It's break time for the campers during their 1.5 hour swim in the middle of the day. 15 minutes. Might as well be an hour in their mind. Sitting there while the cool, inviting crystal blue water mocks them.
"We have to do something. Something fun to entertain the kids."
(It is a quite a thing to think of others on the 15 minutes you have to yourself for the entire day. I must admit, it melted my heart when I heard this)
"Like what?"
Turning to the campers, some of them sitting on the sides of the pool with their feet dangling in the water, some sitting at tables around the pool, he yells out…
"Campers! Let me introduce you to Shabu!."
And that was the creation of the Shabu (Sh-aaa-booo) show at Day Camp pool time. One counselor with a crazy idea and a few others who happily played along. Completely improvised. There was a whale trainer and, of course, a whale, plus the trainer-in-training. They performed 10 minute shows once a week during Day Camp pool break.
The kids went berzerk, screaming, rejoicing, oohing, ahhhhing, chanting "Shabu, Shabu, Shabu." It was a thing to behold, let me tell you. They were in kid heaven.
There were tricks. There were giant splashes onto glee-filled children. There were a few whale attacks. I wouldn't have thought it possible, but the "whale" really did sound, act, seem like a whale. Hilarious.
These are the reasons that other jobs just seem like "jobs". Camp life lends itself to an over abundance of imagination. You can make up silly things and no one thinks you are crazy. You can act goofy and dress up in crazy outfits and speak with an accents just because it's Tuesday or you are bored. No one even bats an eye at you.
And at the same time, you can be showing kids that it's okay to have fun and be yourself and act crazy. Jesus laughed and enjoyed life. He wasn't serious 100% of the time. I think that's how the world views Christians at times though, which makes me sad. Shouldn't we be the most joyful, happy people? Knowing the grace and mercy that is granted to us daily?
The Shabu show. It was a highlight of my summer. I miss those afternoon shows. I sure do.
2 comments:
I love this! I was listening to some PBS radio show this summer (it might have been called something like American Life) and he was interviewing a camp counselor and the reporter kept trying to convey how camp culture is so different than "real life" and silly things become very important things. It made me think of you and it all sounded really nice :) I was too much of a homebody to ever go to camp as a kid though!
S: I know exactly what you are talking about. This American Life! That was one of the very first episodes I heard years ago. So good!
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