4 more things I need to share from writing camp

It’s been over a month since I last posted and I don’t have any good excuses. But I do have some poor excuses: finishing up my year-long co-op in June, general gnashing of teeth over having about a month before college, and going to writing camp at Indiana Wesleyan University two weeks ago. Which is what I’m going to be talking about today.

• some things about camp

Camp this year was fun and difficult and the same and different.

Two of my closest friends from writing camp last year returned, and our Teaching Assistant, who is possibly the coolest person on the planet, was also there again. (Someone asked if we were sisters while I was there and I was extremely flattered.) So, transitioning into camp life was easier this year, I guess. I didn’t have to go through as much of the awkward stage of getting to know people, just catching up.

However, this year of writing camp was also more stressful. Last year was stressful because I didn’t know what to expect. This year was stressful because I knew exactly what to expect. I knew how challenging it had been for me to feel like I didn’t have enough time to work last year and I worried about that more than I needed to. Because worrying always helps me out. But to be fair, I divided my worry evenly between concern about not having enough time and concern that my brain had shriveled up and I no longer had any good ideas or writing abilities (if I’d ever had them to begin with.) I spent a lot of my free time typing in the Google Docs app on my phone, trying to finish stories and essays in more hectic, people-inhabited spaces (which actually seemed to help.)

• some things about people

Even more than last year, I noticed how much I love the people at IWU. Spending time with the other campers and student workers was one of my favorite parts of writing camp. I got to discuss Harry Potter houses across the table at lunch, talk about the properties of ectoplasm at midnight with my roommate, stargaze before getting donuts at an irresponsibly late time, and talk to a guy who’d decided to climb up a tree when it was pitch black outside. And I was part of several conversations centered around naming the admiral attributes of several British actors. (Also I observed/participated in an argument over whether pole dancing was always bad or if it was a valid way to get exercise.) (That wasn’t even the weirdest conversation I’d had that week.)

• some things about art

Along with camp stuff, I’ve also been thinking about the value of art, shared and unshared. Art consumed by the masses is generally considered the most worthwhile—judged by how long it’s been around or how large the fanbase is for it. But does art still hold value if nobody sees it except its creator? There’s growth that comes with practice, and creating stuff in and of itself has many positive health benefits. But it seems like both you and possibly everyone else is missing out if you make art purely for yourself. You miss out on the feedback that helps you go from practice art to work in progress art. And everyone else misses out on the earth-shattering wisdom that you have. However, sometimes it’s good to make things for yourself and yourself alone, and sometimes the wisdom you write is most useful to your own brain.

• some poetry (that I wrote)

Small confession—this year I actually enjoyed writing poetry. Slightly. Mostly because I was writing complete gibberish bUT I had fun.

Some of my prestigious work:

spiders

the spider on my wall

has a bad habit

of staring. Its mother

never taught it better.

applesauce

applesauce is the

mashed potatoes of apples.

it is sweeter but

it has no butter.