Dear First-Time Camp Parent,
In the summer of 2013, J Camp introduced the weekly photo dump: hundreds of blurry but colorful photos linked in its newsletter.
Parents would scour each photo looking for a glimpse that confirmed their greatest hopes (that their kids were having fun despite the non-answers they received to the question “how was your day?”) or worst fears (that their kids were having the worst summer ever despite the non-answers they received to “how was your day?”).
I remember this clearly, as it was my last summer as a J Camp director. I was flummoxed that parents of children who attended day camp required such documentation. Couldn’t they sense the life changing experience from the tired, only mildly-sunburned smiles? Did the tie-dye crammed at the bottom of the backpack not speak of success? Is joy not evident in the 12 missing water bottles?
And still more befuddling were comments in the drop-off lines the next week or — worse — the irritated phone calls just minutes after the links were sent.
“Hundreds of photos and not ONE of my kid?”
I told them that their kid was moving too fast to be captured on film. That the memories were too wondrous to be crystallized.
I was so frustrated. This seemed ungrateful. I thought, where is the trust? Where is the faith? My parents never needed photographic evidence of my fun. (Note that my mother ran the camp herself and my father was literally its photographer.)
Likewise, in Spring of 2025, after enrolling our son Darby in camp in Wisconsin, we received waiver after waiver for the release of his image on a secure photo app, for use in marketing materials, for distribution in camp-wide emails. I scoffed. Who needs this? Why, in my day, I took my own photos! My parents sent me off to the wilds of the upper Midwest with nothing but a toothbrush and a flashlight and said, “Good riddance, kid, watch out for bears!”
But then came the ping.
Camp photos these days aren’t delivered with something so quaint as a link. They go straight to an app, to which I uploaded Darby’s picture for the purposes of facial recognition. I am grateful for and grossed out by this technology in equal measure.
Ping! Gone were my concerns about this app owning my child’s image. Ping! Gone was my lofty belief that Darby’s camp memories were his own. Ping! Gone, gone, gone was my nonchalance, my too-cool-for-schoolness, my trust that Darby could have a wonderful time and I would never need to know the details. Here was a lifeline to my oldest, my ringleader, my field general. All were labels given to Darby by his teachers, who got to see him where my eyes wouldn’t reach – and now I could see for myself.
Ping! I peered closely: does he look like he’s making friends? Is he the leader of the pack? And if so, does he seem to be including the quiet kids?
Ping! There’s a red shirt on the opposite side of the soccer field! Is that him!?
Ping! He looks like he’s not wearing sunscreen…
Ping! Ping! Ping! Never before had I experienced screen addiction. Everything else could wait: an image of my far-flung firstborn has shown up on my phone!
I dropped Darby off for his second year at Jewish overnight camp today, and the app is uploaded and ready to go. This is the little window through which I’ll receive hastily scrawled letters home, updates on weather and travel, changes to itinerary, and — of course — photos.
This electronic connection is a blessing for me. What a joy and wonder to witness even snatches of these formative days. But this is not my experience — this is Darby’s. And everyone deserves to grow up without scrutiny that is too close, too questioning.
And so, dear First-Time Camp Parent, enjoy the photos. Peruse them while the laundry, the memo, the lunches for tomorrow all wait. Scratch your head that your camper is wearing the same shirt for the fourth day in a row, and then put down your phone and pour a glass of wine.
Your camper is fine, fine, fine.
Sincerely,
Second-Time Camp Parent
