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Day two: September 16, 2001:
That day itself was not hard, but it lead to the most emotionally difficult few months of my life. It was the day my friend Nat died of a brain tumor...4 months shy of his 16th Birthday. I've been a part of my camp community for MANY years now. I started at age 6 as this pipsqueak of a camper, and here I am, just got my contract for year 16 in the mail, now running the archery program. The way the camp works is from ages 13-17, you're a Junior Counselor -- you tread the line between camper and counselor, helping in activities and learning the fundamentals of teaching each activity. (Well, theoretically. There are some JCs who didn't really do much learning, and some counselors and activities who didn't really teach how to teach.) The 40 of us were a very close-knit group. (They still are, perennially, a very close group.) Nat had been part of the camp community for 5 or 6 years, so we all knew him. He wasn't the most well liked person -- he was kind of annoying at times -- but I always got along with him. In January of 2001, we all got a letter home saying that our fellow JC had been diagnosed with a brain tumor.
Not stated in the letter, but upon talking to the camp director, I found out that the family wasn't optimistic, even at that early stage, and that his only goal was to make it back to camp for one last summer. He did. It was the most inspiring summer of my life. It started without Nat there. On the first (or second…my memory is kinda spotty at times) day, we voted on "captains of the corps." This was an honor the overnight camp had been doing for years, but the day camp had never done. (And we only did it for one more summer, realized it didn’t work for our format, and never did it again.) I was voted captain along with another decade-plus camper who has been a counselor for a number of years now. I essentially was a liaison between the JCs and the administration. (Theoretically speaking.) If JCs had something bad to say, they told me, and I passed it along, as one cohesive unit as opposed to just one person's opinion. I also helped run events and was generally looked upon as one of the emotional leaders of the group. (Practically, it was a position that didn’t do much…)
Once Nat came to camp, he came for 2 days a week. The other days, he was in and out of hospitals in Boston and DC trying the latest treatments and surgeries. Nat made it through camp, but his condition declined rapidly thereafter. I was among the first JC to be notified of Nat's passing, and I took it upon myself to personally call every JC and let them know. In retrospect, that was a really dumb thing for a just-shy-of-16 year old to do, but it was something very important in my own grieving process. I needed to feel needed in order to be okay with myself. There were times after that where it hit me that I hadn’t really grieved. But time healed me, as it does everything.
--Coming soon: Day 3
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