Camp Blog

The Unbreakable Agawak Family

by: 
Camp Director

When we call our campers “The Agawak Family”, we differ from the dictionary that defines family as: “A group consisting of parents and children living together in a household.”

 

We may not be bound by bloodlines, yet our camp sisters share the core tenets of family life. The relationships that are formed at Agawak are unbreakable, formed of love, loyalty, trust and tradition. These qualities bind us forever.

 

Some of my closest friends are women I went to camp with during the 1960s and 1970s. No one knows you better, pushes you harder to achieve or is able to make you laugh as hard, as our Agawak sisters.

 

These are friends that took the journey together from young childhood to CITs. These are the friends who watch us wobble on water skis during our first try, then a couple weeks later watch us make it around the lake. These are the friends who fight with fire for a win on the fields for a Blue or White victory, then fall into each other’s arms back at their cabins.

 

There are now thousands of us Agawak sisters as we approach our 100th birthday in 2021. Much about camp is different and much is the same, especially when it comes to our close sisterhood. Now in my fifth season back – after skipping 40 years -- I am watching thick bonds of friendship evolve every day, solidified with each passing summer.

 

What has changed is that we didn’t have 50 activities, including a Tango Tower or candle-making or Hippie Living – though many of us are old hippies and still living!

 

And, there was no Lip Sync competition. In our day, each cabin group wrote their own lyrics to an original song, and actually sang the song. Our voices were not always in a unified pitch yet our hearts were always in unity.

 

The constant, the drumbeat of Agawak, that is eternally unchanged are the deep and abiding relationships that form on the shores of Blue Lake. Today, I am hearing girls screaming in joy after trying new sports and activities, egged on by their friends. One of my campers at the Agalog writing activity came breathlessly running to me holding archery targets with a round of near bullseyes, this her first time in the sport.

 

Nearby at candle-making, I see a group of cabin mates hugging each other as they caress their colorful creations. I hear one camper say: “Can you believe WE made candles?”

 

Walking to the waterfront, I am watching three nine-year-olds trying paddle boarding for the first time. They are wobbly and falling but trying and trying again until they get it right, empowered by cheering each other on.

 

Magic happens here every day as it did during my camping days decades ago, as girls arise together, eat together, play together, compete against one another, and always laugh together. You cannot walk anywhere at Camp Agawak without hearing that delicious peal of laughter coming from a huddle of girls.

 

The campers love Agawak and love each other with the intensity – and endurance -- that we did. I observe the large groups who have grown up together at Agawak and they walk with arms looped, as if they were one gigantic animal.

 

I can’t tell you enough how important my early Agawak years have been, in building essential character traits such as ambition, tenacity and a sense of adventure. Also at the top of the list is the ability to make friends with girls far different than me.  Yet, somehow, we end up as sisters that forever share a heart.

 

There is more than one way to define the word “family”.    

-Iris Krasnow