Our kids are curious about camp. Something about children leaving their parents behind for weeks at a time to go live with strangers is a proposition at once intriguing and terrifying. And that’s just what my wife and I think.
I think Otis and Rosey developed their camp fascination as fans of “The Parent Trap,” the 1998 version of the film starring everyone’s favorite role model, Lindsay Lohan. She plays twin sisters Annie and Hallie, 11-year-olds who don’t know the other exists until they meet at summer camp. Hilarity and hijinks ensue, as the twins conspire to reunite their estranged mother and father by switching lives and returning to the other’s home, one in Napa Valley and one in London.
The twins are strong and smart female characters, and they drive the action to a suitably happy ending. So it makes the regular rotation along with Disney and Pixar films.
Our youngest seems to like the movie, too. But she’s 21 months old, so it’s not like we let her sit in front of the screen with her siblings, mesmerized … much.
My wife and I don’t have a lot to tell our kids about camp. We don’t come from families with strong summer camp traditions. We’re both children of divorce, raised by hard-working single mothers. So while we can identify with the part of “The Parent Trap” that shows happy families led by single parents, none of our four respective parents lived on a wine country ranch or in a luxurious house in central London.
I always imagined summer camp as something richer people did, sort of like boarding school. The only sleepaway camp experience I had was called Outdoor Lab, where public-school sixth graders went to live in dorms in the Colorado mountains for a week. It’s where I got my first wedgie, a painful right of passage where older and stronger boys pull you up by your underwear and carry you around. I also learned there’s no such thing as a snipe, so don’t go hunting it.
My wife has a strong memory of a similar Orange County-based outdoor science school program (since abandoned, apparently), though her recollection is of not being allowed to attend. Her camp experience was canceled as punishment for a $700 long-distance phone bill racked up on phone calls to someone she “met” in an AOL chat room, apparently. They were discussing homework and such, no doubt.
All my wife and I really know about summer camp we learned from movies like “The Parent Trap.” It’s a long list that includes “Meatballs,” “Space Camp,” “Little Darlings,” “Camp,” “Friday the 13th,” “Camp Nowhere,” “Moonrise Kingdom,” “Addams Family Values,” “Huge” and “But I’m a Cheerleader.”
Filmmakers love using camp as a dramatic device, to the point of cliché. You have your underestimated misfits with unlikely leaders, who work together to overcome an entitled and often deceitful adversary. They learn about ambition, acceptance and finding one’s place in the world.
And hormones. Young love (or lust) is often a plot point in the movies, many of which are only for mature audiences – in age, if not in cinematic taste and sophistication.
Real-life summer camp may be an option for our kids … someday. We know a local family that has a long tradition of sending daughters to Camp Tapawingo in Maine, “where girls spend their summer days in an encouraging environment of play, learning, companionship and fresh air.”
It sounds marvelous. But I can’t even imagine having our girls so far away, for so long.
For now, we’ll likely stick to day camps like the one we discovered at last year’s Summer Camp & Activities Fair. It’s a Lego-based STEM camp put on by Irvine Public Schools Foundation. Otis was just old enough to try it last summer, and we’ll likely look for something like it at this year’s Camp Fair on April 7 at Irvine Market Place.
Still, hearing adults describe the life-changing impact of their childhood summer camp experiences makes me wonder what I missed. But not so much as to consider going away to adult summer camp, which is apparently a thing. “Adult camp is about making new friends, unplugging from technology and trying new things,” reads one adult camp description. “Most camps have dance-offs, lip-sync battles, talent shows and other camper-led performances.”
It sounds excruciating, right? I’d rather get a wedgie and be sent on a snipe hunt. They probably make macramé plant holders, learn to salsa dance and sing Adele songs. Plus, my wife says I don’t need any so-called “new friends” from adult camp. So I guess I’ll grab a beer and see if I can find “Meatballs” on Netflix instead.
