“Put it in the books” is the catchphrase of New York Mets’ radio announcer Howie Rose after the final out in a Mets’ victory. In baseball, unlike in most things in life, there are clear measurements of success in a game or over the course of a season. The final score? Number of wins? Did you make the Playoffs? The World Series?

When is the exact moment when the approaching summer firmly starts to take shape in a camper’s mind? As a child growing up in the late 1960s, the youngest of 4, I think it may have been the day when the trunks were brought down from the attic and lined up along one wall in the dining room….

On a visit to camp in early January, the temperature locked below 20 degrees in the first true freeze of the off-season, it seemed (okay, felt) like the kind of day to spend in the Admin office organizing the archives. 

Always thinking I’m braced and ready, just how suddenly summer ends on Closing Day never ceases to surprise me with the stark contrast between camp and not camp. Daily sounds of campers and staff—laughter, games being played, singing,...—instantly giving way to the near-silence of the wind in the trees and the eerie sense that you can still hear a faint bugle call lingering in the air.

The Doppler Effect (without delving too deeply into the science) explains why the sound of an approaching object (like a train whistle) seems to rise in pitch. Also created is an illusion that the speed of the object in question (the train) appears to be accelerating. At Scatico, we have our own magical Doppler Effect—but on a temporal (referring to both time and loftier matters) plane. 

First the leaves and then the snow. Fallen. Standing on the dock at the girls waterfront, you can see clear through the ridge of trees across the lake to the boys lower hill cabins and social hall. Camp is eerily quiet. Darkness descends by 5PM.