Friday 11 July 2008--Endings

So I most definitely have just over six days to cover in this journal entry--this will probably take a while, and I most likely won't finish today =] Here goes...

After dinner on Saturday, there was yet ANOTHER dance party--the 4th one!!! Houdini and I didn't participate much...Only when we wanted to, the rest of the time was spent sitting outside just doing random things. After everyone but us and Sky High Adventure left, we watched Open Season. I sat by Wombat, who was really loud so I wasn't completely getting the movie. By 10:30 Houdini and I decided to go to bed, so...yeah, Open Season is definitely a movie I need to rewatch. But, oh my geez, sleeping in the lodge was SO uncomfortable. As a rule, I can't sleep on my back and my chest right on the ground was rather suffocating. But then when I was on my side, the floor was cutting right into my hip--so I woke up A LOT to switch sides. Not a good night, that's for sure, and we didn't even get to sleep in as much on Sunday because all the working in the kitchen woke me up at 7:30. We had to pack all our stuff up relatively quickly (most people weren't up until later), move it all onto the back porch, and set up all the tables for breakfast.

After breakfast all the camps still there helped clean up the lodge and went to do sports. The main game being played was softball, which I completely stink at. So Houdini, Feather, and I went up to go "play basketball"--we pretended to do that for while (shot baskets) and also kicked a soccer ball back and forth for 20-30 minutes until that got boring. Mostly, we talked an awful lot about injuries and just some general life stories. More towards lunch we shot some baskets while talking, then helped put a lot of equipment away. Lunch was pretty quiet, which was nice. But afterwards we didn't get any metime--The CITs went to their units to help the counselors prepare for the girls and us WITs/Wranglers waited on the porch for riding staff and then went down to the parking lot and got organized with directing/parking cars and the trailers. Things went pretty smoothly--I was helping load trailers--until it started to rain, then thunder and lightning. First we huddled in trailers, still coming out to help families load luggage, but once we had 5 people and the trailer tipped forward. Somewhere between 3:00 and 3:30 it started to absolutely pour rain!!! Kandi came and we fit TWELVE people into the cab of a truck (meant for five people) to be driven to the barn. It wasn't very comfortable, but the sheer hilarity of the situation made up for it! We passed two parents and Cocoa (who thought we were crazy). Once down at the barn they let us go up to the old hayloft, then cleaned. We straightened boots, relabeled the helmet numbers, and seriously swept every single part of the breezeway so there wasn't dirt/dust in corners, etc, and helped feed. Dinner was pretty good, and we totally owned at campfire...with our reused "We Will Rock You" song from the second Sunday campfire. There was a gorgeous double rainbow. And we sang SO loud to the new CIT/WITs in Arrowhead--all of us were freakishly hyper!!! Something about 3 weeks =] It was the earliest we'd gotten back to Troopie, but we went to bed after 11:00.

Hmm...so Monday was July 7th and officially a month until Terminus!!!! It was also our first morning as WITs going to early breakfast, which only meant getting up at 6:50 and eating crappy cereal (in my opinion, anyway). Er...I don't remember anything too special. We basically did a lot of chores in the morning after catching, grooming, and tacking horses. To be honest, it was mostly Basil and me sweeping, mucking, etc and...we were really late for lunch =[ Once again, about 25 minutes of metime and then back down to the bark to catch, groom, and tack all over again. I helped out in the ring somewhat, but I mostly remember doing more chores around the barn, getting really annoyed that Basil and I were doing most of the work. Oh, and Houdini was feeling sick that day, for reasons I found out later. We helped load the Kobota again and then went to dinner. And...after dinner there was sports again!!! GAH! Once again, I didn't play--just sat next to Houdini on the picnic tables by the volleyball court talking. Oh, and there was an absolutely gorgeous sunset that evening. =] What I remember most about Monday was that it was COLD--the coldest day of camp so far and it's JULY. *sigh* So, when we got back to Troopie we wrote any problems we had with CIT/WIT IIs (boy did Basil and I have a lot to say!) and then went to bed.

So, Tuesday. We went to our second early breakfast, caught, groomed, tacked, did basic barn chores (well, we didn't catch until around 9:15 because Top Hand had their ground lesson first). I guess the work by the others improved somewhat, but I still felt Basil and I were doing most of it. Squirt called us to the lodge at 11:30 just to tell us the CIT/WITs (I & II) had to be at the back of the line for lunch...which we would've been anyway, so kind of annoyed me. Basically no metime again and back to the barn. Catch, groom, and tack again, then redo some barn as well as some new ones. We left around 4:30 to begin our walk to Middle Puddle. I got a package w/ brownies (=]) but there wasn't a letter(=[). On the way, we stopped at Troop House to grab a few things and drop off other stuff. We saw Juice on the way and wanted a ride, but it turned out we didn't need one...it took about 20 minutes to get from the car to Middle Puddle. Once there, we put the horses in the pasture and fed them, then set up our tent (our small, small tent). We helped Petunia cook a little--she made this really good stir fry, but there was no rice so we made them into fajita things. We also had cheese quesadillas and non-melted Puppy Chow for dessert. It was really cold (and I had to do dishes in that cold!) so the fire felt really good. But...TWO HORSES GOT OUT!!!! Lil said she didn't need all of us, so I stayed behind with the Top Hand girls, trying to stay warm, while they did a Scout's Own. Both horses were caught and brought back so...we went to bed. It wasn't a very good night. I was freezing and Vegas progressively spread out so Basil and I had about 1/3 of the already small tent.

We slept in until around 8:00 Wednesday morning, then quickly fed the horses. The same two escaped AGAIN, but they'd just gone back to the barn, so we let it go. Afterwards we changed real quickly, caught, groomed, and bridled the horses, and took down our tent. Petunia made these amazing chocolate chip pancakes and the WITs helped clean up since we'd be walking back again. We stopped at Troop House to drop off stuff we'd had for the overnight, and ended up at the barn between 10:30 and 10:45. So, we did some basic chores, and Squirt came up with a new list of chores for us to do. So, I spent a while picking up big rocks in the arena, considerably boring and tedious. We weren't late for lunch, but we had to be in the back again anyway. During lunch the staff had a freakishly long meeting about something or other. Whatever it was, it caused an awful lot of the counselors to cry and meant I seriously got NO metime. Well, so we caught, groomed, and tacked again, then set girls off on a trail ride. Since there weren't any girls in the arena, I finished picking up big rocks while Hershey and Basil mucked the arena and the three of us complained about the lack of work everyone else did and how rude Tat2 was. Mmm, after that Basil and I swept and mucked stalls, and...Knicker pushed us into pulling weeds in the arena. It was horrible--my allergies flaring, Tat2 complaining, Vegas telling us just to stop while she didn't do anything herself, and overall really tedious. Something about Vegas bitching at me and being forced to do work and the fact that I'd been holding back my feelings about Aunt Susan and the staff meeting made me BREAK DOWN. I ran into the Wrangler room crying, and Squirt actually had the nerve to ask if I was okay. I cried for a little, then pulled myself together enough to help with the last of putting away horses. Squirt took all 4 of us to Troopie on the golf cart to get shower stuff, where she tried talking to me and I cried more. I managed to pull myself together to get through dinner (a stupid "Clue Dinner"), but once the girls left our table and Houdini asked why I looked so sad, I started crying again, which lasted quite a long time. I walked to Troopie with the other people who still needed shower stuff, then up to Arrowhead to get their stuff from the overnight, and back to showers. Oh, the first shower in 4 days felt SO, SO amazing. And after showers we hung around with Wombat while Basil and Vegas had their hair french braided. Back at Troop House, I explained my reasons for crying and Houdini told be she'd been feeling sick because she's pregnant! I'd kind of worked it out, so it actually wasn't too surprising. But...we managed to go to bed relatively early, which was good. =]

Thursday, now. Well, so we had to go to early breakfast again. The only thing I really mind about it is that I have to resort to eating Chex cereal, and I'm not really a fan...When we got down to the barn we did chores--I swept a lot, and we fed/watered the horses that were in stalls, plus Fancy out in the ring. We helped with the beginning of Golden Horseshoes ground lesson, then went to go catch, groom, and tack horses (again). Erm...while they were doing their lesson in the arena, I got the idea that we could clean saddles, which we did! Yay! (I guess) It's better than a lot of the other tedious chores we've had to do before. When Top Hand came in to do their ground lesson, we moved out to the breezeway. We cleaned all the leather saddles that weren't on horses pretty thoroughly, and...well, smelled like saddle soap, but that's better than a lot of things. Once we were done with that, we had a short time until lunch.. Petunia and Ribs came up with MORE random chores for us to do, one of which was picking up twine from the pasture, which Basil and I went to do. So, erm, I actually got about 20 minutes of metime on Thursday! Amazing! (better than none, anyway) We'd actually left the horses in the arena, so we didn't have to catch or groom them, really. Just saddle, so we didn't NEED to be there 30 minutes ahead of time. But whatever. The basic summary of my afternoon was that I did work for 4 hours straight (I only sat down for about 5 minutes because Lil TOLD me to). I swept the breezeway really thoroughly, straightened the hoses, fed Fancy (the hay cut my arm, and since I'm allergic, gave me hives all over), and reswept the breezeway of the hay I'd dropped. Then, Bronze Bits was trotting for the first time so for about 20 minutes I ran with horses and helped control Rana, who was in a really bad mood. After that, Basil and I mucked stalls, with the sweet help of Kodiak for a little while =] We asked Tat2 to feed the horses while we were doing that, which she was apparently incapable of. And...since there was hay in the breezeway now, we swept that real quick. Then I swept the tackroom. And we mucked about 5/8 of the arena, then Lil told us to make the Wranglers do the rest of it. By this point (5:30), I was pretty exhausted and hungry. The 4 of us (Vegas had gone to get pancreas meds) walked up to flag/dinner. I staffed with Kodiak that evening, and I'll be honest...dinner kind of sucked. And I didn't have a popsicle for dessert.

The CIT/WITs were in charge of campfire Thursday night. It was Crazy Hair campfire, so I had this really funny looking high 80s side ponytail. We did a pretty good job with the fire and leading songs and all, but once we sang Linger at the end...ALL of us started crying. Jeez, that was not fun. I mean, when you've lived together for 4 weeks, there's a unique connection and it's hard to leave. Squirt sent us down to Troopie to clean...Aaaaaaaaaaaand...Surprised us with a party!!! There was a cake with our names/symbols for us on it, a bunch of chips, soda, brownies (mine), and music. It was so much fun, definitely the perfect last night. We did Copperhead Road out on the porch for the last time (I definitely won't do it until next summer at camp, if then). It was nice, because Pepper, Tink, Bubbles, and Blossom were all there. (Though, since Sunshine left early again it wasn't QUITE the same) So, after a very fun party we walked Tink back down to Lucky Circle. And then Squirt sat us down in the middle of the road by the trail up to Troop House and said we were going to do a Scout's Own. Oh, Crap. (That was my first thought) Like I said, I'd lived with these 15 girls for 4 weeks. I had a connection with 14 of them, and a really strong relationship/friendship with most of them. So we all got really sentimental, and I ended up crying/sobbing (along with Vegas). As sad and sappy as it was, it was really sweet. Because around these girls, I can be myself totally. More than anyone, they know the true me, secrets no one else does, I trust them beyond anything, and...they love me for everything about me. So, once the sentimental Scout's Own was done, we walked back to Troop House. And we ended up going to bed after 12:30. Yay!

We were planning on sleeping in until 7:15, but Tat2 left her alarm for 6:50 on. And I really WANTED those 25 minutes of sleep, so I was thoroughly annoyed. I mean, she knew we didn't have to go to early breakfast, and she left it on anyway. *sigh* So we got dressed and all that joyous stuff, then went to flag. Our last flag. *sniff* (not really) And breakfast. I staffed with Houdini and we had really good French toast =] After breakfast we went down to Troop House to really seriously clean. It was pretty gross, all the dirt and trash that was under our beds and the dirty mattresses and...yeah. GROSS. I pretty much swept the whole time, and people kept getting in the way and not helping. Gah. After we were done cleaning, the WITs went to go get boots and stuff from the barn, and once we were back to Troop House all of us walked up to the lodge. We did the camp evaluations and...erm...sat around for the rest of the morning, pretty much. Talking. I also organized the pictures into stacks for Bubbles. So...lunch was pretty crappy. A peanut butter sandwich and a cookie. After lunch Houdini and I decorated our staff cups with my Sharpie and then all of us did our evaluation talk things with Squirt and Tink. All of mine were really positive. I just need to talk more apparently at the barn (?) and tell Squirt what's bothering me/going on (*rolls eyes*). Then, the awards ceremony! I got the "Next President of the US" which...er...I guess is a compliment. Aaaaaaand...then Home. Actually, not home. Mom's house. Okay, so and then...away from camp. Which is just really sad because I love camp. The atmosphere, the amazing friends, the horses...*sigh*

So yeah. I miss it a lot. For every bad time at the barn, I would come back to smiling faces and everything would be better (almost). So, I think I will go back next year, despite what I might've thought before. Cheers!