Memorial Day

Typically a day of travel. Well, for me it surely was. Took the oldest and her friend to their summer camp job - Boy Scout Reservation Kia Kima, extreme north Arkansas. The map provided by their website is deceptively not to scale, and neglects to give any directions past the town of Hardy. Through LOTS of trial and error, we found it within 2 hours, even getting a map from a fire station.

I expect to get a call from her before the week is out. The camp is very remote and they are in heavy canvas tents on wooden platforms. They were the last to arrive and got the leaky tent ("It should be OK if you put a tarp over it" - yeah, because my girl knows what a tarp is), and their area is about 1.5 miles from the administration area. I get the feeling, though, that they open up different sections of the camp as necessary, since there were pavillions for crafts and nature study in their area. Plus a waterfront. Much different than Camp YI, which was more compact and seemingly more organized. It made me a little "homesick" for camp life, remembering bonding with friends and making new friends by virtue of shared experiences, both good and bad. She has her best friend with her, sharing her tent, and that counts for a lot.

Driving back was another 2 hours or more, with curtains of rain every few minutes as I drove through the squalls. Stopped in Marion Arkansas to visit the gravesite of Specialist Christopher Thomas Fox, a good friend and adoptive son of some close friends. Chris shared my cabin at the aforementioned camp. He was killed in Iraq last fall, and against his wishes his body was returned to his half brother, rather than his adoptive family. He wound up in a county cemetery, not a veteran's cemetery near his loved ones. I expected to be the only person to visit him today, but when I arrived, a couple was just leaving, and they came back to meet me. They knew me as Amy's friend - they were Chris' biological father's sister and her husband. It was good to meet them and hear that they visit his grave regularly to drop off flowers.