Category: Alumni News
Took the Back to School Challenge & Became a Better Friend!
Lee @ Shamrock Marathon
Hello everyone! We hope you have been enjoying all the articles we are posting in our Camp Woodland blog. We are posting inspiring alumni stories, camp events, cabin photos with favorite camps memories, and much more!
It is also fun to read back through all the summer posts that you may have missed, because you were having too much fun enjoying camp! I especially loved the post that Kim wrote about setting goals and challenging yourself at the beginning of each school year. I was so inspired, I took the challenge and got back into running with a few friends. I started running an hour each day, just like practicing an activity for an hour at camp. It was so much fun, that I soon built this confidence I could run a marathon again, yes 26.2 miles! I have marathons in the past but it had been a long time and 2 children ago.
Lee @ Grandma’s Marathon
I got through all of my long and excruciating weekend runs, but just 3 weeks before the marathon, I got injured! I was so bummed because I had the “I can, I will, and I am going to do it right away” mantra engrained in mind. Every time I was thinking about giving up, this mantra came screaming into my head. This is also the same mantra we tell campers when they think they can’t do a challenging activity or pass the next level in an activity. I tried and tried but my injury was not getting better and had to tell my running friends and supporters that I would not be able to compete in the marathon. Just as I was floating into the depths of despair, I remember something Kim also wrote in the Back to school challenge…be a team player and help a friend. So I did. I turned my despair around and I drove my friends 5 hours to the marathon, shuttled them to the start line of the race, cheered them on at different parts of the 26.2 mile route. I even ran the last 6 miles with one of my friends that just needed a little TLC when she thought she was not going to finish. But you know what??? She finished (sprinted to the finish line with her head held high) and so did all my friends racing that day. I have to admit helping others achieve their goals was even more fun than running the race. So even though I did not achieve my goal (but soon), the friends I supported along the journey were worth it!
Lee supporting her friends @ steam town marathon
Take a leap and try something new…..You never know the story you are going to be able to tell later!
Save the Date: Chicago Camper Reunion
Date: November 23, 2013
Location: Chicago Area (TBD)
Time: 3:30 – 5:30pm
Alumni Camp Woodland Memories….
Britt and her brother were fixtures at camp for a number of years. She recently revised this beautiful essay she wrote about camp. We are posting a small bit of it for our weekly post:
“June 21st has come again: the solstice, the 28th of my longest days. This is my real New Year’s Eve. Today is the first day of the tangible months of summer, the first day of ice-cold popsicles tracing lines of sticky juices down the sides of blue-red lips, the first day of re-learning how to build a red-hot, marshmallow-roasting fire. Somewhere it is written that all businesses, even mine, must be on summer schedules, all schools let out, and all children set free. So here I am: all grown up, yet still a child, lying beneath a blanket of morning stars, wondering what my summer has in store.
The sun is coming up now, and the horizon is losing its pink-blue edges. In the summer, the sun is patently closer and its heat seems to burn the atmosphere that much more, even at sunrise. I am protected from this heat, my skin dry and cool. The air conditioner hums away and my lightweight sheets lie still across my body. When I was younger and had less to worry about, I had no need for these luxuries to protect me from the summer or the solstice. I welcomed the shortest night of the year—the solstice was mere days before my yearly pilgrimage to the Northwoods. It meant a racing heart and packed bags. Of course, I never thought about what the date was then—I simply knew camp was coming. Stuffed deep into my soft canvas duffle bags were the worn-old bedspread, thinned-out sheets, terry-cloth towels, riding-worn jeans and color-coded bathing suits: all the armaments I needed for the summer. I packed weeks in advance and shuffled through the wrinkly, rolled up old clothes in all the days preceding to be sure I was prepared for my adventure.
I would take these bags across the state line to Wisconsin, home of summer camp upon summer camp and the true land of thousands of lakes. The trip would be six hours by car, though it seemed an eternity before we would drive down the final stretch and see the towering pines above. And I would know I was truly home. I would leap from the car and in an instant summer was real, in sights, smells and sounds. The ground was littered with grass sprouts, daisies, Indian Paintbrushes, and collecting rocks. The air was rich with the smell of pine and the sounds of insects. In the evenings, loons would call their lonesome song.
So many clichéd summer dreams hold no meaning for me; I have never associated summer with weekly family barbeques and dripping sauce over grilled meat, nor do I associate this season with long, stretched out beaches of untouched castles and pool chairs. My summer dreams involve having wind in my hair and a horse at my hand or a canoe under my control. I dream about running across wild plains and through the Climax Forest, of camping out with my friends and swimming in ice-cold lakes. But these are dreams of my past, and today I have new dreams, dreams of success, of work, of being a parent. I have hopes that involve business attire and a retirement plan. Somehow, though, these dreams never feel as tangible as those of the Northwoods
Now the sun is up. I am awake. I am not going to camp to find brave adventures, explore the forests with newfound friends, or sail across the lake. Good morning, sunshine. Take me away. The solstice means nothing now but more work, more days in a climate-controlled office. Somehow, at some point, I grew up and left my summers behind. But I will always have with me what summer once was, and this will always be a part of who I am. And one day, I hope to return that part of me to where it belongs, once again finding my way down the pine-shaded road that leads to camp, my summers, and all my summer dreams. One day it will be my daughter who learns of the summer, of its freedom, and of its power. And with that I, too, will be home.”
-Britt Frederickson Holmes
University of Utah Neuropsychiatric Institute
If you have a camp essay and would like to share, please send it to: campwoodlandtp@gmail.com
The seasons they go ’round and ’round
We spend a lot of our lives at camp. We grow here during a summer, of course; we learn about ourselves, we learn to love each other, we learn how to be our best selves. At times, these platitudes can seem overused and insincere; we hear them so often that they begin to lose their meaning. But every so often – when the sunshine hits the pine trees just right, when we close the campfire circle holding hands, when we’re laughing so hard with our cabin mates that we can hardly see straight – it hits us anew how big camp is in our lives. How much of who we all are is made up of this forest-scented Northwoods air and sparkling blue lake water. How much of the good in who we are and what we see in the world comes from Woodland.
It is these times that add the real value to receiving a “five year” pendant. Yes, it means five years of activities and birthdays and banquets and gold rushes. It means that we’ve hopped too many tables to count, that we’ve braved hundreds of cold Sand Lake mornings, that we could spigot shower in our sleep. But more than that, it means that we’ve been here long enough to become a part of Woodland, forever. For Woodland to be a part of us. Five years? that’s five cabin groups we’ve loved so hard we can’t imagine leaving them after six weeks. that’s fifteen sessions of hard working and rewarding activities, five years of passed levels and shows and gained skills. Five years of this big messy loving family we all call Camp. Five years of home.
Congratulations to all of our campers that will be receiving a five year pendant at our annual Camp Birthday Bash tonight. Also, congratulations to Camp Woodland for being part of the Jordan Family for the last 44 years! We love you Camp Woodland and the Jordan Family.
Ooh, Ahh, Wonderful!
Yesterday evening, as the sun started to descend on another beautiful day in the North Woods, the fun here at Towering Pines and Woodland was only just beginning. Right after dinner, the girls piled into vans to go and visit the boys for a wonderful and very special 4th of July campfire right on Lake Nokomis. The campfire leaders for the boys – The Referee, The Trojan, and The Slave – joined up with our Woodland campfire leaders Luanne, Hazel and Napoli to keep our campfire moving along and to entertain us all. Great work, campfire hosts!
All sixteen cabins from both camps performed and enjoyed a night of fine entertainment. Each cabin group performed a skit, and boy, were they hilarious! There were some camp classics, but also a few original creations. Treetops, that was quite the production! It’s always great to watch all of the campers work and perform together – and it’s especially fun to see how the boys do things!
We also had some very special musical performances from the gentleman of Towering Pines – what a treat! First, the boys from the Towering Pines Band evening workshop performed The Lumineer’s “Ho Hey.” Great job, guys! The youngest Dellingers, Calla and Willie, sang “Radioactive” by Imagine Dragons, and the Sorkins, Jessica and John, teamed upfor another family performance with P
hillip Phillips’ 0“Home”.Andoni a0nd Michael Palmer performed a duet and serenaded us with the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Under the Bridge”, and later Andoni followed up with a solo performance of Mumford and Sons’ “The Cave”, and we wrapped up the evening’s concert series with Jeff Jordan and John Sorkin singing and playing “The Cape.” Amazing musical selections!
We closed campfire as always with our friendship circle and closing songs, then headed over to the waterfront for some Ooh, Ahh, Wonderful fireworks. Each burst of sparks was dedicated to a different aspect of life here at camp, including our amazing kitchen staff, the hard-working CITs, and finally, to a great summer – and many more to come – here at Towering Pines and Woodland. What an amazing way to celebrate our nation’s independence!
4th of July at Camp Woodland – Oooh, Aahh, Wonderful!
This is what 4th of July at Camp Woodland means to one of our Alumni, Alice Decker Burke:
The Fourth of July is the time of year that most reminds me of summers at Woodland. From my very first summer at 10 years old, I always, always loved the Fourth of July TP/Woodland campfire. I loved the change of setting from Woodland’s beautiful campfire spot to TP’s, with Nakomis Lake, so windy by day, suddenly still as glass. I loved the campy skits, inevitably puzzling me because boys sometimes find things so funny that strike us girls as so dumb! (On the other hand, sometimes they’re totally, legitimately hilarious.) I loved hearing guitar played in the fading summer light, appreciating how beautiful it is to hear men and women singing together. And I loved waiting – and watching – and waiting…. and waiting… and waiting…. for each solitary firework 
and answering each one with a sleepy chorus of “Ooh… ahh… wonderful!”
So as I prepare to watch fireworks over Lake Michigan with 1.3 million of my closest friends, I know they’ll be a spectacular symphony of light. I know they’ll be over the top. I know the Tribune will say they were perfect. And I also know they won’t be what I really want. Because I will always prefer my fireworks on Lake Nakomis – one beautiful burst of light at a time.
– Alice Decker Burke (11 summers at Camp Woodland)