Time Flies

When you get to camp, the first week is always the longest, most drawn-out, awkward, seemingly endless seven days you'll ever spend in your life. You get there and it takes hours to unpack - clothes, shoes, toiletries, little idiosyncratic relics that you bring to try and give your room some semblance of the one you left at home - and then another handful of hours to get settled. You have to get used to the people there; not only their physical presence but the thought of them, the thought of them showering in your shower, using your toilet, brushing their teeth in your sink. Moving into a dorm is natural selection on steroids, a pressure cooker of adaptation. Those who adjust will enjoy their five weeks immensely, those who can't find a comfort zone will be relegated to many a night alone reading in their room while their roommate produces improvisational music videos in the lobby.

But you get through it. The next three weeks will be euphoric. You'll laugh endlessly at recurring jokes. You'll make ceremonial trips to the local Chinese restaurant. You'll order the same thing every time. You'll eat with the same people. You'll stretch the rules. You'll jaywalk whenever possible. Curfew will come. You'll disregard it. You'll stay with someone in their room until even the instructors call it a night. You'll tiptoe back upstairs to your floor. You'll meet your friends. Now their more like family. You'll tiptoe back downstairs to raid the fridge. You'll tiptoe back upstairs and feast on your chilled prizes. You'll speak in code. You'll refer to campers and staff using short acronyms. You'll go to the beach. Way past operating hours, you'll take 7,000 pictures in the sand. You'll write on 35 Facebook walls a day. Some of the recipients will be in the room with you. You'll sing along to the same three songs every night. You'll tell yourself you'll do those interviews tomorrow. You'll climb up to the top bunk. You'll collapse onto the bed. Your roommate coughs and laughs as the dust lands on him. You'll talk about your late-night exploits. You'll laugh. You'll anticipate tomorrow. You'll say goodnight.

During the last week, time stretches out again. This will be the second-longest week of your life. You'll spend every moment possible with the people you've gotten closest to; those who you don't know very well get the rest of your time, visits and conversations you'll regret not having earlier and more often. You'll eat out together and, after the meal, just sit there talking, not wanting to leave because that would mean one more thing has ended and you, and time, have to move on to the next thing. You'll spend all your time on your floor in the common room; you'll brush your teeth there, wait for the shower there, read your pre-lecture material there. You'll stay up till 2 a.m. and talk with anyone who'll listen; about any and all things, sometimes about nothing at all. You'll spend the night in someone else's room, because even sleeping next to someone is spending time with them. You'll cherish every second of every day, as appreciative as a patient with a terminal illness. You'll watch the sunrise on that final day, with the people closest to you, and even if you can't actually see the sun, you were there and you stayed up for it. You check your cellphone every two minutes and watch helplessly as time inches forward and, in a juvenile bout of disbelief and denial, you'll close your eyes as hard as you can to try and stop it.

Then it's over.