Our blog post to kick-off the Summer Season of 2015 focused on the Opening Campfire, so for the sake of book-ending and synchronicity, we're gonna take a look at the way we end our session (which in turn ends the season).
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| Campers prepare for the Closing Campfire. |
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| Laughing or crying? It's the end of Session #6. So it's very hard to tell. |
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| A CIT II and the next generation. |
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| Group time is good time. |
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| These are faces who have lived at Summer Camp for over two months. |
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| Extravagant for the dinner extravaganza. |
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| Group time is good for end of the week photos... |
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| Preparing the weeks highlights... |
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| Comparing friendship bracelets... |
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| And then taking more end of the week photos. |
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| Who is ready to go on down to the campfire? |
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| All of us? |
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| We're all ready? |
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| Even Senior Staff? |
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| Even Senior Staff. |
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| We're all ready! For the Closing Campfire! |
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| Junkyard Band kicks it off. |
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| Followed by a little action from Drama II. |
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| Advanced Drama always manages... |
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| To put together a pretty good opening... |
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| To the Closing Campfire. |
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| A rapt audience. |
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| We move on to our Group's Week in Review! |
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| The Green Turtles had the advantage of Hunter on the guitar. |
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| Week in Review is good fun. |
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| Cause there's some of this. |
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| And some of this. |
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| And even some of that. |
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| Closing Campfire Session #6? You know the tye-dye suit will be out. |
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| And you know the Camp Director will be there with the Camp Spirit. (Camp Spirit? Y'see that little flame in the lantern? That's the spirit. It lights our fires. Pay attention to it. And to the lantern. It's a recurring theme.) |
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| Do you know what's fun? Having girls come to Camp when they're young kids and then keep coming back for years and years and summers and summers because they love it so much and then becoming our CIT II's leading our classic Go Back To the Mountains song at our closing Campfire... |
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| ...celebrating their final year as campers,while on their way to becoming our potential future counselors. |
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| That, my friends. Is fun. |
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| That lantern again. Is this a running theme we should be noticing? (Yes. Yes it is. Notice.) |
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| What do you say, crew? On to the Honor Ceremony? |
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| On to the Honor Ceremony. |
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| We quietly march... |
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| On out to... |
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| To one of our most sacred spots on Camp. |
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| For our Honor Ceremony. |
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| We circle around a stone clover... |
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| And select our Honor Campers. |
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| A camper to represent Head, |
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| A camper to represent Heart, |
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| A camper to represent Hands, and a camper to represent Health. |
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| We even award an Honor Counselor, who has made the best better this Summer. |
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| Our Honor Campers then spread that light... |
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| (Started by the Camp Spirit, of course...) |
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| Around the circle... |
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| Candle by candle... |
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| Flame by flame... |
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| To every single person on Camp... |
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| Until every candle is lit... |
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| And the whole Ceremonial Campfire Ring is aglow. |
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| We then sing a couple songs... |
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| And bask in how far the Camp Spirit has spread in the course of our week here. |
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| It is something that every camper, |
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| Whether they've been here one week or twenty... |
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| Is now a part of, and can hold in their hand... |
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| Share with their camp-mates... |
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| And when gathered all together for a week (or a season) at Summer Camp... |
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| It can light up the darkest woods. |
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| But we also know in this moment that it's the end of our week, |
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| And the end of a season... |
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| And that while we are now gathered together, soon we will part. |
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| Soon these candles will go out, and those of us who were here together in the Summer of 2015 will go our separate ways and this bright moment in the forest will be but a memory. |
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| But worry not. |
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| Because we've been paying attention to the Lantern. |
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| There's a reason why it's patched onto our Staff Shirts, there's a reason why it's emblazoned on our publicity, there's a reason why the lantern is our logo. |
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| Because it's a portable Camp Spirit transportation device. |
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| Because it reminds us that we can carry that Camp Spirit with us wherever we go, it reminds us that what happens at Camp and the people we are here never have to leave us, and that the Camp Spirit we each keep in the lantern of our hearts will be just enough to tide us over... |
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| Until we're all together once again, here at Summer Camp. |
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