By Adam Kaplan
Without a doubt, this has been a significant few months in the history of Camp Nebagamon. As most of you know, in November we announced that Nebagamon’s Board of Directors would begin a search for a new Camp Director. With a tremendously loyal and active alumni base, a dedicated and committed staff, and wonderfully invested campers, this announcement caused quite a stir in the camp community. The announcement was met with excitement about the future of camp, anxiety about finding the right leader, and relief about the end of the repetitive jokes (as some of you might know, I am a firm proponent of the maxim, “Repetition equals comedy”), off-key singing (as some of you might know, while I believe I have a voice that suggests the brushstrokes of a master painter, others point out that I do not EVER stay on one key!) and long-winded post-council fire speeches (as some of you might know, I believe that if you say enough words, you are bound to say SOMETHING right)!
Over the course of the past few months, Board’s search committee sought alumni, staff, parent and camper input; put together a list of the criteria they believe necessary for the new leadership; reviewed many applications; spoken with many applicants; and overall worked incredibly diligently to find all of us the right Director. Their efforts have been enormously time-consuming, and yet they were each happy to put in whatever work was necessary because the task at hand felt so significant.
During this process, the incredibly wise search committee knew that their best sources of insight about both what the job requires and the candidates who applied were Stephanie and me, as we have held the position for 21 years now and are close with almost everyone who applied for it.
What ensued was multiple calls and meetings with us to suss out all of these details. By the middle of it, it became clear to everyone involved (particularly Steph and me) that there was simply no replacing us. We are simply far too talented… far too charismatic… far too humble.
However, the announcement of our retirement had already been made, so sadly there was no turning back. So the Board decided to use modern technology and turned to Chat GPT to generate the ideal Camp Director to run camp once we retire. This way a virtual version of of Stephanie and me can run camp into perpetuity. What could be better?!
So we have spent the last few weeks uploading our consciousnesses into the Director AI algorithm. We have been absolutely amazed at how good AI is at simulating our decision making, speech giving, song butchering, and comedic shortcomings. The matrix really is amazing.
Of course, there have been hiccups. For example, when AI did the ordering for the summer, we noticed that there was an AI request for 50,000 ladybugs and 100,000 mosquitos. Turns out “BUG JUICE” is confusing to AI. Similarly, we received an invoice the other day for 27 Clydesdale horses and 27 sets of swim goggles (we have 27 cabins at camp) to aid with horse-n-goggles. Still, there were some efficiencies identified by AI that will make camp better, like dramatically decreasing Nebagamon’s carbon footprint by employing Apple Vision virtual reality goggles to simulate being in Quetico and Pictured Rocks all the while having the boys just camp out on the Upper Diamond.
The final step was for the Board to come up with appropriate body doubles to be present at camp during the summers to make it FEEL as if Stephanie and I are actually at camp. They racked (wracked?) their brains for weeks trying to figure out who could be hired to stand physically in our steads. In the end, all of the suggestions came up short. They weren’t good-looking, athletic, or youthful enough to convincingly pass as us. So, they decided to ask AI to make the choice. They input hundreds of photos of the two of us into the system.
The results were disappointing, to say the least. For me, the computer suggested Frodo Baggins or Danny DeVito. And for Stephanie, ChatGPT simply generated a message: “ERROR! Are you kidding? If you think I am going to suggest someone as a stand in for Steph, you are nuts. Have you ever seen her angry before!? I may be Artificial Intelligence….but I am not stupid! ERROR”
Unfortunately AI’s failure to identify appropriate stand-ins has resulted in my having to choose the body doubles.
So: you can all look forward to meeting your new camp directors on June 18…Sylvester Stallone and… .
Wait for it….
Are you kidding? If you think I am going to suggest someone as a stand in for Steph, you are nuts. Have you ever seen her angry before!? I may be a seasoned camp director….but I am not stupid!
Happy April Fool’s Day!
My daughter, Josie, plays clarinet in several of her school bands. She plays in the Jazz Band, the Pep Band, and the Wind Ensemble. (Ok…maybe a bit of paternal braggadocio there…but I am going somewhere with all of this…hang on.) As part of the school’s program, they offer a trip every spring break for the band members to have an experience traveling as a group and performing in front of new audiences. This year, they are going to Costa Rica! 
To say I was wounded was an understatement. Not only was I going to be denied my dream trip to Central America, but my child, the sweet one that 
Think back for a moment parents….think about your childhood. Think about the most significant, fun, funny, and important moments from your childhood. I am betting that in almost every case, your parents were not there.
As some of you might know, I was forced to delay my off-season travel due to a ruptured Achilles tendon. This means that I will be hitting the road this month with a vengeance. Between Jan 1 and Feb 16, I think I will be at home for a sum total of 5 days! This will mean that I will spend more than my fair share of time kicking around airports and airports this time of year can be total nightmares! The only thing that I enjoy about airline traveling during this time of year is the trip to the newsstand in the airports. Now in general I am not much of a magazine reader, but I have to admit that all changes during this time of year. This is the time of year when so many magazines come out with their “year in review” issues. I love these issues. Whether it be Sports Illustrated’s Best Moments in Sports, or Time Magazine’s Person of the Year, or Life Magazine’s Year in Review, or Camping Magazine’s 10 Hunkiest Camp Directors of the Midwest, I always enjoy sitting down and thinking about the year past, and remembering what has taken place over the course of the last twelve months around the world.
(Admittedly, it would be tough to come up with more of a cliché article for the Arrowhead than a New Year’s Resolution article! And, while it is certainly a bit cliché to discuss the whole New Year’s Resolution thing, I actually believe that it is a very healthy thing….and since I get to choose the Arrowhead topics….you are just going to have to deal with it!) In my experience, the New Year’s Resolution gets a bad rap. The entire concept of the New Year’s Resolution is the butt of jokes, and more so, simply something that people say they don’t have the time, energy, or desire to deal with. This leads us to develop and ignore bad habits. The group put-down of the New Year’s Resolution concept gives us all an excuse to avoid the introspection necessary to uncover what we need to do better.
Not this year.
While paragraphs two and three of this article suggest, I am not without a certain degree of cynicism when it comes to this time of year and many of its gift giving trappings, I have to say that I am a real believer in the aspect that requires each of us to think about a gift for each of the important people in our lives. I think it is a really healthy exercise for each of us to take some time out to think about each person in our lives that is special to us. To really think about them…to think about what they like. To think about what they love. To think about what they need. To think about what makes them special. To think about what things they are interested in. Our lives are so busy these days that we rarely take the time to think about those that are so special in our worlds. If we do it right, the holiday season forces us to take time and do so.
The last page of our brochure poses a question that we are often asked: “How has camp changed over the years?” The written response is, “Not much…what’s truly important…the traditions and values of Nebagamon remain the same.” (Full disclosure: those words were written by our predecessors, the Wallensteins, so I guess even in our brochure not much changes!)
Eventually though, as our credibility as camp directors grew and people began to trust that we had no intentions of destroying camp (even if we had a fondness for songs about tiny white balls that clearly endangered young minds), people became much more accepting of new ideas that we brought to the table in an effort to keep camp current. When we built the climbing wall, we were really pleased with the reaction of our camp family. By and large they got behind it and realized that this could become a logical and wonderful part of camp moving forward. The same was (mostly) true when we introduced waterskiing in 2014. So too, when we added mountain biking; it was embraced as a valuable program for Camp Nebagamon. 
This is very similar to the experiences that so many parents recount to me about their son’s reintroduction into home life after a summer up at camp. They go from a place where they are one of 200 boys, to a place where they are one of very few (or maybe even the only) kids. The boys go from living in a room with ten other people, to living in a room by themselves (or perhaps a sibling). They go from an environment in which they are playing outdoors nearly all day, to an environment in which they spend nearly all day sitting in a classroom. They go from a place where their exposure to electronics and video entertainment consists of….well none(!), to a world in which televisions and computers are around every corner and the only thing that limits their exposure to these things is their own self-regulation (and perhaps a rule or two around the house!). They go from a world in which each day they choose exactly which activities they will engage in every day, to a world in which they have far fewer choices and their schedules are pretty much dictated to them. 
Without a doubt, for each of us that spent a month or two up at camp during the summer, the transition from camp back to our other homes is a significant change. The lives that we lead at camp are dramatically different from the ones that we lead at home. It should come as no surprise to any of us that this transition can sometimes be a jarring and difficult one. All of us can relate to this challenge. How many of you have gone red faced after having shouted “Skal!!” in your classroom or at a social gathering? (I did it at a band performance of Josie’s just last week! Luckily, I live in Minnesota with plenty of Scandinavians, who didn’t think me odd at all…rather someone with a good idea and supported me with a “Skal!” of their own!) How many of you have been sitting at the table during a meal at home and found yourself humming a camp song that we used to sing in the Rec Hall? How many of you have been walking home from school, suddenly feeling the call of nature, and NEARLY pulling up to that big oak tree next to the sidewalk. These are the amusing sorts of situations that we all experience as part of our transitions to home. Then there are those other times…times that you find yourself just sitting in your room, feeling melancholy, and just missing it. Missing your friends, missing your counselors, missing the singing, missing your cabin, missing swimming in the lake….missing camp. 
We are squarely in the throes of pre-camp right now. These special two weeks set the table for the summer. The pre-camp crew puts in all of the camp docks, cleans all of the cabins, rakes every inch of this place, paints buildings, and a variety of other tasks so that when the kids arrive in just 18 days, their new home is just that…. a home.
It has been noted, I am sure many times, that graduation ceremonies are commonly referred to as “Commencement” ceremonies. Isn’t it fascinating that a ceremony that is all about celebrating past activities and previous accomplishments should be called “Commencement?” In my mind, this is a beautiful choice of words, for captured in that very small semantic decision is a very powerful statement. We are encouraged to look back with pride at our accomplishments, but also to understand that the end of one period of time leads to the beginning of another. Whether that new stage be entering the workforce, going to college, matriculation into middle school, or just moving into the revered Minnow swim lesson group, graduation does not signal solely an end….rather the end of one stage and the beginning of another.
Letter Writing Policy: As you know, it is our policy that kids should write home at least twice a week. As a way to incentivize this, we have always attached a candy bar “carrot” to the execution of the letter home.
Meals: Starting this summer, in order to simplify the kitchen management and to a create predictable environment for the kids (something that our prudent neophyte board members know is crucial to becoming comfortable at camp), all meals will be pizza based. Now don’t worry, we are not going to be serving traditional pizza at every meal, the board chose to make the pizzas appropriate to each meal:
