The Future of Summer Camp, Post-Camp Mystic

I grew up going to all manner of camps: church camp, science camp, French camp, cheerleading camp... if there was a way for me to be away from home (and have a fun packing list), I took it. I loved the freedoms and rituals of camp, the goofy, cool counselors who felt like visions of my potential future, and the cachet that accumulated with each passing summer. Camp was a place where I could be a different person, or at least a better, more likable one. I thought I was a camp person.

But when I reached adulthood, I realized my camp-ness was nothing in comparison to the people whose families had dedicated their kids' summers to one camp... for decades. That's what Camp Mystic was — and still is — for thousands of former campers. So when a flash flood last July took the lives of 28 Mystic campers, questions about the future of the camp also became questions about the future of that identity.

Kerry Howley spent six months reporting a stunning feature for New York Magazine on the aftermath of the Mystic flood. She joins the pod to answer your questions about Camp Mystic itself, but also the larger culture of camp and its role in identity formation. This conversation's going to stick with me for a very long time.

A Camp Mystic Brochure from 1981 (via Getty)

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Show Notes:

• Read Kerry Howley's incredible New York Magazine feature — "Could the Girls of Camp Mystic Have Been Saved?" — here
• Read more of Kerry's features at NYMag here
• Find out more about Kerry's work here and buy her book Bottoms Up and the Devil Laughs: A Journey Through the Deep State (a real fave in this household) here

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