A freshman Kenwood camper told me this week why he picked K&E. Super simple and right on the nose.

“I wanted a friends camp, not a stuff camp.”

He came up for a tour last summer, and he still remembers it. The thing that stood out at the time? The kids at camp were just plain nice to him. Nice enough that he walked away thinking, this is where I’m going to make friends.

I’ve been fumbling a bit to explain that idea (something I could see from the minute I came here), and a 9-year-old did it in one sentence. It’s now the line I keep repeating to anyone who will listen.

We have plenty of stuff here, and it’s good stuff. It’s great stuff. But the stuff was never and is never really the point. Kids fall for this place because of who they’re standing next to while they use it.

The lake is better with a friend in the next canoe.

Pond Kids

Speaking of the lake, this is where it gets a little weirder, so stay with me.

DJ runs a bit at assembly called DJ Debates. Last week the whole camp voted on whether Eagle Pond is a lake or a pond. Lake won in a landslide.

That’s fine. It’s a huge stretch of water and when you’re out on a boat, it feels like a lake.

And then Bix, a former camper and staff, told me camp is made for pond kids. What did he mean by it?

To him, a pond kid isn’t managing how they come across. You just get who they actually are, no performance, no angle. If that clicks for you, great. If it doesn’t, it’s the freshman’s point again, dressed up a little different.

The Small Choices

Pond and lake is fun to say and hard to pin down, so let me make it concrete.

The kid who makes the whole table laugh, over the kid working on the perfect selfie. The game where the fun is that everyone’s in it, over the game where the fun is winning the next thirty seconds. Camp keeps choosing that first kid, quietly, in a hundred small moments nobody ever announces.

Is a pond vs a lake the perfect place to draw a dividing line? Maybe. It kinda makes sense to me.

That freshman felt all of it on a two-hour tour, a full year before he had words for it.

So that’s who we’re trying to be. A place full of friends. A big old pond out back. Where the stuff is really just the excuse to be with each other all summer.

A friend camp full of pond kids.

You got this,

Jack

P.S. Visiting Day is July 18, and if you're a parent getting this, can’t wait to see everyone. We've got a bunch of stuff planned and some exciting announcements for this year too.

114 Eagle Pond Rd, Wilmot, NH 03287
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