Camp Or Bust...

Last fall, I went to camp and the leaves were vibrant, the weather was crisp and it was so peaceful and perfect, I vowed that this fall, I would spend a whole week enjoying it.

My schedule didn't allow for a whole week, but Wednesday-Saturday, I was back to camp for the first time since the summer. I had piles of work, my camera, my running shoes, my vest and other outdoor clothes. I envisioned four perfect days of a restful, yet productive retreat into the woods. I planned to start every day with a long run, spend ample time crunching through the leaves photographing camp in Autumn. And the cool air would refresh and motivate me to tackle some projects that have been sitting on my desk for a long time. It was going to be the perfect combination of rest, work, quiet reflection, relaxation, and enjoying my beloved camp.

Recently my house has become slightly more chaotic with the addition of a third canine member of our family- no, I didn't get another dog, but my brother did, so now Olivia and Griffin have a cousin. Buddha is 15 pounds, but he faces down all 120 pounds of bulldog as if he were ten times his size. Actually, the three of them play quite nicely together, but it is still three barking, running, needy dogs that make life a little louder and a little muddier. I have washed my floors about a million times in the past few weeks and I can't seem to get my house to as clean as I would like. It's driving me crazy.

It's been good to be back to my office- I have several projects going at once and I am eager to jump in to 2011 planning. But for the past few weeks, I haven't seemed to make any progress- I work a lot, but I haven't been able to cross anything off my list. It's driving me crazy.

My boyfriend is wonderful, we are going to Vegas in a few days. But he is driving me crazy.

The craziness is actually probably less to do with all of those things and more to do with the fact that I have been sick for three weeks now. Yes, THREE weeks. I have bronchitis, or at least, that's what we think. I've been to the doctor twice. I've downed 4 bottles of cough medicine and I'm on antibiotics. But still, I have been hacking uncontrollably like an old man who has smoked his whole life.

I was excited that I had this time at camp planned and on Wednesday, I eagerly jumped in my car and headed for a much needed break.

Except...

It rained almost the entire time I was at camp (the sun was bright as I packed my car to leave).

Olivia whined the entire time I was at camp- no amount of playing outside (in the rain), treats, toys or cuddling made her stop.

Both Olivia and Griffin insisted on being on my lap every time I sat down (120 pounds of bulldog is just 15 pounds less than me, but that was how we sat, over and over again).

I was not motivated to work, didn't go for even one run, didn't take any photos, and I continued to cough nonstop.

Now I'm home and possibly feeling more tense than before.

Bust.

Mice

Mice are an every day occurrence at camp. Before I moved my office, I used to start every day by bringing my garbage can outside and releasing the mouse (or mice) that had fallen in overnight and were scratching around. The kitchen and health center are both kept very clean and mouse free, my house, the staff house and cabins are all pretty clear of mice, but many of the other buildings have mouse visitors regularly, so, at this point in life, it's not a big deal to me to see a mouse.

Last Spring, before heading off to camp, I had a ferocious battle with the smartest mouse on the planet who was happily living in my kitchen and making me crazy. My experiences at camp have made me pretty tolerant of vermin (probably more so than is normal), but a mouse in a kitchen is not acceptable and a mouse that destroys box after box of Costco sized bulk groceries had to die.

Last night I was at my boyfriend's house and as we sat together in the living room, we saw a flash of brown fur scurry across the kitchen floor and under the oven. Ugh! Another mouse! I will never escape!

BF's parents were over and so the four of us discussed mouse trap options. I had tried, unsuccessfully to use a live trap to humanely capture and relocate my mouse. When that failed, I set several of the standard bait and snap traps. As I mentioned above, I had the smartest mouse alive and he managed to avoid those as well, so eventually I resorted to poison, which I really didn't want to do, but successfully left me mouse-free.

BF is a fan of the sticky traps. I think they are the least humane option of all because once the mouse is caught, you just throw it away, stuck, but still alive.

As we had this discussion, I excused myself to use the bathroom. The living room leads to a little cove (not even enough space to be called a hallway) which has doors for two bedrooms, a small linen closet and the bathroom. The living room light was on, but not the light in that area, so it was kind of dark.

In a split second (although, in my memory, I can remember every millisecond), I realized the mouse was sitting in the cove. I squeaked (in a very annoying girly startled way) and jumped out of the way, but in doing so, I startled the mouse, who also flinched. As we both moved, my foot (I was wearing shoes) landed on top of the mouse, and I could feel a sickening crunch.

At that point, I made a louder squeak and said, "oh my gosh, oh my gosh". When I turned on the light, there was a long streak of blood and a flattened mouse. I continued to squeak "oh my gosh, oh my gosh" until BF arrived with the dustpan and broom. Except that instead of cleaning it up, he just danced around and started making sissy noises, which snapped me back into reality. I grabbed the broom and dustpan and elbowed him out of the way. I scooped up the little body, saying, "I'm sorry! I'm sorry! I'm an animal lover!", told BF to clean up the crime scene mess I'd left, and went outside to throw the mouse in the garbage can.

BF doesn't have a mouse anymore.

A few thoughts-

I keep having terrible flashbacks of the crunch. That was awful.

If that scenario had happened and I wouldn't have had shoes on, I think I would have fainted.

If I had intentionally tried to step on a mouse, I would never, in a million years, been able to be quick enough to catch it. That was a fluke- we startled each other, had the same reaction and panic knocked both of us into the exact same place.

I feel really terrible about being a killer, however, of all the mouse-removal options we'd discussed, I think this was the quickest, least painful, most humane way for him to go. So I guess I should take comfort in that.

Playing the Game

98% of the time in my job, I can do anything I want, when I want, how I want, without asking anyone. I love the flexibility. I don't know if I will ever be able to re-adjust to how the majority of the population works now that I have been in this situation. Once or twice a month September-May, the Board of Directors pops into my life. Sometimes I run things by them, but mostly I don't. Most of our relationship is me telling them what I've been up to and them telling me I'm awesome. Every now and then they make suggestions or ask me for something or give me advice but I can't think of any examples off the top of my head where I had to do something I didn't want to because they told me I had to.

From that description, it is clear why this camp has had so many troubles in the past. Abusing the freedom would be easy. But luckily for me and for the Board, I am passionate and committed and I don't abuse the freedom. In my opinion, everyone is winning in this scenario. Camp is succeeding, the Board doesn't have to worry or put much effort into things and I have my dream job!

The President of the Board (Pres) is a wonderfully kind, supportive man. He runs a major bank. He has two personal assistants (one of which is also on the Board). The last time I went to his office, one of the assistants brought us drinks in the conference room. She brought him a Diet Pepsi. He'd asked for a Diet Coke. When she told him that the company fridge didn't have any, he reminded her there was a machine downstairs. She took away the Pepsi and returned a few minutes later with Coke.

Pres wasn't demanding or condescending and his assistant didn't seem upset. In my line of work, we carry our own plastic water bottles and if beverages are available at meetings, they are set out at a table and you get whatever is there. But that's the way it is with him, probably not just at the office, but in life.

The first year and a half or so of working at camp, Pres drove me insane. I wasn't used to working for someone who is used to being waited on, doted on and the center of the universe. As I said before, I have almost complete freedom with most of camp (programming, staffing, etc), but anything involving the Board, Board members or organization policy has to involve him.

I learned quickly that if I need his participation in something, it's not as easy as making a proposal and him approving it. What needs to happen is this: propose the idea somewhere between 3-6 times, including all details, written documentation, etc. He will appear to listen but he won't take in anything I am saying until the 5th or 6th time it comes up, at which point, he will "have an idea" and will repeat (usually verbatim) what I have been talking to him about as if the idea just came to him out of the blue.

This process drives Business Manager J INSANE. She hates that he doesn't listen in the first place and tries to point out that it's not his idea and we already talked to him about it a million times. And then when he doesn't acknowledge that, she gets even more enraged. It used to drive me crazy too. I felt invisible, unappreciated and disrespected as a human being. I felt outraged and wasn't sure I could work in such an unacceptable environment.

And then I stepped back and looked at my job overall. And I realized 98% of the time in my job, I am completely on my own doing whatever I want and LOVING every minute of it. 1% of my job is me reporting what I am doing to the Board and them telling me I'm awesome and to keep doing whatever I want to do. And 1% is annoying and frustrating.

Every job has positive and negative and the best you can do is find a job where the ratio of good is greater than bad. I'm not going to do better than 99% good.

And so instead of feeling outraged or offended by Pres, I decided to work with my situation. I repeat whatever it is I need from him the required 3-6 times and then when he repeats it back to me, I respond with, "that is a great idea! We will get to work on this right away!" He's happy, I get what I want and life is good. It's called "playing the game".

Even more frustrating to J than Pres not listening to her is the fact that I play this game with him and give him all the credit. She wants me to go back to being outraged, fight him, and spend hours ranting and raving about the injustice of women being looked down on and not acknowledged and blah blah blah...

Yesterday at our Board meeting this happened with something so inconsequential to my life, I can't even remember. This morning, I called to let J know I would be working from home because I was feeling sick, she started ranting and raving and going on about how upset she's been since yesterday and how disrespected she feels and how she doesn't understand why he doesn't notice how capable and qualified we are.

It was 10:15am and I was wearing sweatpants on my couch, drinking coffee at leisure while checking my email. I was having a difficult time agreeing with her argument against the working conditions of the organization.

Yes, I am a proud, strong woman who expects to have my opinions heard and matter. But this man is SUPER nice, compliments us constantly on what a great job we are doing and backs up his words by giving me complete control and freedom, expressing his trust and respect with his actions, not just words. Yes, he's sort of oblivious and self centered sometimes. No, I couldn't work with him on a regular basis. But he isn't that way on purpose and I know he isn't going to change. "Playing the game" doesn't mean that I'm not standing up for myself or that I'm compromising my self worth. In playing, it is important to know when to rely on strength and when it is better to use strategy.

Thus far, being strategic has made it possible to use my couch for an office. If there were points awarded in the game of life, I would clearly be ahead...

Catching Up

When I write blog entries, I always sort of imagine that I am typing to no one and that this blog is mostly for me to remember all the fun stories that get lost in the hectic schedule of the summer.

But apparently I have "fans". And apparently my fans are upset that I haven't been writing. So I'm back...

The problem is that I don't really have anything interesting to talk about anymore.

August 22- I spent the morning frantically cleaning, keeping the dogs out of the house and around the time every single person who was "up north" for the weekend decided to head home, I did too. I fought the traffic and wished I was still at peaceful quiet camp. When I got home, there was a 20 degree temperature difference and my delicate bulldogs immediately overheated and were forced inside to the air conditioning. They wanted to be back at camp, wandering free, cool breeze running through their fur. I felt guilty and also annoyed by their whining.

My annoyance continued because my house was a mess, the weeds in the backyard up to my waste and no food in sight. I was trying to be excited to see my boyfriend and roommates and be home, but I thought about getting back in the car and going back to camp several times.

The first week home was a whirlwind (as it always is). I spent a lot of time organizing (my house, my boyfriend's house, my office...), shopping, sitting around. I have two entirely different lives- both of which I love. Some people aren't happy at all, so it seems kind of spoiled and bratty to whine about having so much goodness. But it is difficult to re-adjust to a whole different existence- my stuff is in different places, my schedule completely different.

The dogs have spent most of the past 3 weeks pouting and looking like tortured little pound puppies, less than satisfied with my fenced in, small city yard, the fact that my door is not open from morning until night, and that they don't have constant attention from hoards of children.I have been doing my best to give them attention, bring them to the park to let them run free in the trees and I've been leaving my back door open as much as possible. They have the most pampered lives of any animals (better than some people actually), and yet, I feel terribly guilty when they look at me like poor, neglected, caged in, unloved animals (the fact that they sleep with their heads on my pillow, covers up to their little chins, spend every minute of the day playing with piles of toys, chewing on treats and are treated like royalty doesn't make me feel less guilty from taking them from camp).

After a week of adjusting I went back to work on August 30. 310 days or so until summer 2011. I started with updating my month by month to do list and then spent the week reading camper and parent evaluations, looking through 8000 (or more) photos from the summer and laying out next year's weeks, themes and prices. Early Bird registration begins October 1, so the turn around is really fast. I think most people who ask the standard, "so what do you do the rest of the year" would be surprised how early planning actually starts.

This week I have met with the Board of Directors twice, continued with lists of lists, updating paperwork so that we can get the website ready for registration. My staff have begun emailing more and more- the novelty of being home, seeing friends and starting school is wearing off, and they are beginning to ache for camp in a way they never expected.

I've also been spending lots of time with the BF, eagerly catching up on my beloved MTV reality tv shows, running daily, tanning regularly, reading books, seeing friends and sitting... just sitting, doing nothing, soaking in the quiet. I went to the State Fair, took a weekend road trip 4 hours south to visit my best friend, and am planning a trip to Vegas for the end of the month.

None of those things make for very good blog entries.

I will try to be more interesting in the next few days...