The Meaning of Tradition

On one of the last days of June, you hop into the car/bus/plane with one destination in mind. Your heart races and your stomach does a flipturn with every minute that passes, as you journey on into more and more rural territory. The cows flash by and the cornstalks grow taller, and you know you’re getting close. As you see the sign for Camp Yavneh, your parents make a right turn onto Lower Deerfield Road, the boundary between the outside world and camp. You cross this threshold every year - it signifies the beginning of something great.   As you wait in line to go into camp, the Kerem girls’ counselors greet you. You recall how last year and the year before, the Kerem girls’ counselors are always the greeters. It’s something you’ve come to expect, part of the process of re-entering the camp world. You are then instructed to help the Kerem kids unload your bags into the appropriate pile in Sadeh Yarok, and then you’re sent to get a lice check under the Pavilion. As you walk to your bunk, you pass parents, campers and counselors, some of whom you recognize, others you don’t.  Your facial expression mirrors that of the other campers around you – a mixture of disbelief, pure excitement, and a hint of nerves. It’s the same every year.

The second you get through that screen door to your bunk, you encounter a mad house: parents trying to set up their kids’ areas, campers nervously meeting and happily reuniting, and counselors running around, trying to appease the parents. After all the parents have left, your counselor tells you to go down for Mifkad.   As you walk down the boys/girls path,find your place in line, and begin singing the Star Spangled Banner, it finally hits you. “I am in camp. I am ready for the start of the summer.”   The first day of camp – the first hour, even –has become a tradition for each of us, one that we take part in individually but we experience collectively.  It is a series of events that we expect every summer. The first-day-of-camp tradition opens up a summer full of traditions that define those 8 crucial weeks of the year.

It is tradition, Masoret, culture, attitude, or custom that keeps our camp, and every other camp, cohesive and comforting. If camp were a human, the buildings, programs and people would make up the body  but the history, customs, and traditions would represent the soul. Buildings are torn down and rebuilt, programs succeed and fail, and the people come and go, but  masoret is the thread of continuity that preserves Yavneh’s integrity and identity. We love camp because it is constant, reliable and dependable. We know Zimriyah happens first month, and Maccabiah second, and we know on Shabbat we get brownies before davening, and M&M cookies at seudat shelishit, and we know about the birthday Eurovision song, and “bumbumbumbum good Shabbas.” We love the consistency, the tradition. It’s like watching our favorite movie over and over again. It’s the same thing, but it never gets old.

It’s not only the intangible things, but the physical ones as well. Debbie Sussman recently told me a story about someone asking her when she was planning to redo the Kerem boys’ bunk. She didn’t tell me what she answered, but she did reveal that this person had never attended Yavneh. The Kerem/Maalot boys’ bunks are so enriched in years of tradition, which makes living on waterfront so special. It is not about living close to the middle of camp (even though this helps as well) that makes it so popular. It’s about knowing and valuing the sacredness of the building. I call this the phenomenon of ‘looking up.’

What do I mean by ‘looking up?’ As most people know, the Kerem and Maalot bunks contain names from the 1960s and plaques from the 1980s. When the kids arrive, they feel honored to be able to sleep in the same place past members of Kerem and Maalot slept. So what do the kids do? They read, reread, and re-reread every single plaque in these buildings.[1] They represent a portal into the past, a “synopsis” of that particular year. To creators and the readers of the plaque, this is what Yavneh represents, the names and the memories of past campers.

However, not all traditions are created equal, and a lot of them serve different purposes. I have divided camp tradition into three categories.

The first group consists of everything that falls into the subject of camp history. These are the stories, memories, camp lore, and conversations about camp. This is what the plaque represents to the Kerem campers, why people debate which year was the best Kerem ever, and is the only aspect of camp to which people can hold onto outside of the summer. My blog certainly fits into this category as well.  From a philosophical standpoint, tradition includes talking about camp customs and rituals just asthe foundation of Judaism is retelling the story of our ancestors. Therefore, I feel that the act of conversation revolving camp is part of the tradition.

The second category to camp tradition is everything relating to the mission of our camp. This is not limited to the five-paragraph mission that is on the camp website, even though this is important as well. Within the definition of Camp Yavneh I am including big programs like Maccabiah, Zimriayah, and KTV. Here, I’m including defining Jewish characteristics like pluralism, Shabbat, and our dedication to our heritage. This also encompasses the structure of our aydot, the daily grind of our schedule and our dedication to freedom and responsibility.  I would finally include the intangibles like building unshakeable friendships, the desire to remain consistent and just simply having fun. Without these traditions, these goals, Camp Yavneh would cease to be the camp that I know, that I love, that I cherish.

The final category, which most people identify as real camp traditions, are what I call memes. According to Wikipedia, a meme (rhymes with cream) “identifies ideas or beliefs that are transmitted from one person or group of people to another. The name comes from an analogy: as genes transmit biological information, memes can be said to transmit idea and belief information.”  There are a billion aspects of camp that are passed down from one summer to the next, from one generation to the next. Smaller ones include the counselor rad hayom, the Naaleh letter and M&M cookies. Larger ones include Relish, Havdalah, and a$$ ball. Newer ones encompass Tzipori, Mar Milon and the Yavnotes, where older ones include Kerem leading Zmirot, Yom Sport, and the Kerem play.  All of these things and countless others define each summer. As in the case of the older traditions, it might define ten, twenty or even the thirty summers in a row. However, the beauty of a meme is that once you are handed the idea, information or tradition, it is yours to own, and yours to change (on purpose or by accident). A tradition might be a particular way one year, and completely different another year - and that is perfectly alright.  For example, I was talking to a member from Kerem ‘05 who did not return to camp as counselor, and he asked about a$$ ball. I told him the rules about the bounces and touches, the fact that people play during the day, and the fact that it is mostly played with shoes. His response was something along the lines of, “It’s too bad, because when I was in Kerem, we played it a better way. This new way is totally wrong.” I disagree. Camp in 2005 is not camp in 2011. The campers and counselors of 2011 have  every right to take ownership of their summer and morph Yavneh into a better place. We must be able to recognize and appreciate that every year camp traditions change – and this is fine, natural, and good.

We need traditions at camp to provide continuity from summer to summer. But we need to realize that it is expected for our traditions to change each summer and facilitate growth. From year to year, the things we hold dear will not disappear[2] because that is what contributes to the good of camp. The structure of Mifkad might change a little bit, but I hope that the sense of the camp gathering every morning and evening will not. The superfluous parts of the memes will disappear, just as human genes evolved to dictate how we behave today.

I will never go back to camp and say I am upset about a changed tradition. I will be perfectly content to return to a camp where the everyday traditions are unfamiliar to me. My camp will always be in my heart, but my perception of camp is only mine; I should not be the one telling others what is good or bad about camp. As long as people are still telling and retelling Yavneh history and the camp continues to live up to its mission, Camp Yavneh will be my home. And as long as campers continue to get that jittery feeling of anticipation as they round the corner of Lower Deerfield Road on that fateful first day – the very same feeling I got each of the thirteen years I returned - I’ll know that Yavneh is not too far off from the place I know and love.

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[1] EDITOR’S NOTE: “The looking up phenomenon happens in girls' bunks too. It’s actually even more interesting because up until recently, the Kerem girls’ bunk changed year to year, so there are plaques all over the place. Because the plaques are so widespread in the girls' area, it can be argued that the looking up phenomenon starts even earlier than Maalot in the girls area.” I agree.

[2] Yes, the rhymes and the reference to On and On is on purpose.