Camp Two Sentinels

For a while in my youth, I was involved in Girl Scouts, mainly because my mom had a big interest in the organization. I was in it for several years, but by the time I was in junior high I had lost interest. My mom kept up with it though. She took first aid classes, and for a couple of summers was the nurse at Girl Scout camp. In the summer of 1966, the camp was at Two Sentinels by Lake Kirkwood. A bit southwest of Tahoe. Lovely area. My favorite type of nature. Even though I was no longer in a troop, I could’ve gone to camp. I went the previous year on that consideration, but I’d had my fill of sleeping on the ground.

Camp had been going on for a while when my dad and I went to visit mom and my brother. My brother got to tag along, and at the age of 8 he was a little cutie and sort of the camp mascot. We were only going to be gone the weekend. Once I got there, I was hooked. I wanted to stay, but did NOT want to be in a unit. So I was allowed to stay and sleep in the infirmary (on a bed!) as long as I earned my keep.

I got up at the crack of dawn and went down to the kitchen and helped the cook get everything ready for breakfast. I did the same for dinner. Lunch was usually a sack lunch that the girls in the units would make up themselves after breakfast. After dishes were done, the rest of the day was my own. One girl had brought a huge stack of 16 and Tiger Beat magazines, and for some reason the unit counselor confiscated them until the end of session. They were brought to the infirmary and I was DELIGHTED with them!

Between sessions, a few of the counselors wanted to go into Kirkwood to the movies. My mom and I went with them. We saw “Shenandoah” with Jimmy Stewart.

At some point, there was an open bed in the cabin where some of the kitchen help slept, and I started sleeping there instead of the infirmary. There were a couple times when a camper was sick and had to stay in the infirmary for a couple of days. One time a girl was sick enough that they had to call on a doctor who was staying in a vacation cabin around the other side of the lake. I was dispatched to go fetch her. So I walked around the lake until I found the right cabin. There was another girl who became ill and they were moving her out of the infirmary on a stretcher and she had a seizure. Scared me to death!

That was the last year my mom was a camp nurse. I also think it was the last year camp was help at Kirkwood. If I had to pick one type of spot on this earth to spend the rest of my days, it would be in a setting like Kirkwood. Or Tahoe. Or anyplace like it. It doesn’t even have to have a lake. Just give me those pine trees.