The Toughest Job You'll Ever...Something Something

"Love" might be too strong a word. I wouldn't say "love."

We survived Spring Camp in Agadir and took a bus out of town under cover of darkness while the children slept so that we could get to our next Spring Camp, an appropriately-staffed adequately-supplied day camp where the average work day is just nine hours shorter than in Agadir.

It all looked so good on paper.

I'll say this for overnight camp: it just matters so much more. When you're spending 19 hours a day with each other, a camaraderie forms. You find a couple of "Sponjboob Sceor Pintce"'s lying around and you feel a strange tightening in the muscles of of your face, lips pulled back stupidly around your teeth. Then you're on the beach and one of the little snot-nosed twerps tears you off a huge piece of his svinge, this unholy Moroccan sugared donut, and you just have to sit there eating it and staring at the ocean, while your brain tries to weasel out of your heart's pathetic Grinch-in-Whoville conversion.

Two of the campers who wormed their way into our hearts.

The kids for their part were properly Stockholm Syndrome-d by the end of the week. The last night of camp, teens thanked us with trembling voices, children wept -one girl fainted- and the campers milked their last opportunity for melodramatic hysterics during the aptly-named end-of-camp "Spectacle."

Just a hint of the ritualistic madness that was the Spectac.

Did you ever see Hearts of Darkness?

 One of the marks of Agadir I'll carry all my days.

We had a camp prom; every bit as excruciating as the genuine article.

The kids sang "Deep in the Heart of Texas" on the way to the beach and endeared themselves to us against our will.

Me with Camp Director John at the end of the Spectac, and our wits.

One of the campers interviewed me the last day of camp -for a camp newspaper, I guess, or else just for her diary- and asked for a quote. I didn't even have to think about it. "I'll never forget my time with you all at Camp Agadir."

The toughest job you'll ever simultaneously repress yet feel nostalgia for? I'll keep working on it. I bet I'll recycle that joke a thousand times before it's all said and done.