Well folks, we are now solidly in the middle of Session 1, and you can feel the shift. Campers know where they’re supposed to be, friend groups are pretty much established and the settled routine allows for everyone to push themselves a little harder to make camp even greater. All this means that last night’s evening activity, Atlantic City Night, was quite possibly the greatest thing to ever happen on the East Coast in the past decade.
Evening Activities are planned and executed by counselors, but not all of us are involved in all activities. So although I know how much effort goes into every night’s event, I wasn’t sure what to expect out of Atlantic City Night. It went a little something like this: In the gym, there were different stations for Blackjack, Texas Hold’em and Roulette. There was also a fortune teller, arm wrestling and other activities. Each camper received 1,000 (fake) dollars to spend as they wanted, either on games or lemonade or tarot readings. If you got up to $3,000, you were a part of the elite High Roller’s Club, which met in the Art Shack. The primary incentive to enter the High Roller’s Club was the better drinks: in the Art Shack, rumor told, they drank ginger ale.
I was stationed at the roulette table, and boy did I have a great view. I got to learn a lot about our campers. Most of the younger campers bet in $10 or $20 increments, and flitted back and forth between activity tables. A few of the younger boys seemed tethered to the roulette table: no sooner had they lost $150 in a single game but they were back, certain that this round they would win it all back. Across the room, at the Texas Hold’em station, kids would hang back, learning the rules before sidling cautiously up to the table, certain that this was their game.
And then there was the “wedding chapel” in the rec hall. For some, this little ceremony was a chance to hold hands with their camp crush. For others (cough, Jen Heiman, cough) it was an opportunity to marry five people in as many minutes and accumulate as many plastic smiley-face rings as humanly possible.
When the evening activity was over, campers flooded out of the gym, comparing how much money they’d ended up with. Everyone was all smiles and laughter. That’s the mark of a good evening activity. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go plan tomorrow night’s campfire.
Other Tall Timbers Happenings
– The Wet Your Feet Week campers did a great job in golf
– Sydney Sachs learned her first two chords in guitar
– The Red Bulls and the Purple Nurples face off in flag football during first free swim today