“My best friend at the time was going with me to Maqua. It was her first time away from home, a fact I could scarcely believe, since she was already fourteen. Her family was somewhat dysfunctional, as I look back on it. Her parents eventually divorced and her father was an alcoholic, so being the typical oldest child, she felt she needed to be home to take care of them. None of the rest of our friends had anything but Ozzie and Harriet households,” said Kay Alcorn, who had camped in the late forties with a great group of girls. (Her friend had a good time by the end of her session.)

Laurie Cone’s older sister Tally was in Senior Village in 1962 when she attended. One would think she would not have been homesick with a sister close by, but her two-week session turned into one when she got a stomach ache and ended up in the infirmary. “I loved it there and didn’t want to go home, or so I told them, “ laughed Laurie. “My parents had a cottage in Oscoda and they had to come pick me up, but the next summer I begged to go back to camp.”

Tally, of course, remembered camp to be a blast and could not wait to get to Senior Village with the older girls. “My sister looked up to me and she was in elementary school when I was in middle school,” said outgoing and independent Tally. “Ironically, Laurie was the one who ended up going for years and becoming a counselor.”

Geraldine Folkert, who had attended camp in 1942, forced her son Matthew to go to camp the year it turned co-ed in 1976. He was twelve years old and hated it. He knew no one and left after one week. It was his first time away from home and the only memories that remained included a rained out canoe trip and cool sail on the lake.

“My brother Matt was there at the same time and we usually didn’t get along, but I remember one afternoon he was sitting on a log on the lake, so I sat down next to him,” recalled Rebecca Prieskorn. “This sucks, he said, and I said yup and there was our brother sister bonding time.” (She was only nine when she went at age nine for the same week.)

“I didn’t go with friends and I was very homesick. I was shy, I stuttered and took my stuffed monkey Jo-Jo with me. I still have him in my lingerie chest and my Mom had given it to me when I was little. I know I was teased, especially by those who didn’t know me, and home seemed to be so far away. This is how I felt about camp. My password on my computer is MAQUA POW. Now I will have to change it, ” said Rebecca.

Amy Falk bunked in with a friend in 1971, who was one of eight children. It took her a long while to get comfortable at camp, even with her stuffed animal there to comfort her. Jan Schreiber remembers her friend Shelley Harris crying every third night for her dog Fritzi in the sixties and Marsha Immerman (1947-53) missed her brother. Beth Phillips was fine until her Mom sent mail during her stay in the seventies.

Randi Wynne-Parry was eight years old in 1969 and despite her homesickness, she felt her mind was eased knowing her sister was there. “I wasn’t going to be that girl who went home. I knew that wasn’t happening.” Missy Butsch, who camped the same year, said her Mom came to pick her up and “I was like a little dot roaring up to them, and even though I was homesick, I didn’t show it and I never sent letters home.”

“I was homesick. My Mom had packed my trunk and she was very into buying clothes, so I’m sure I had some new ones, but I remember having a hard time going to sleep that first night. I was anxious about not going to sleep and I was out of sorts the next day because I didn’t sleep. I had a few crying jags, I’m sure because I was overtired”, said Ilene Zacher (1959-62). “I was quiet as a child and read a lot, but in general I was with friends in my hut and even though there were always cliques, I found a way in.”

Nothing beats lonely ten-year old Lucille Greenwald in 1947. “On the last day when parents came to pick up the girls, I walked out to the main road and stood in the pouring rain for hours waiting for them.” (Thankfully, fonder memories were formed once her sister Linda attended the following two years.)

When your parents arrived to pick you up, what was your reaction? Not ready to leave or ready?