Although I have lived in many places since adulthood — including Mexico, Europe and New York City — the bonds I made with my friends at summer camp have held tight.
When the Fireman sisters arrived at Walnut Creek’s Contra Costa Jewish Community Center for their first day of summer camp in 1980, who could miss their red hair and freckles? My sister and I certainly did not. (Samantha and Marissa Fireman, on the other hand, say they approached us because they couldn’t figure out if I was a boy or a girl. I had very short hair and wore an A’s baseball cap every day following early-morning swim practice.)
As it turned out, the Fireman sisters were the same ages as us — 7 and 8. Moreover, we bonded by the fact that we all came from broken homes: My parents were divorced, and the Fireman family was on its way to splitting up. Within a few weeks after camp began, the four of us were inseparable; soon, in fact, our counselors were calling us “The Fearsome Foursome.” We were the rowdy ones who sang “Shalom, Chaverim” the loudest and stuck challah dough to the underside of the table when the counselors weren’t looking.
In the past 25 years, there have been many misunderstandings among the four of us, and we’ve taken turns giving one another the silent treatment. But in the end, I want my daughter, Mae, to know that the bonds you make at summer camp are immeasurable. Recently, in fact, I took Mae back to the suburbs to celebrate the second birthday of Samantha’s daughter, and as our girls shared pizza, our circle became larger.
Because I want Mae to get the same learning lessons that I got at camp, I enrolled her this summer in the Chalutzim (Pioneers) program at the Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center. (Yeah, and I also think she’ll love the field trips to the zoo and waterslides.)
“Give me a kiss, sweetheart,” I’m whispering to my 5-year-old on her first morning of camp. But her eyes are on Ira, the cute 20-something songleader who is bouncing up and down just a few feet away from us, belting out “Havenu Shalom Alechem.”
“Just a little kiss,” I beg her. She’s squeezed in between her girlfriends, Rivca and Meredith, and doesn’t even glance at me.
As I plant a big smooch on top of her head, I try not to feel slighted. After all, wasn’t that me more than two decades ago? This is one of her biggest transitions, going from preschool — and her mother — into a community of Jewish friends and leaders. I know that she will learn how to make and keep lifelong alliances, as I did.
Ten years after befriending the Fireman sisters, I was a counselor at Camp Tawonga in Yosemite when I found 16-year-old Limor Farber from San Rafael drawing in her big sketch pad under an evergreen tree. I, too, was a reflective teenager, and I found a spot next to her to write in my journal. Soon, we were talking about how hard it was growing up in the suburbs, and that night, we were side-by-side for Shabbat circle.
Limor and I spent the next two summers together, and then both of us went off to college. We would not see each other for another decade, but we wrote letters during those years: about getting married, having children and becoming single mothers. We reminisced about those all-camp Shabbat freilach with dancing and singing.
A few years ago, I flew with my daughter to Hawaii to see Limor and meet her three children for the first time. Since then, she and her kids have come to Berkeley to visit .
When I pick up my daughter from camp her first day, she’s singing “Shalom Chaverim,” squeezed back in between Rivca and Meredith. I’m grateful that she, too, has the chance to make the same deep friendships I did.
Rachel Sarah is a Berkeley-based writer. You can reach her at [email protected].