Compounded Celebration

Instead of the rising bell ringing, hoofbeats came pounding up the cabin lines this morning. Riders decked out in red, white and blue, their horses just as dressed up with ribbons and paint, clopped along yelling “The British are coming! The British are coming!” Still in their pajamas, girls tumbled out of their cabins and made their way to the hill, hair in every direction, blinking at horses in the early light. I love this tradition even after all these years I’ve watched it, if only for the two seconds of pure confusion on a new camper’s face when she realizes those are, in fact, horses outside her window.

On the hill, small red, white and blue BombPops were waiting for everyone, cold enough to finish waking up whatever the horses hadn’t already startled out of them. Then came the more solemn turn of the morning: the Hi-Ups raised the American flag, and the whole camp recited the Pledge of Allegiance and sang “America the Beautiful” together. It’s a strange, lovely sequence when you stop to think about it: Revolutionary War references, an unexpected sugary treat, and then all our voices finding the same note before breakfast. Only camp could make all three feel like they belong in the same five minutes.

At Rockbrook, the 4th of July is a sort of compounded celebration. Every day at camp is already a celebration with singing at meals, cheering at activities, the small triumphs everyone shares out loud. On the 4th, we kick it up further and paint all of that red, white and blue— bright colors poured straight into the celebrating that was already well underway. It’s one long, sanctioned invitation for everybody to be as joyfully ridiculous as they can manage, together, with the friends they’ve made so far this session.

By the time everyone reached the dining hall for breakfast, the decorations were in place: posters, streamers, and red-white-and-blue tablecloths turning every table into its own colorful parade. And it was then time to show off the costumes. One counselor arrived in a full Founding Father costume, powdered wig and long coat included, looking like they’d wandered in from 1776. Marston, our staff director, went a different direction entirely and became the Statue of Liberty for the day— green from head to toe, paper torch held high, playing the part with total conviction. Elsewhere, faces were painted into full American flags, headbands and beaded necklaces multiplied by the hour, and more than one camper had rigged herself a flag cape for the occasion. By mid-morning, it was hard to find anyone who hadn’t found some way to dress for the holiday.

The morning itself kept to its regular schedule of activities— archery, riding lessons, weaving, the usual rhythm of a Rockbrook day. What made it different was everywhere you looked: flashes of red, white and blue scattered across every activity area, a Founding Father wandering past the climbing tower, a green-painted Lady Liberty checking in on the schedule. Camp doesn’t need much of an excuse to feel festive, but on a day like this, the ordinary and the ridiculous ran right alongside each other, compounded for full effect.

Lunch on the Hill

Lunch gave us a picnic on the hill, plates balanced on laps, sun and shade on the grass with the mountains off in the distance. Rick and his kitchen crew had barbecue chicken and barbecue meatballs going, plus a barbecue tofu for anyone who wanted it, alongside corn on the cob, homemade coleslaw and potato salad, cornbread, and watermelon— enough food that nobody left the hill still hungry. To drink, cans of Cheerwine, kept cold in the creek since morning, made their way into everyone’s hands, a treat we save for days exactly like this one.

An Afternoon of Choices

After Rest Hour, the schedule opened into an afternoon of choice activities. At 3:00 pm, about fifty campers and counselors laced up for the ninth annual Betsy Ross Two-Miler, a running loop out through the camp woods. Afterwards, everyone moved between whatever activity option caught their interest: tie-dying socks red, white and blue, embroidering bandanas in needlecraft, painting a 4th of July banner for the dining hall, or wading into the creek for basket making and watercolors. Down at the lake, teams raced through watermelon relays, while archers aimed at balloons taped to their targets, and over at riflery, paper targets gave way to empty soda cans. At the land sports field, campers turned water guns on each other with more enthusiasm than accuracy, and a badminton tournament ran alongside the regular tennis matches at the courts.

Threaded through all of it was a running bingo game, cards filled in by tracking down the right person or scene: someone wearing 4th of July socks, someone with a full flag painted on her face, a camper from Washington, D.C., three people who weren’t from the United States at all.

Pie, Twilight, and Fireworks

As dinner wound down (which was a fantastic meal of homemade lasagna, salad and bread), six counselors gathered at a table on the hill for a pie-eating contest. With their hands behind their backs, faces first into the tins, and the whole camp gathered around to watch and cheer them on, they did everything they could to finish their pies. There is something enthralling, and admittedly a little gross, about watching someone disappear face-first into pie filling. But the uproarious cheering kept everyone going, and soon, to everyone’s relief, there was a clear winner to congratulate. Congrats, Hayley!

As the sky started to dim, campers and counselors filled up the hill again, this time for a dance party that carried straight from twilight into full dark, glow sticks cracked and swinging, music loud enough to pull everyone onto their feet. Once it was good and dark, around 9:30 pm, the fireworks began, and two hundred girls who’d spent the whole day being loud and silly, so freely celebrating, cheered and sang along to each colorful blast in the sky.

When the last firework had faded and the smoke cleared over the lake, all that extra color from the day, the face paint and glitter, was beginning to fade too, ready to be washed off before bed. But underneath, something more lasting remained, something true about every full day of camp: two hundred girls walking back to their cabins in the dark, glow sticks dim around their wrists, a little more attached to each other than they had been that morning. That part of our days doesn’t wash off.