I’m one week removed from my ENC experience, summer 2012. Eight days of awesome--called Session IV. All five Linney’s were in attendance and for three of us it was our first summer. George IV has logged four summers and now nestles into the fourth year green blanket that is sometimes tear-stained as he gets a bit leaky around the eyes in the return to what is a good life, but an altogether different environment as he prepares for the school year. Cabin seven can have an awfully strong affect in a young boys’ life.
William (age 5) was a day camper without major incident. Kathryn (age 7) was a librarian, and the nostalgia of watching a Waite/Kucera guide my daughter through her first week at 43 Hart Road was almost more than this old softy could bear. My loving wife, Kristen, served tirelessly as a camp nurse. I think all the Linney rookies did great and will hope to return for more turns of the medicine wheel.
In 2012 I spent my 13th summer spread over the last 26 years and found myself in a more watchful mode than ever—listening more than talking. I was calmer than I had ever been before in all my years. I enjoyed the mid-day and morning sounds more than ever and many of those ocular stimuli were from the natural world, and I seemed to be plowing against the grain of the human world. I always brush up against this animal and plant rhythm at the Nest, but this season I was more in their rhythm and less with the homo sapiens. I’m not sure I contributed as much as I could have, but I tried not to get in the way. Eagle’s Nest has a rhythm to it by the first week of August and sometimes it seems more sacred to just watch and learn rather than impose too many crotchety old bear stories if that is what I have to offer around the place. It’s not as if I feel as though I don’t fit in. No, that’s really not the case. I have many friends and colleagues collected at the Nest over the last few summers and many of those loved ones are 15-20 years my junior. But somehow, they didn’t need me, and that did not feel isolating or lonely. In fact, it made me feel quite good, like the new regime is in a flow that is caring for children peacefully, teaching how to eat together, to clean and paddle, to kick and dance, to mold and dye. The crickets were pleased, I feel sure.
If you are considering a trip to the Nest to revisit the woods, the critters, and even those good old humans, make it the 85th Anniversary, September 21-23. Register today.
George Linney, III
Camper and Staff since ‘86
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