Last February, I interviewed to work at CYO (Catholic Youth Organization )Camp Rancho Framasa and shortly after I interviewed I was offered a spot as a general staff camp counselor for the summer. When I found out, I was extremely excited. After all, I loved working with kids and I loved my Catholic faith. I knew that this was a job that would work well for me. But as time went on, my excitement about the job grew less and less. After learning I would have to miss out on my annual family reunion, I began to notice so many negative things about the position. As my friends started to make different plans for the summer, I shortly realized that I was going to be missing out on a lot because I would be devoting my whole entire summer to this job. I also was not a big nature person so the thought of spending that much time in the outdoors scared me. By the time it was time to leave for camp, I was dreading it. I convinced myself to go by telling myself that it would only be one summer and then after that I wouldn't want to go back. The irony in that situation is the fact that when I had to leave to go home at the end of the summer, I couldn't find the strength in my heart to leave. The truth is, leaving Camp Rancho Framasa was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do.
But what made saying goodbye so hard? Well, as I sit here and think about it in-depth, there were so many good reasons that made it so hard to leave. First of all, I was spending all of my time around children. While you think that you're going to leave a long-lasting impact on the children you are counselors for, the children turn around a leave a long-lasting impact on you. My second week of camp, I had a group that I could never forget. They were a group of 10 and 11-year-old girls who were so excited to spend their whole week at camp. They all got along so perfectly and suddenly we all found ourselves laughing so hard that our stomachs hurt. On the last night, a lot of them could not stop crying. You think it might be because they were homesick, or because they were scared or hurt but in reality, they were crying because they didn't want to leave their amazing time at camp. I will never forget watching the last girl getting picked up by her parents because as I watched her leave I couldn't stop myself from crying because I knew I was so blessed to have spent that whole week with such amazing campers.
Speaking of amazing people, another reason why camp was so hard to leave was because of the amazing staff that I got to work with each and every day. There's something different about the bond between camp counselors. Maybe it's the fact that you're singing the same silly songs 24/7, maybe it's because you're sleeping in the same cabin, maybe it's because you're dealing with homesick children together, or maybe it's because you're literally spending your whole entire summer together but for some reason, the bond between camp counselors is the tightest bond you've ever seen. When you're working at camp, your co-workers quickly turn into your best friends. You find yourselves bonding over things like singing camp songs in public as loud as you can, sending each other memes that only relate to things you can find at camp, and finding yourself in awkward situations after you've made a camp reference in the outside world that no one else will understand. With these bonds being created, you also experience a whole lot of love that you've never experienced before. You always hear people saying that certain groups of people are like family to them. I know I've heard a lot of people say that. During senior year it was my high school graduating class, freshman year of college it was my sorority. But never did I ever feel like something was an actual family until I joined CYO Camp Rancho Framasa. The kind of true amazing love that you receive from everyone makes it truly feel like an actual family. Everyone cares for you and when I say everyone I mean, EVERYONE. I will never forget when I had to leave camp for two weeks (one week I was sick and the other week I was on a family vacation) and I came back and everyone nearly tackled me because they were so excited to see me. I had never experienced anything like that before.
Being a camp counselor taught me a lot of things but most importantly it taught me what the love of Christ truly is. To love like Christ is to love sacrificially and to love with no boundaries and that is exactly the type of love I experienced as a camp counselor. So if you're contemplating it, apply to be a camp counselor. Not only will you find yourself crazily in love with your job but it will be one of the best experiences of your life.
