Compiled by Louis Olive
When the Camp team travels, we often spend a good chunk of time in a car, driving on a relatively uninteresting, midwestern highway between cities, letting the conversation flow or listening to music and podcasts together. This month, on one of these less scenic drives north on I-55 from St. Louis to Chicago, Noah and I spent some time binging one of my favorite podcasts, Song Exploder, hosted by Hrishikesh Hirway. Episodes consist of an interview
with a songwriter about a single song, diving into its origins, songwriting, and production. There really isn’t a bad episode of the show, and they manage to book some incredible guests, so Noah and I went through the back catalog picking and choosing episodes to pass by the miles. On a whim I picked an episode that was intriguing to me: an interview with Dan Wilson, lead singer of the Minneapolis rock band Semisonic, discussing their biggest hit “Closing Time.” You can listen to the episode here, and while it’s not necessary for you to appreciate all that I’m about to write here, it’s a phenomenal podcast that I do recommend. (Brief aside… Semisonic is often thought of as a one-hit-wonder, and to that I say, check out their most recent hit, “Little Bit of Sun” from 2023, and tell me it doesn’t groove. It grooves.)
For years, I have loved “Closing Time.” I am sure you know the tune; it’s anthemic, nostalgic, and plays at the end of all sorts of things. I’d even go so far as to say that it’s the definitive song for endings – it played at the end of my wedding! It contains a litany of end-themed lyrics that are fun to belt out, my favorite being “You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay here.” And in listening to Dan Wilson “explode” the song with Hirway, I found myself caught on one lyric I hadn’t really thought about: “Time for you to go out to the places you will be from.”
Huh. What does that even mean? It’s a clunky line, and in a song so clearly about endings, it reads like it’s actually about a beginning. Where in the world are these places we will be from, and why does it have to end in a preposition? Wilson explains on Song Exploder that he wrote “Closing Time” during his wife’s first pregnancy. He saw parallels between leaving a party and a baby being born as he and his wife prepared for a big transition in their life. “Closing Time” isn’t a celebration of the ending, one last hurrah before it’s all over. Instead, it’s an exploration of all the emotions that well up during all sorts of transitions that happen in our lives – in the song, leaving a comfortable party for the outside world, and in the metaphor, the transition into parenthood. I’ve had “ClosingTime” stuck in my head for a few weeks now, and not just because it’s catchy. The song’s tone, buzzy guitars, and strained vocals reflect the anxiety of the transition, the uncertainty of the ending, and being suddenly thrust into the new beginning.
Obviously, once this metaphor was thoroughly laid out for me in this podcast, it beat me over the head, so much so that I started tearing up upon its conclusion. It’s almost time for my kid to go out to the places that they’ll be from, and that’s a hopeful and scary feeling. Yes, the first place they’ll go out to will be Chicago. But in just a few months, they’ll come with my wife Maggie and me to Camp for the very first time. I truly hope that my kid feels like they’re from camp, just in the same way that camp is one of the places I am from. Also, the number of people who have said to me “say goodbye to your old life” is only matched by the number of childbirth and early childcare books we’ve got stacked on our bedside tables. We feel ready, or as ready as we’ll ever be, for what’s coming next, but it’s not quite possible to properly prepare for the unknown.
Heading to camp for the first time can be scary. I am not confident this will hold for my three-month-old, as I’m not quite sure they’ll even understand what’s happening… but I know that it’s true for our first-year campers. There’s the comfort of home, of a place you are already from, and there’s the scary uncertainty of this new place. Our team travels the country, doing home visits, getting to know parents and families and campers in person, because we know it can feel scary for a new camper. Meeting a friendly face in the place you’re already from makes it easier to feel that maybe you could be from this new place too. The people make the transition easier.
Dan Wilson’s main refrain, repeated a dozen times through the chorus at the end of “Closing Time,” goes like this: “I know who I want to take me home.” In the biggest transition in his life, Wilson finds comfort in the people with whom he’s going out into the world with. I too know who I want to take me home. I cannot wait to take my baby home with my incredible wife Maggie. Carrying and delivering a child is nothing short of a miracle, and to walk by her side through this journey is all I could ever dream of. Our biggest transition ever feels much less scary and way more comfortable knowing that we’re doing it together.
And I want you, the Camp Family, to take this kid home too. We want to raise our child at camp because of the people, the incredible, kind-hearted, loving mentors and leaders and teachers who call (or called) Camp home for a few months of the year. Maggie and I really do believe that it takes a village, and taking our first kid to camp, to a place that they will be from, is as much about them spending a childhood outside as it is about them spending their lives around these people.
I imagine this is the last article I’ll write for at least a few months as our due date approaches – maybe this transition is gonna kick my butt and I will write again in May about how in-over-my-head I am! – so Keep The Fires Burning in the meantime, and I can’t wait for you to meet our kid at camp this summer, in the place that we’re all from, and in the place that this child will be from.
We’ve got news to report from the road show! As you just read, I’ll be out of office by the time we write our next Arrowhead newsletter, so please send your news this month to my colleague Katie Cukerbaum at Katie@campnebagamon.com.
IT MAY INTEREST YOU TO KNOW… In Tulsa, Jude Alderman just finished playing a key role in his high school’s play, “Pride and Prejudice,” and will be acting in his school’s production of Neil Simon’s “Rumors” after the winter break! Owen Showalter is currently running for his high school’s cross country team. In Austin, Paul Korman and Leo Seidman are crewing for the same after school rowing club and Max Seidman is practicing jujitsu at a club after school. In Dallas, Louie Bader is prepping for Paul Bunyan Day on his school’s Quiz Bowl team, and races for his school’s swim team. Brother Henry Bader is also swimming for his school, and is practicing trumpet for the school band. Ari Foxman is in both the chess and the climbing club at his school, and participates in school math and science competitions. In Houston, we’ve got a ton of athletes; Philip Slosburg is playing club soccer after school, Henry Kramer is working on his tennis game in the hope of making his school’s team, and Will Goldfarb is playing school lacrosse. Gus Goldfbarb is playing club soccer and basketball, Arthurt Kramer is playing academy tennis and swims on a club team, and Ruben Katz is playing club lacrosse and running cross country.