have proven Thomas Wolfe wrong so many times in my adult life, I smile when
I pass "You Can't Go Home Again" on our bookshelf. You can go home when
you return to a place with such a hold on you that the memory of it hugs you
in a never-ending embrace. For me, this place is a camp in Maine...just a
pretty spot to most people, but the single place I would choose to visit
over any other in this world.
The place is Camp Tapawingo. I spent nine summers there as a camper and counselor from 1959 to 1967. It is a place for the privileged. It was expensive then and it is expensive now. I used to think I was lucky that my parents chose to send me there. Now I know I was blessed to have had this experience. My husband and I were able to give it to our daughter who I hope will one day send her daughters.
I have rarely missed an annual visit to Tapawingo. If I were anywhere in New England, I headed for camp. When I turned off Route 93 onto Tap's dirt road, I drove a little faster, even though I could barely see the road through my tears. I was in a hurry to see that that the camp bell, the ever-enduring symbol of Tapawingo, was still there.
In the 40 years I have been visiting, camp has not changed much. There are new buildings, but I don't see them. I see only the part of camp that I consider mine: the open-air bunks with one 40-watt light bulb and a single coldwater faucet at the sinks; the lodge where being invited to sit between the knees of your favorite counselor made your day; the dining room where the smells of bacon and cornbread even today signify the definitive breakfast to me, and finally, the waterfront where I not only learned to swim, but learned it was acceptable to be a gracious yet driven competitor.
All these things make me smile. But when I think of the friends I made at camp, I laugh. These girls touched my soul 40 years ago; over the years continuing friendships with some of them have kept me grounded in my chosen world. Now, my camp friends are back in my life. We are all volunteers at Circle of Tapawingo, a non-profit organization that provides a free week of overnight camp to young girls who have lost a parent to death.
Circle of Tapawingo has had six successful programs. In August 2002, we hosted 32 campers from the greater New England area. In August 2003, there were 38 campers, in 2004 we had 48, in 2005 we grew to 62 campers. Last year Circle had 71 campers, and this past summer we grew to 85 campers and 49 volunteers! Six special weeks where grieving girls could cry for their losses at night and giggle through a camp day. Six weeks where we volunteer counselors embraced the campers' grief and folded it into our everyday lives in such a way that they knew it was OK to smile.
This program is exceptional and unusual in that every volunteer at Circle of Tapawingo has a direct contact to Camp Tapawingo. We range in age from our early 20's to our mid 80's. No matter our years, we all have an emotional connection to this place. Why else would we sleep on army cots with plastic mattresses, brush our teeth with cold water and shower only once every three days? Does it matter to us that the temperature dips into the low 40's and we are sleeping in open bunks? No. We sleep in our clothes and then wear them to breakfast the next morning. If we don't have blankets, we cover ourselves with our beach towels, and put socks on our hands. We are happy, and not a little smug at being so cheerful about our discomfort. Our happiness surrounds our campers and invades the inner places where many of them have locked away their smiles.
When one of the 2002 volunteers, a grandmother, went tubing for the first time, her hoots of joy were dwarfed by the louder cheers of the campers who couldn't believe an old lady could (or would) do that. At the 2004 Talent Show, when husbands of volunteers sang "I am Woman" in full make-up, we didn't know or care if the campers were laughing with us or at us. The magic of the moment took over and the bonds between us all became unbreakable.
Eating is one of the best parts of our week. It isn't the food, but the order-followed-by-chaos that fills the dining room. We start out acting respectably. We sing grace, and serve and clear our tables in a somewhat controlled fashion. Then the singing begins and order breaks down as we all chant, "Hello, my name is Joe, I have a wife, a dog and a family, I work in a button factory..." The words are meaningless, but they are accompanied by wild gyrations. We all look and sound outrageous, and we all grin through every word of every dumb song. The volunteers are once again happy campers. The kids can not ignore us, so they join in and our age differences disappear. We become one goofy group singing and stomping our way through silly songs, eight year-olds and 83 year-olds together.
We volunteers don't have to work to make Circle of Tapawingo a success. We are so thankful to be where we are that our campers catch our joy. For one week, a group of young girls who lived through devastating experiences smiles. And a group of women, many of whom had never met before, go home again and find their favorite house in perfect order.
As one camper wrote on the rock she 'planted' in our 2002 Memory Garden, "Dear Daddy, I came here to cry for you but ended up laughing instead." Over the past five summers, hundreds of Circle campers and volunteers joined her. We all call Tapawingo home and we can, and will, go home again next summer.