I dumped my paper plate into the trash along with the others. Alex and Mac chatted about different types of video games.

“Scary games are really fun!” Alex said.

“No way!” Mac said with a shiver. “Those scare me too much. I love to crash cars!”

“Maybe the cars should be monsters and crash. That would be fun!” Alex compromised.

“Yeah,” Mac agreed.

I walked with them through the camp to where the pools were located. The camp had two pools—one for kids who had passed their swimming tests and one for those who still needed lessons. The two counselors brought us to the one where we’d be able to swim if we passed the swimming tests.

“Alright Blue Stars,” Adam said once we’d all changed into our swim trunks. “You need to be tested to show what level you’re at. If you don’t know how to swim, raise your hand.”

Two of the campers raised their hands.

“The two of you don’t need to get tested. The rest of you will be tested in pairs.”

“That’s right,” said a man in swim trunks that said ‘lifeguard’ on them. “The first test is to see how far you can swim with your face in the water. You can use whichever stroke you prefer. After that—if you can swim at least the length of the pool—I want to see how long you can tread water. I will be observing each of you and keeping you safe. Now, who’s up first?”

Not wanting to sit there waiting, I raised my hand. Micah did as well. I looked at him and he sneered back at me. We stepped to the end of the pool in different lanes.

“Alright, why don’t you both jump into the water? When you’re ready, I’ll blow my whistle.”

The water bit into me. It was still early summer and the water wasn’t nearly as warm as it would be by the end of the swimming season. I put one hand on the top of the wall and my feet against the side. I drew myself in and looked at the lifeguard. He checked on Micah and then me. He raised the whistle to his lips and blew.

I let go of the wall with my hand and pushed hard with my legs. I went with the more efficient front crawl. Though I hadn’t practiced it much in a long time, it wasn’t something I’d forgotten how to do. The motions came easily enough. The only tricky part was breathing every few strokes. That part turned out alright and I slowed before I ran into the wall at the deep end.

I turned around and began the swim back. As I did, I saw Micah struggling about two thirds of the way to the end of the pool. I put my face back into the water and went back to work. Though I was beginning to tire, the amount of activity I did day in and day out left me with solid stamina. Finally, the shallow end’s wall was in sight. I breathed heavily once my hand caught the edge of the wall.

I stood up and looked around. Micah was sitting on the edge of the pool glowering at me. The other boys were not really paying much attention—busying themselves chatting.

“Good job,” the lifeguard said. “Are you ready to tread water?”

I nodded.

“Go to the deep end and tread water until I tell you to stop or you can’t anymore. I’ll blow the whistle when it’s time to start.”

I used the side wall to pull myself to the deep end while using less energy than swimming there. It was faster, too. I pushed off the edge at the same moment the lifeguard’s whistle shrieked.

The first few seconds were easy. Then my arms began to burn followed shortly after by my legs. I closed my eyes to focus on keeping my head above the water. I breathed steadily and found a motion that kept me up while allowing me to alternately rest my arms and legs. Eventually, the lifeguard blew his whistle again so I went back to the wall and climbed out.

“Congratulations,” he said. “You pass fully. You don’t have to take lessons if you don’t want to and can come to this pool when you have swimming time with your group. You will need a swim buddy—which might come from your group or one of the others who are testing at the other pool right now.”

I nodded then went back to the rest of the boys.

The testing ended up taking around half an hour. Of the boys in my group, I was the only one to pass the test fully. There were a couple who passed enough to be able to swim in just the shallow end of the free swim pool after their shorter lessons. If I wanted to swim before the lessons finished, I’d need to be swim buddies with someone from another group. Thankfully, the different groups split up to go to the pools they would be swimming in, so I was able to be paired with a boy a couple years older than me who had passed the full test like I had.

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The time I had to swim after the testing was short. My buddy-for-the-day—or Patrick as his parents named him—took turns diving for small toys on the bottom of the pool. A couple blasts of the lifeguard’s whistle signaled the end of swimming and it was back into the changing room to dry off.

The last activity for the day was free play at the playground. I thought the playground itself was rather spartan—consisting of a single slide, some short pillars to jump between, and a jungle gym. Instead of queuing for the slide like everyone else, I built a wood chip castle. Mac came over after he went down the slide a couple of times.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Making a castle,” I said, showing him the various features of it.

“Cool! I’m going to make a racetrack.”

A couple other boys peeled off from the main contingent and joined us in building structures out of the splintered wood. It wasn’t a terrible way to pass the time, but I wished it had been something better like archery or dodge ball or, well, nearly anything else.

I was glad when the end of the day came. We were marshaled back to the open area where we’d been in the morning. Attendance was taken one more time and then each camper was checked off the list when their guardian arrived to take them away.

“How was your first day?” Grandpa Joe asked when he picked me up.

“Not bad,” I shrugged.

“Meet anyone you liked?”

“Eh, maybe. Definitely one of them’s got some sort of grudge against me.”

“Oh?”

“Kept giving me nasty looks all day when he thought no one else was looking. Pretty silly.”

“I remember those days,” Grandpa Joe said with a smile. “Got into a few fights back then!”

“I doubt it’ll get to that point,” I laughed.

“If it does, give ‘im the what-for, yeah?”

“Rather deal with it diplomatically,” I shrugged. “More experience that way… I think.”

“Always with the experience… sometimes you’ve got to live a little. Do what needs doing instead of trying to be as efficient as you possibly can. You’ll never be perfect the first time.”

“But I’ll learn for the next time.”

“That you will. You have time to make your mistakes now. Better to learn from ‘em while there’s no real pressure.”

“True.” I sighed. “I’d rather avoid the obvious pitfalls I can see a mile away than consciously walk into them to find out just how much they hurt.”

“You’re a smart kid.”

“Took a long time to get there,” I chuckled.

Grandpa Joe laughed with me.

----------------------------------------

Two days later was a rainy day. Instead of meeting at the open field like we had the previous two days, the meeting place for our group was in the cafeteria. Mac pulled out a handheld gaming console to pass the time. There were activities for everyone to do, but they were frankly boring. Watching the rain fall in sheets from the roof of the cafeteria was more entertaining!

Since the rain showed no sign of slowing down, the counselors tried several tactics to grab our attention for more than a few moments. None of them worked on more than a couple of the campers. The rest ended up chatting amongst themselves. Alex, Mac, and I traded time on Mac’s device. First one would play while the others watched. After a level or a death, the next person would take over.

“Where’d you get that?” Micah asked when I was playing.

“It’s Mac’s,” I said with a quick glance his way.

“Can I have a turn?”

“Ask Mac,” I said, not bothering to look up again.

I put my focus back into not dying.

“Give him a turn next,” Mac decided after Micah asked him.

For the next five minutes, Micah hovered over my shoulder uncomfortably close. I was playing well, but had a hard time concentrating.

“Come on,” Micah complained.

He went to snatch it away from me. I expertly dodged both him and an on-screen enemy.

“I’m almost done with the level. You can have it after,” I said with a quick glare his way.

True to my word, I finished the level less than a minute later. Mac cheered—we’d all struggled to pass it for a while—and I passed the console over to Micah. He died quickly and reluctantly gave it to Alex. While the console made its rounds, Micah complained the entire time. I wanted to tell him to shut up, but I bit my tongue.

You’re better than that, Eddy, I told myself. You’re almost 40 and he’s a little kid.

We played for half of the day until the rain finally let up after lunch.

I got a chance to go swimming—and finish the swimming quest I had for the day. The water was colder from the rain and lack of sun. I shivered through the swim session. I was paired with one of the older kids as usual, but that was fine. It was fun hanging out with different people each time.

The final program of the day was archery. I’d been looking forward to it as soon as I’d had a look over the weekly schedule. Archery was held at the far end of the soccer field—past the far goal and facing the trees. Five targets stood on stands backed by netting to catch any errant shots.

“Has anyone shot a bow before?” the archery instructor asked.

Only three of us raised our hands—including me.

“Good. For the rest of you, the most important thing is safety—“

The man talked for ten minutes. He showed us how to shoot the traditional bow and the compound bow. There were enough bows for ten campers at the same time, but most of the bows would be too hard to draw back. As I was one of the three who had archery experience, I got first crack at it along with the other two. Two newbies were also selected for the instructor to assist.

I got ten arrows to shoot. I chose a compound bow. While the traditional was easier to draw, it was harder to hold drawn in order to aim. I notched the first arrow and pulled the string back. Once past the hard part of the draw, I did my best to aim at my target. The targets were only about twenty feet away. I didn’t know the strength of my bow well, so I guessed how much I needed to compensate for gravity. I loosed the first arrow and it scraped the top of the target. I adjusted. The next nine turned the target into a porcupine.

I waited until the instructor told us to put our bows down and retrieve the arrows. Pulling them from the target took a fair amount of strength, but it was doable. When I had them all, I dropped them into holder on the ground and went to watch the next batch try shooting for the first time.

“Since everyone’s had a chance to shoot at least once,” the instructor said, “let’s see who’s the better shot!”