I was really excited when our friend Boo came up with the idea of doing a “Co-op Camp”- where a bunch of us families would coalesce our talents to make a multi-stage camp over the entire summer. The idea is that, each parent would come up with something they could “lead a camp” with, and would welcome all of the other family’s kids into our camp. So far, we have: science, drama, art, and TENNIS (my contribution). We are hoping this becomes a tradition, over the summers.
But I have to say it was really exciting to see my campers learn the basics of tennis. This is another one of those “I’ve been dreaming about this moment since they were born” moments that I have, as a dad. One of my favorite memories from growing up is when my Dad did this very thing with me, my brothers, and our friends. It was really cool for me to see my Dad interact with my friends, and to see him teach something they thought was important. It made me think I’d like to do the same.
So, to my first stab at camp: I had five campers, all girls. You could tell there was a little bit of trepidation from the beginning (I got this confirmed from one of the moms: some of the campers are a little nervous around sports, in general.) But they all told me that they had fun, and they wanted to do more. You cannot get a higher compliment than that.
Camp went only three days… and one of the days was rained out. But it was so much fun, getting back into teaching tennis… it made me think that this is only the very beginning, and that I’d love to see some blossoming tennis players out of this group. The most exciting thing for me about this camp was thinking about how much more these campers have to learn… and how much I’d love to teach them through the way!
To be continued… 🙂
