New Year

Every new year I see countless people proclaim, "New year, new me!" on social media. While I do agree with the sentiment, I don't believe someone will be a fundamentally different person just because it's a new year. Who you truly are will not change, but you can always strive to be a better version of yourself. Camp is no different.

A new year at camp is a turning point of sorts. We’ve had plenty of time since the end of summer to see what we did well and what we can improve on for the coming summer. Fundamentally, camp will be exactly the same. There will still be happy campers running around having the most fun, ever. There will still be counselors making fools of themselves on stage during sing-song. We will still throw 10,000 nickels in the pool every four weeks. Our core values and what makes us who we are will be exactly the same as they were last year.

This doesn't mean there won't be changes. We have revamped our lunch menu and vendors to better serve the needs of our camp families. We have a new member on our leadership team, Eugene, who will lead our pool and rockwall crews. Personally, I am excited for the new soccer nets and the effect all the rain is having on the grass out here. Not to mention the new crew of staff and brand new campers that will be here before we know it. There will be differences and changes to camp this year, but our core purpose of ensuring campers have the most safe and fun summer will always be fundamentally who we are!

-- Parker

The Best Thanksgiving

It was Friday the 13^th, 1970, close to midnight when we got the phone call.  Right after Mother answered the phone, I could tell something wasn’t right.  After she hung up, she told me Daddy had been in an accident and he was being transported to the hospital in Weatherford.  Luckily, the hospital was within walking distance from our house.  We got to the hospital just ahead of the ambulance.  The doctor stabilized Daddy, then he was transported to Harris Hospital in Fort Worth.  Mother and I went with Daddy in the ambulance.  That was the longest ride of the longest night of my life.  It was serious.  My father sustained life-threatening injuries.  All we wanted to hear was, “Joe will be alright.”  That night we didn’t hear many words of comfort.  We didn’t hear much of all.

You don’t realize how important family is until storms roll into your life. The next morning, the entire Griffin and Lester clan joined us in the waiting room.  Conversation was minimal but comfort was abundant. Later, members of my father’s church, Northside Baptist Church of Weatherford, Texas, joined in the vigil.

My father pulled through.  Considering the severity of his injuries, it was amazing that three days before Thanksgiving, he was home.  He was in a hospital bed in the living room, but he was home.

Of all the Thanksgivings I’ve celebrated, the Thanksgiving of 1970 was the one that stands apart from all the rest.  It was possibly the smallest.  Only Mother, Daddy, my sister Janis and I celebrated together that day.  With great effort, Daddy moved from the bed to the table for our Thanksgiving meal.  On that day, Daddy’s Thanksgiving prayer wasn’t a ritual we went through before digging into Mother’s wonderful meal.  It was a genuine offering of thanks for everything the Lord had provided us.  This Thanksgiving was special.

Daddy won’t be with us this Thanksgiving, he passed away October 8^th.  We will miss him this year, but I’m grateful for the 48 Thanksgivings we celebrated with Daddy since his accident.  This Thanksgiving I have so much to be grateful for.  I have a wonderful wife, Susan, I still have my mother, brother and sister.  I have a job I love during the school year and Doublecreek during the summer.  I have an ever expanding Doublecreek family of campers, parents, counselors and staff who mean everything to me.

My message to you this Thanksgiving is a simple one.  Cherish those close to you and appreciate all you have.  Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

-- Joe Ray

Carnival Week 2018

Carnival is a fun word, so it’s appropriate for Doublecreek to have a Carnival Week.  I recently googled the word, carnival.  After several clicks, I worked my way past the cruise line to a working definition.  The definition of carnival is basically, “A time of public revelry at a specific time of year or a traveling amusement show or circus.”  I actually remember traveling circuses coming to town when I was in elementary school.  Now, I associate the word carnival with school fund raisers!

This week was Carnival Week at Camp Doublecreek.  We’ve had fun and games all week!  During Sing-Song, we had mass juggling contests, ring-toss contests using hula hoops and our taller counselors, knocking over cups with dodgeballs, and a “Find the Head of the Counselor” through a blanket game.  I’ll try to explain that one.  Three counselors were behind a screen.  Two were holding balls and pushed them into the screen.  The third counselor pushes their head into the screen.  A camper is given a foam club, boxing glove, whatever and hit one of the bulges.  They have a one in three chance of hitting the counselor.  All the games described above some with the caveat, “Only at Doublecreek.”

I noticed when reading up on carnivals that the focus is on having a good time.  You get the impression that it’s “canned” fun.  It may look spontaneous, but it’s choreographed.  Doublecreek is both similar and dissimilar to a carnival.  Like a carnival, we’re here to have fun!  Our activities are chosen on the basis of “will the campers enjoy this?” 

We’re constantly changing and modifying games and tweaking our schedules to ensure our campers have the most fun possible.  For example, we might start out playing Newcomb or Volleyball in the sand pit and end up seeing who can make the largest sandpile!  Once, we started off playing basketball and ended up with Pac-Man!  Ore than half the games we play aren’t played anywhere else but at Doublecreek!

While I’m trying this write this article, I’m watching a Farmer/Rancher contest consisting of a dunking booth; then the world’s tallest ice-cream drop!  As the contest ends (I think the Farmers won, but it doesn’t really matter), the groups are now taking turns dancing off the stage to go to 4th Period.

Officially, the carnival is almost over.  Meta-physically, the circus is leaving town!  The thing is that at Doublecreek, we don’t have to have a circus to have a carnival!

 -- Joe Ray

Mr. and Mrs. Doublecreek 2018!

This week was our Mr. and Mrs. Doublecreek Week, which always is so exciting! I’m not sure when this contest started, but it wasn’t an annual event until somewhere between 10 or 20 years ago. It’s fuzzy when this tradition started.  I do remember a pair of our early winners were Hanz & Franz!  They spent the week yelling, “We’re going to pump you up!" But what really separated them from the other pairs was the talent show.  While other pairs sang and danced, they wrestled.  It was spectacular!  They dove off tables and playfully pretended to hit each other with chairs!  How can ballroom dancing compete with that?  No, they didn’t get hurt – which I thought was impressive.  The campers loved it!

An issue we have now is choosing the contestants.  I’m grateful I’m not part of that process.  So, I’m not sure how the contestants are selected.  Now the format changes from year to year.  Some years we have formal wear, which usually translates into everyone wearing heels.  Beach wear usually incorporates a water fight of some kind.  We almost always have a relay race of some sort.  Now that’s a Doublecreek concept which would liven up any beauty contest, especially the section where the girls throw a soccer ball at the boys’ faces!  Trust me, it is not as bad as it sounds.

This year our minis kicked off the event with a waving contest. Then the counselors took over and it went downhill, sideways, whatever from there.  Tuesday, we had the ‘Newlywed Game.” This was an entertaining, if dubious affair.  It appeared some contestants had a “heads-up” of some sort.  That is the only way I can explain both contestants saying, “Ice cream,” when asked the question, “What is your spirit animal?”

Wednesday was our singing and dancing part of the contest.  It might be more accurate to compare it to karaoke, but it doesn’t matter.  I don’t know who enjoyed it more – the performers or our audience!

Thursday was the relay race which took twenty minutes to set up and less than a minute to complete.  But, it was an intense minute.

That brings us to the Friday Talent Show.  When I think of talent, I think of singing, dancing, or maybe magic tricks.   But our counselors think outside the box – way outside the box!  We had one song-and-dance routine – a well done song and dance!  Bus we also had counselors showing us how various animals (ranging from a pigeon to a T-Rex) would eat a bowl of cheddar goldfish.  Another pair had an obstacle course which involved painting, eating without hands and feeding other counselors using their feet!  The phrase, “you had to see it,” comes to mind.  And finally, we had a science act which was similar to a physics circus.  They had lots of foam and explosions!  Of course, the foam and explosions won the day!

When told she and her partner were the winners, Madison had the quote of the summer: “I may not be the Prom Queen, but at least I won this!”  I can’t think of a better sentiment to end on!  So, congratulations, Jacob and Madison!!  And thank you: Jaicie and Eric, Brandon and Sydney, and Alex and Alex, for giving us another thrilling Mr. and Mrs. Doublecreek.  It will be hard for the next year’s show to top this year’s show!  But, we’ll have a plethora of counselors who will give it the ol’ Doublecreek try!

-- Joe Ray

Pirate Drama

If you’re a history channel aficionado, you have watched at least one, if not several specials about what pirates were really like.  Pirates were not the romantic swashbucklers portrayed in the movies.  Apparently, they were similar to other ship crews of that era.  They were more concerned with fighting scurvy and boredom than making fashion statements by wearing eye patches (unless they lost an eye), parrots on their shoulders and the iconic tri-cornered hat.  The song, “Sixteen Men on a Dead Man’s Chest,” wasn’t sung by pirates or anybody until Robert Louis Stevenson wrote Treasure Island.   So “real” pirates weren’t as cool as movie pirates. 

During Pirate Week at Doublecreek, guess which version we went with?  If you said movie pirates, you chose wisely.  Let’s face it – movie pirates are more fun!  All things being equal, we go with fun here at Doublecreek.  This is typified by our skit this week.  I’ll try to summarize this masterpiece in a few lines.  Here goes:

Princess Buttercup’s brother and his sidekick are kidnapped by the nasty pirate captain, Soggy Bottoms, and his first mate and only crew member, Mattie Dead Locks.  In desperation, Princess Buttercup and her lovely entourage of one, recruit a group of pirates who don’t do anything (our apologies to Veggie Tales) to save her beloved brother.  Except for the fact these pirates are cowards and lazy, they’re the perfect choice.  After several close calls and high drama (and low humor), the pirates who don’t do anything save the day!  Like most pirate movies I’ve seen, only a happy ending will do!

To appreciate the attention to detail, we employed when writing our opus, all you have to do is read the script.  We use precise naval terms, like starboard and port in the stage directions.  In the end, we had fun with Pirate Week!  I truly believe Long John Silver and Jim Hawkins would be proud!

-- Joe Ray

Lights, Camera, Action!

There’s an old song which goes, “You Ought to be in Pictures, You Can be a Star.”  I think that’s how it goes.  I could be wrong.  My memory is fuzzy sometimes, especially when it comes to a song I haven’t heard in several decades.

This week’s mantra has been “Lights, Camera, Action!”  Nothing is more exciting than being in a show.  We had a ton of shows this week.  By my count, we had a total of sixteen “shows” this week.  Each group acted out either a scene from a movie or they sang a song from a movie.

Of course the hardest part for each group was finding time to rehearse.  Somehow, practice time was procured.  Of course, for most groups it wasn’t enough to have a scene ready to go – they also needed props and costumes to add an extra special touch to the production.

What I enjoyed was how campers got into the spirit of putting on a show.  When the groups went on stage, they were up there to perform, not stand around.  We had campers acting like animals from the jungle "The Lion King"; toys from “Toy Story"; monsters from “Monsters Inc."; Luke and Darth Vader from “Star Wars” and "Harry Potter" characters.  We had re-enactments of two dance numbers from “Grease.”  We were inspired by the chant from “Remember the Titans.”  The scene from “Finding Nemo” really brought a smile to our faces!

But the all time show stopper has to go to the Minis.  On Friday, they acted out a ballroom scene from “Beauty and the Beast”.  The stage was covered with pairs of minis swaying to ballroom music, except for one boy who was standing alone in the middle of the stage.  From a door in the back came a camper dressed as the beast.  Beast and boy stood center stage, then from the back of the Dance Barn, weaving her way through the crowd, was Belle.  When Belle got to the stage, the Beast bowed, Belle curtsied, and then they danced!  But don’t feel sorry for the boy left standing.  His little sister ran on stage and they started dancing.  I don’t know what was louder,  the clapping or everyone going “awwwww.”

Of course the minis won the first ever Uncle Carter Acting Award.  As one proud mini held the award aloft, the other minis waved to the crowd.  They may be only four or five years of age, but they knew they’d hit a home run!  I need to say there were many home run hits on our stage this week.  But our minis with, Miss Chloe’s direction, hit the grand slam!

 -- Joe Ray

DC Cup!!

Soccer isn’t my thing.   I wish it were, but it isn’t.   Like many of my generation, I wasn’t exposed to soccer during my formative years (whenever that was).  So I missed that boat.

I have a rudimentary understanding of soccer.  I know enough to know I wouldn’t be very good at it.  It wasn’t until Dan became director, that soccer became a big deal at Doublecreek.  We played lots of ‘football,’ but it wasn’t the world view of football.

Now soccer is the game time lifeblood of Doublecreek.  One of the highlights every summer is the DC Cup.  It’s our version of the World Cup.  What we lack in scale and media coverage, we make up with passion and intensity.

Our format is similar to the big World Cup.  Notice that I didn’t say ‘real.’  To the campers, DC Cup is very real!  Campers are placed on teams based on two parts planning and three parts random, which makes for some fascinating matchups.  We give the teams names of countries that qualified for the World Cup.   The only good aspect of the United States not making the World Cup, was not having campers becoming upset because they were not on Team USA.

One year, per my suggestion, we named the teams after the planets.  Not a good idea.  I mean, how can you take pride in being called Team Earth?  This week we had teams representing Great Britain, Brazil, Russia, France, Belgium and Croatia!  For a brief period, a dozen or so campers banded together to take on campers from another country.  The games are as authentic as we can achieve at Doublecreek.  We have a referee, linesmen and even an announcer.  And we keep score.  We even keep track of point differentials.  There are even two venues where we played.  Some of the players have jerseys with number on the front and back.  All we need are corporate sponsors.  Okay, maybe I’m getting carried away.  But if campers are excited about playing in our DC Cup, then the least I can do is be excited while writing about it! Goooooooooallll - how was that?

Honestly, I’ve seen more soccer at Doublecreek than I’ve seen on TV, so I can’t claim to be a soccer aficionado.  However, I’ve picked up on two irrefutable facts about soccer.  It’s takes teamwork and it is fun.  Those are two components we celebrate over many spectrums at Doublecreek. 
Actually I’m glad Doublecreek has embraced soccer, or should I say soccer has enhanced Doublecreek?!

 Joe Ray