Tony’s Adventure Camp aka Endless Summer

This summer, Austin went out to camp a four year old boy and came back a man. 

Sigh. 

That’s how it felt. The independence lessons were more than this mom could take as we had no choice but to send him in to the densely packed, loosely structured den of “Tony’s Adventure Camp” for 6 weeks. 

On his very first day, once I found him amongst the throngs, he was soaking wet, even his shoes. 

“Austin, why are you wet?” 

“They have sprinklers, mommy!” 

“But your shoes are wet.” 

“Hey mommy, guess what? We took the X2 today!”

“But your shoes...we need to change them. You shouldn’t have wet shoes.”

“Ok, mommy. Hey mommy, watch how fast I can run down the hallway!”

It was a good experience in the end. He had an excellent caregiver, Mrs. Dorsey, whom he knew from Miner. He got to see some really exciting things, like Discovery theater on the Mall, the Zoo and some park with a zip line in it. He went to every small-owned business in Capitol Hill, like the Candy Jar and Pow Pow vegan restaurant. He learned the ENTIRE Washington DC metrobus line. “Oh mommy, there’s the 92. I’ve been on that!” 

He went the whole day walking and walking and walking through the city, and then would come home and collapse in bed by 7:30. He never complained though. 

I, on the other hand, was a wreck. I stressed about his stamina and gave him pep talks every morning about the importance of hydration and shade. I stressed about unattended potty breaks. “Don’t wait until the last minute. Remember you have extra clothes. Did you wipe?” I stressed about him getting lost in the city, about eating his lunch “not just the cookies” etc etc and he did fine. Just fine.

To get to him took an hour on two trains and a bus or two buses and a train. I’d sprint the last leg up K street NE, melting from the heat. My face was flushed, my throat parched and blisters were stinging my feet from 60 minutes of walk-running the length of Washington to arrive just as soon as I could, lest he’d be left to fend for himself even 2 minutes more. When I arrived in the strange place, frantically scanning room after room, little body upon little body, for my curly blonde kid, he’d always be there, in the last room, with a “MOMMY” and a running jump into my arms.

Austin was resilient and amazing this summer and handled the grueling “adventure” with no complaints.

We are back at Miner with Mrs. Mukendi and it feels like an utter relief. But that’s more about me than Austin. He loved this summer. After all, it was an adventure!