Counselor and Staff Blog

We say it every year because it’s true – what makes Alpine each summer is the staff.  These incredibly fun, cool, Christian college age guys are the life of Alpine each summer.  They make camp!  They are the reason that you campers want to come back year after year.

We’re fired up because it’s time to start staff recruiting!  November is almost here and that means it’s time to strike out on the highways and byways of the South to some of the coolest places around – college towns.  Weldon, Peter, and I head out next Tuesday to Knoxville and the University of Tennessee.  We’re looking forward to getting dinner with our Tennessee staff and then doing interviews with some new prospects.  Evan Warner is setting those up so talk with him if you know a great prospect.

Wednesday will find us on the move to Nashville for a little time hanging out at Vanderbilt.  We had a great group of Vanderbilt guys last summer including Stephen Maroda, Nelson Graham, Andrew Dudas, Patterson Fenelon, Peyton Davis, and Carver Morgan.  We’ll have a reunion with these guys and are counting on interviewing a number of their friends (Stephen Maroda is setting those up).

The next week will find us at Mississippi State and Ole Miss.  New RUF pastor Brian Sorgenfrei and his wife Liza are friends of ours (and he is a former staff member), so we’re looking forward to seeing them and having dinner with all the Bulldog faithful (hopefully at Little Dooey’s, some of the best BBQ in the state of Mississippi in my opinion).  Talk to Brian or Price Davis, who’s setting our schedule, about interviews at State.

Then on to Ole Miss where Carter and the girls will join us and hopefully the O’s too.  We always have a great time staying at the Inn at Ole Miss and interviewing guys while looking out over the lovely Grove (Talk to Sumner Abraham about setting up an interview there).  3 year staff member Hammond McEver is the new RUF intern there after graduating from Washinton and Lee last May so it’ll be great to catch up with him.  And Les Newsom, longtime RUF minister there is an Alpine alum and good friend.  The highlight of the week will be staying for the weekend in Oxford to see if the Rebels can hold their own against the solid looking Tennessee Volunteers.  We’ll be setting up an Alpine tent in the Grove so please come by and see us if you’re there that weekend (more on the location later).

Tentative plans for the week before Thanksgiving call for trips to Auburn and Georgia.  More on those soon.  We also hope to travel to Wake Forest, Virginia Tech, Virginia, and Washington and Lee the week after Thanksgiving.

Veteran staff, we hope to see you out on the road.  Thanks for continuing to spread the word to your friends about Alpine.

For rapids that flow,

Glenn

We’re excited to get out on the road to see lots of familiar faces and meet many new Alpiners!  Here is a copy of our schedule so far.  Please check back often as we are adding new dates all the time. 

Cities without a location are usually at someone’s home.  For more information on a particular slide show, call our office, 256.634.4404. 

We hope to see you this fall!

Carter and I fly out Thursday to Dallas, TX for our first 2010 Alpine Slide Show.  Thursday night, September 17th, at 7PM.  We can’t wait to be at the Boyd’s home, see many familiar faces, and meet new families who are interested in Alpine.  If you are in the Dallas area and are interested in Alpine, please come.  We’d love to meet you.  For more information, call the camp office, 256.634.4404. 

Hope to see you there!

Our counselors are priveleged each summer to sit under the instruction of senior level clinical social worker  Bob Ditter during our 9 day staff training.  Ditter is widely considered the foremost expert on children and summer camps.  He maintains a clinical psychotherapy practice  in Boston, Massachusetts.  He is a nationally sought after speaker, trainer, and consultant who has consulted for Disney, the American Camp Association, and the YMCA.  He has appeared on The Today Show, ABC Evening News, and Good Morning America.  Sports Illustrated has called him “camping’s most articulate spokesman”.  

Most recently he has written a piece for PBS called “Getting Your Child Ready for Camp“.  It is a great article with very practical advice about going off to camp.  Bob has lots of other great information on his website and blog. 

Bob has been a great friend to Alpine and our family over the years and we are grateful for his contributions to camp.

Weldon Pless (far left) with Rob Langley, David Steele, Chris Kerr and Clarke Norton

Here is an essay written by Weldon Pless.  Weldon has been at Alpine every summer since he was in the first grade (only missing one summer).  This year, after he graduates from Ole Miss we are excited that he will join our full time staff.  I think you will enjoy Weldon’s reflections on camp!  

Whenever I buy new music, I buy records. And that’s not just slang for CDs. I’m talking about black, vinyl, old-timey records. The ones you put on and sit back to listen to the entire thing without stopping. To me, Alpine is a bit like those records.

Records are sort of a step back in time. You can’t skip around to your favorite tracks or put all the freshest songs on a playlist. You can’t stick in your headphones and walk around town listening to records, or even play them in your car. But there are some really good things about it too. Listening to records allows you to really listen to the music. Once I take the time to put one on, I sit there and I listen to the whole thing, and I let myself enjoy it. I listen closer to songs I might have skipped if I was listening on my iPod. Stepping back in time to listen to my music actually lets me listen better. It slows me down and holds my attention. 

The same is true of Alpine. Every summer I come back to ride horses instead of driving cars, to watch sunsets instead of watching television, and to sing songs instead of listening to the radio. It’s a step back in time, but it frees me up to really enjoy the summer. 

Sometimes during the school year I don’t give myself a chance to slow down. I never stop long enough to notice the things around me like the sounds and smells of nature that are so prominent at camp. When it rains during the school year, I put on a movie or surf the internet. When it rains at camp, I listen to it.

I also have deeper conversations with friends at camp than I usually do in my life outside. At camp there is time to really talk. Whether it’s while walking to an activity period, playing ping pong, or eating a meal, deep conversations at camp seem to rise up organically. I think it’s because we’re given a schedule and an order in our days, and it frees up our minds to dwell on other things. Alpine lets us take a step back and enjoy living, and it’s one of the biggest reasons I come back every summer.