontiac, as many counselors did, I never forgot my time there. I was named Color War Captain that year (a big deal, as I was the only first year counselor that was named a captain…unless you went to summer camp this probably makes no sense, huh?) and even years later tried to stay in touch with my fellow counselors. I always looked at their summer photos with envy from my cubicle and, later, my office. Some of them still spend the year traveling and doing odd jobs, culminating with another summer at Pontiac. My envy is palpable.

I even looked up how much it would cost to send Lu there for a summer, thinking maybe I could get a job as a nurse or counselor or bunk master or something. Turns out, my summer funplace is actually pretty exclusive, costing about $10,000 per kid, per summer. Either I was grossly underpaid or someone is making BANK!

Due to the amazing capability of social media to bring people together, I’ve found many of my former campers (and counselors, hi Vicks!) via Facebook, and yesterday I almost started screaming when I heard this audio from a former camper, Nina Carlin. I won’t say much, only that we used to refer to her as “Monkey Pants Nina” due to a pair of monkey themed pajamas that she refused to take off or wash. Cut her some slack, she was eight years old. No more, people. Now she’s one of the most talented people I’ve heard in a while. You can play her first single below. And thank me. I’m sure it was my musical influence that shaped her and led her to this day.

(Or not. Likely not. Hi, Nina! It’s me! Megan! I used to read you Harry Potter! Oh, nevermind, just sign my album cover…)