Camp Fair View Lake...Here I come!

Why is it that just when I feel like I have reached my breaking point...When I feel like I just can't take anymore...Like all of the patience that I have left could rest on my pinky toe...Just when I can't break up one more fist fight (and consequently get punched in the left tit), Just when I can't ask Fred to stop gargling water at the sink while I am trying to teach a lesson...Just when I can't tell Matthew NINE times that snack time has ended twenty minutes ago, and to put his freaking snack away...Just when I can't tell Pedro to stop crying over spilt milk (literally), untied shoelaces, boring math homework, and Christian's humming. (Man the fuck up, Pedro). I have to go on a Three Day overnight camping trip with my students come this Monday. Camp Fair View Lake, here I motherfucking come...

Each year the 4th grade heads to Newton, New Jersey to Camp Fair View Lake for a luxurious two day, three night vacation. And by vacation, I do mean just barely surviving unfathomable emotional and physical pain. The children look forward to this trip all year long. They mentally prepare for the amount of fun that they are going to have. I mentally prepare too. On the different ways that I can get out of going on this trip...Only to realize that there is no way out. I am stuck...and for the third consecutive year in a row, I will be there...with or without a small flask of Bacardi.

Each year, I try to call friends and family (for moral support), standing outside of the gnat infested bunk, with my cell phone held high above my head at 11:30 pm, when the kids have FINALLY fallen asleep after a 17 hour day. And, just when I need that moral support the most, I am cut off, as there is 1/27th of cell phone reception at Fair View Lake. With this righteous journey upon me, I thought that I would try and get back into the spirit, and enlighten all of you, on what it is like to go on a three day overnight trip with your students. Below you will find a list of memorable moments from years past, some have made me laugh, some have made me cry. Please, keep right on reading.

1. Being woken at 5:45 am by Tracy, telling me that there was one deer standing outside the bunk. Wide eyed, oooohs and ahhhs heard all throughout the cabin. Really? I've almost hit about 17 deer with my car. Sorry, no thanks. And, thank you so very much for waking me to tell me.


2. Matthew threw up on the bus ride, and didn't tell anyone...The teachers only realized the upchuck, as the bus slowly began to linger with the smell of fruity Doritos.


3.Last year, it poured for the full two nights and three days that we were there. Does Camp Fair View Lake have excellent indoor facilities? Nope. Instead we did archery, played baseball and went boating...in FREEZING rain. Afterwards, the girls living in my bunk thought that it would be funny to prank me; and put shaving cream...in my ONLY dry pair of sneakers. Listen girls, I know where you sleep.

4. I watched as Alana lay on the floor, so that she could peer underneath Lizzie's towel as she stepped out of the shower.

5. Helping Nick to change his underwear because he peed his pants (during wax candle making!?!?)

6. Not showering or pooping for three days.

7. Collecting samples of moss, algae, pollen and ragweed in the rain. Oh, don't worry my seasonal allergies never fared better!

8. And finally, the brilliant idea of serving ice cream sundaes to 36 ADHD children at 9:30 pm.

Stay tuned, for Camp Fair View Lake Part III.