Dating : Pixar Night Game

The night before when I said I was going to get so much sleep — little did I know — that wasn’t gonna happen.

I did manage to go back to my cabin at an earlier than usual hour.

But all that meant was that I made it in time for deep talks with the lifeguard bros about life, anxiety, and doing hard things.

It was a good talk. We reflected on our lives, our plan for our lives, and the other plan for our lives — the one that isn’t our plan at all.

And I think it does take a newcomer on staff a moment to realize that what we do here isn’t easy…and it doesn’t necessarily make sense at first.

We give up a lot of our time, exhaust ourselves, give kids the best time of their lives for one week, and so much more!

I even have the pleasure of lifting canoes up and down from their racks multiple times a day.

The strategy has been to facilitate boating for all cabins on the beach at once because it’s a bit difficult to get everyone organized once they get preoccupied with other things.

But, that means getting down almost twice as many canoes — and putting them all back.

OK — back to my story. I got more sleep last night than I did the night before, because I slept in a cabin with campers.

They were loud, rowdy, kept whispering, kept calling my name, asked me if I was sleeping — but somehow I was tired enough that all of that noise put me right to sleep.

When the feedback loop ends, campers do fall asleep.

When a whisper goes dead in the air, the behavior ceases.

So I guess… if you are not a counselor and you want to get more sleep — just sleep in a cabin with campers.

News break.

I just heard from the counselor whose last name rhymes with sense that a counselor and kitchen aid almost sunk the rowboat today.

I asked him when this happened, because I actually wasn’t there for it.

I was attending fireside for the younger age group which I am part of — meanwhile I missed out on the older age group’s all camp swim shenanigans.

The tallest male counselor whose last name rhymes with bear, and a kitchen aide who is visiting us from France were out in a rowboat.

They had campers with them.

The campers asked what would happen if the boat tipped.

The counselor said something like “Oh, it’ll do this.”

And just like that — he jumped out.

The boat dipped on one side…

A second later, the French kitchen aide jumped out of the rowboat.

The boat’s edge dropped beneath the water surface and began to take on water.

It was sinking.

The counselor on shore whose last name rhymes with sense calls to the lifeguard whose last name rhymes with clerkwood — “Come on bro, we gotta save that sinking rowboat.”

Without fear, they jumped into action and saved the sinking rowboat.

Wish I could have been there…these are the things that make me happy.

I was living the life of a responsible worship coordinator using my handy ripped piece of blue construction paper with five songs written on it.

I was woken up multiple times between 7:47 AM and 8:00 AM by eager campers telling me to get out of bed.

I got out of bed at 8:15 AM.

As a support staff we can’t go through the food line until all the cabins go through.

It takes most camps a while to go through, especially if they are young in age.

I was also raining pretty hard this morning.

I wasn’t in any rush to potentially stand out in the rain when I could stay dry and warm in my clean bed sheets until I could go through the food line.

Breakfast was waffles, they tasted like waffles and syrup — if you put syrup on them.

After breakfast we had a long break because no swimming or boating was scheduled until Flex time.

During that time we had a short lifeguard meeting — then sang worship songs accompanied by guitar and piano play by musically talented lifeguards.

I tended to my foot towards the end of my break. I can’t wait until it doesn’t hurt, because that’ll be great.

Lunch was cookout hot dogs, carrots, celery, apples, oranges, chips, and s’mores.

We facilitated swimming and boating after lunch.

Boating went better this time, minus the fact that they still don’t like the initial part of getting out on the water.

They understood the concepts better and I didn’t have to tow anyone in today — that was a major improvement.

There were still a few who were scared of going into boats, but I convinced them that they could do it and that they could ride in my canoe — I sat in the back and steered the canoe so that it was well controlled.

I’m doing well at helping campers overcome their boating fears, ones who rode with me yesterday weren’t scared of going in canoes today.

One camper even wanted to spend the rest of his swimming time canoeing around with me — so we did.

We went really far, past the boating boundaries — shhhh, I’m a good canoe operator.

The camper pointed at the tall silo off in the distance and asked if we could go to it.

We got within thirty feet of the marsh grass and then turned around, I was cautious of time but somehow we were faster going back to camp than going out.

When we got back he still had fifteen minutes to go on the aqua jump.

I did a lake swim before dinner, all by myself — I tried to get some friends, but they preferred not to.

Dinner was cookout dinner, and it was delicious. The desert was so good! Same with the bread sticks, perfection.

A small accomplishment after my lake swim and just before dinner was getting to king in foursquare and staying king for two or three minutes.

Later I helped ferry stuff over to chicken coupe island for the guys cabin who I bunked with last night — I took all their stuff in one dry canoe and paddled over.

Then I left that dry canoe on the shore and took one of their sandy wet ones back to camp.

After that, I took a shower — all soapy and fresh.

The night ended with a quality night game for the older age group based on Pixar and Toy Story 4.

It was well thought out. The campers got to make toys that resembled Forky from the movie — then they were supposed to sneak around and deliver Forky to a specific destination without getting caught by Pixar character themed patrols.

I was the Luxo Lamp. My costume was simple, I needed a flashlight — which I held above my hand.

The Program Coordinator gave me a small red foam ball — so my act went as follows:

Hop three times over to the ball, hop and turn sideways, then hop and stomp down on the ball.

Between that and the sound of the wet grass on the ball field, my act was a clear depiction of my character.

As for catching groups, I decided not to take their Forky toys — but I slowed them down as much as possible.

I paced back and forth and occasionally reenacted my short scene of stomping on a red ball.

When I heard or saw movements out of the corner of my eye, I turned and shined the flashlight in that direction.

My favorite part was watching them squirm before they froze as part of the game, and it was slippery.

So of course, some did some cool moves or slipped and fell.

It was a good time.

I took one Forky from a group, and that was because they deliberately ran past me and didn’t stop when I shined my flashlight in their direction.

In other news, the female APD badly turned her left ankle.

It doesn’t look good. It is puffy on both sides.

She is wearing a brace and using crutches to get around…

The cause was a little bit of jumping around and one bad landing.

She says it isn’t broken because she can walk on it — let’s go with that.