Blog Post #27: What I Talk About When I Talk About Math Camp

Today's blog post is a bit special, I’m writing it on the eve of turning 20 years old. I spent the last week as a camp counselor at a math camp for high schoolers. I went into it not wanting to spend the week away from home. Home is comfortable, home is where I can sit on my couch scrolling on my phone and only feeling mildly guilty about it. But as the week progressed, I became more grateful for the experience. Being around young people in general is inspiring for me. I’d say it was a pretty rewarding last week of being a teenager. 

At camp, before going to sleep each night, I’d listen to a bit of my audiobook- What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami. I think listening to this book inspired me to want to run again, something I haven’t been doing much at all this summer. So, on two days this past week I woke up extra early (6:35am) to take some students on a morning run. Much of my teenage years were swamped with the ED-inflicted idea that the only reason I should run is to lose weight. One of my goals this summer has been to come up with my own definition of health, that doesn’t revolve around weight or really how my body looks at all. 

From the start, I knew my definition of health needed to include some sort of movement, in any form that I enjoy and that makes me feel good. It could be dancing once a week for all that it matters, as long as I’m moving my body in some way fairly consistently. I don’t dance, but I do enjoy running. Running with high school students this week reminded me that there are plenty of reasons to run that have nothing to do with changing one’s appearance. I think the kids who showed up on those early mornings run because they hunger to get faster and stronger. And also (hopefully) because they also enjoy running as an activity. There’s something special about the feeling of pumping your arms and legs, focusing on letting your body move like a well-oiled machine. It seems so straightforward, but learning new reasons to run from young people gave me a lot of hope this week. I’ve found my new why for running-  I run because I want to feel stronger every day. 

Beyond running, I feel like the campers taught me so much about what I value. For one, a new sense of pride in being a Vermont kid. We all grew up with mountains, trees, and Lake Champlain within reasonable driving distance, and at least for me I feel healed every time I go back to nature. I think it’s likely the same way for a lot of the campers- kids who grew up exploring nature and moving their bodies. 

The campers also reminded me not to take life too seriously. Having blueberry pancakes first thing in the morning isn’t gonna kill me. Chocolate milk is best made using Hershey syrup, but intentionally not fully mixed so there’s extra syrup at the bottom- as you drink the milk, it gets progressively more chocolate-dense until you’re left with one last glorious sip of ultra-chocolatey milk (no need to drink the extra chocolate at the bottom unless you really want to. 

Lastly, the campers reminded me that the most productive thing I can do in this life is just be me. Most of those kids exist only as themselves, fully and uniquely, because that’s the only way they know how to exist in this chaotic world. And those unique versions of self were vibrant. They involved dried apricots being pulled out of pockets to snack on throughout the day, sporadic Mickey Mouse impressions, cat-eared headbands, pauses to gaze at the evening sky and admire its beauty, hair full of colorful clips, intensely-focused lecture sessions, a deck of cards labeled with pieces of paper for mini version of the game Chameleon, and so much more. The world is and will continue to be full of bad things, and as I step out of my teenage years into my 20’s, I’m going to continue having hope.