Camp

A busy day following a busy week...a day spent washing, drying, folding. Printing out packing lists, rounding up stray items, making sure The Boy has all he needs for two weeks away at camp.  The good news is that he did this last year, and we know which items he can do without and which are truly needful.

In between loads of clothes, he hunted down sunscreen and insect repellent, rain jackets and hiking boots. I scrubbed birdbaths and filled bird feeders, topped plants off with more potting soil and cleaned out the cargo area of the truck.

We took a break before diving into the actual packing to run out for dinner, calling one Grandma as we drove. We earned a couple of sour glances from a sour woman sitting nearby in the restaurant when we sat on the same side of the booth, giggling over something The Boy showed me on his phone.  Dinner conversation alternated between planning the following day, silly jokes, sharing the text conversation I was having with his father.

Once home, we got serious about getting everything into the guest room to pack. Suitcase out, items gathered and packed and checked off the list. We scrounged him up a new soap dish, and new toothpaste, emptied his backpack, loaded his gear and made it all fit.  As we put a copy of the packing list in the suitcase...the last thing before zipping it up...he sat on my lap on the floor, this kid as tall as I am now, and hugged me and thanked me "for doing all the hard work."

Tomorrow we will add a pillow and a baseball cap and a kid who has shot up this summer to the pile of things now on my guest room floor. We will load it all into the truck and deliver it to camp, where The Boy will make new friends and the only guidance I will be able to provide is that which is already in his head. I will watch the photos posted nightly for glimpses of him, to follow his adventures with a timed delay, like a show pre-recorded for the audience.

He is inside, enjoying his last night of television and iPhone and computer for a time, while I muse on  his increasing independence from the porch, listening to the crickets, frogs and occasional car. Over the next two weeks, I will watch my lightning bugs here and wonder if there are so many where he is, and I will hope he's warm enough at night and that he is having the time of his life.