About Beinga P A

I was a peer advisor last year for session two. I wanted to be a peer advisor because I'd been going to camp for several years and felt like I could help new people, and also because I felt like being a PA would almost give me permission to go up to people I didn't know and make friends. That is what ened up happening for me, and I made a lot of friends and learned a lot by being a peer advisor. But I am not planning on being a PA this year because of the most important thing I learned.

You don't have to be official to make a difference at camp.

You don't need a title to go up to someone who looks a little lost and hang out with them, If you have an idea for a whole group night-time activity, even if you've never been to camp before you ccan talk to staffers and other campers and make it happen. If you don't like something about camp, change it. This is our camp. This is not Grace's camp, although she puts a helluva lot more work into it than anyone else. This is not Camp Myrtlewood's camp. This is our camp, in a way no toher camp is. We can shape it to be anything we want. We do shape it, with every action. If we invite someone we don't know to go swimming with us, that becomes a part of camp. (I actually remember very clearly when that exact thing happened to me my first year of camp, and how good it made me feel.) If we stay up all night playing truth or dare, that becomes a part of camp. If we bitch and moan and try to sneak around every rule every way we can, that becomes a part of camp too.

Over the past year I've heard a lot of people talk about how camp has changed, and things they wish were still around. Well the people going to camp may be a little different, but I will say it again

Camp is what we make it.

Think about something you love about camp. Think about something you want to find or do this year. Long moonlight conversations? Singing in the lunch line? Dancing by yourself in the middle of the room? Meeting some really cool person and becoming best friends?

It can happen. It will happen, if you decide to make it happen.

It's hard going into camp with a lot of expectations. Camp is never the same two years in a row, or even two sessions in a row. But if there's something you've hoped for that isn't happening, be it a foozeball tournament or a deep conversation or just a generally happy haze over the whole camp... do something about it. Organize it. Pull someone who seems interested aside. Ask someone how they feel and really mean it. Talk to someone new. It really is that simple.

So I will not be an official PA this year. But I will be there for al my friends, both old ones and ones I have yet to meet, and I will be volunteering to do extra chores or anything that seems to need doing, and if I have a really cool idea I'm going to try to make it happen.

Oh yeah. And I encourage anyone who's been thinking about being a peer advisor to go for it!

Hugs,

That was really great to read. Thanks marina!!

 *hugs*

~Franny~

Thanks marina, Evan

  *clapclapclap* Yeah. --/witchbaby/