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Who here has ever worked at a summer camp?

What to do this summer?

  • I'm twenty years old, in college, and I feel like my life is standing still. Help me find something to do this summer that will change my life. College is supposed to be life-changing (or so I've heard), but my isolated, rural college is not providing me with the real world experiences I wish it would. (Instead, it feels very much like boarding school, but with beer.) I'm originally from NYC, and it almost feels like I've regressed since I went away to school. My peers from home seem much older than I, and my personal development seems stagnant--like I'm the same person I was several years ago. From the ages of nine to eighteen, I attended (and then worked at) a sleepaway camp during the summer, which were some of the best times of my life--I met people from all different cultures and countries, had wonderful shared experiences, and made many long-lasting friendships. After the summer ended, I always felt like a more mature person and came back to school in the fall with a renewed sense of self. Unfortunately (long story) I am no longer able to return to that particular camp, but that feeling at the end of the summer is what I am looking for. The past two summers I have spent living at home in the city, working at day camps. They have been vaguely rewarding in that I like working with kids, but overall profoundly disappointing and lonely because I was living alone (both parents spend the summer elsewhere) and I have no real group of friends at home. I'd like to do something this summer that is meaningful in my own life and will (hopefully) jump-start some feelings of more independence and maturity. Preferably it will also be fun and help me make new friends. I'd also like to get out of NYC and see more of the world. I'm looking for either suggestions or personal experiences that you could share to inspire me. It doesn't need to pay well (or at all). Also, I only speak English and I don't know how to drive.

  • Answer:

    I'm looking for either suggestions or personal experiences that you could share to inspire me. I moved to Ghana for a summer after finding a volunteer position teaching high school politics, my college major, on http://www.idealist.org. When I got there, I found that I was a little isolated from the local community - living with an insanely affluent family in a huge gated mansion outside of the capital, commuting an hour each way everyday by local transport (which was fun at first and then became incredibly tiring), and pretty much being very cosseted. At the end of the summer, though, I traveled to Togo and Senegal with a backpack, a little college French and a Lonely Planet and had a great old time, seeing thunderstorms evolve over the desert, watching the brightly painted fishing boats come in at dawn, all that traveler stuff. School paid for the whole trip - I wrote a grant to cover my expenses and submitted it to a campus committee that funds independent study and volunteer projects. Now, I have to say that I have some mixed feelings about the experience: at the time, I saw my time there as selfless and altrusitic, and it certainly changed my life - I teach English in Indonesia now - but I also see my commitment as a relatively lightweight, low-impact-on-the-community experience which also padded my resume. If you're cool with that - I mostly am, now that I understand a little more about the developing world a little more - then I'd go that route: take something you love or know lots about and offer it to others. meaningful in my own life out of NYC doesn't need to pay well independence and maturity I feel like JujuB's New Orleans suggestion is the best one so far, but I don't know about your limit on "summer" if you're looking for something truly different: could you take a semester off to volunteer for a longer period of time - maybe for some credit? - and then come back in the winter recharged? The lack of a car might be an issue, though. Alternatively, learn a language in the foreign city of your choice - you say you only speak English, but is that any way to live your life in our polyglot republic? The amount you will learn by being immersed in the language from the get-go is probably exponentially beyond what you'd learn in class at Small Rural U, and if you pick a language like Spanish with many speakers in the United States, you'll be much more useful for volunteer positions later on, especially in areas (health care, housing, education) where immigrants are among those most served.

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Just another vote for going abroad. I found myself in a very similar situation as you about a year ago, 20 years old, in college and feeling relatively unfulfilled and unhappy with my college experience and how it was unfolding. I just came back from a semester abroad and it opened and expanded me in ways I could have never imagined. I met amazing people, both American and otherwise, learned a lot of things about myself and my life as I knew it, and am looking forward to my next semester back at university more than I ever have. My appreciation for my own life, my family, my friends and my college--that I, at some points a year ago, thought about leaving--grew immeasurably from my abroad experience. At the end of the semester, as I was packing to come home, I simultaneously was wishing I was staying for an entire year and itching to get home. If you can't go abroad for a semester, a summer program, if you really throw yourself into it, should provide a similar experience. And if abroad doesn't work out for whatever reasons--and there are lots--travel and/or volunteer work in a foreign country or simply a foreign city work just as well. Good luck.

jckll

Two good and cheap/free options if you don't want to get away from where you are: Take a bus (or train or plane) to http://www.wikihow.com/Get-a-Summer-Job-in-Glacier-National-Park. I did it (and wrote the linked article) and am very glad for that summer. -Sign up for an entire summer's worth of sessions http://www.appalachiantrail.org/site/c.jkLXJ8MQKtH/b.715469/k.E966/Volunteer.htm. I've done it for a few years now (on the Southern Crew - there are closer ones to you, but if you're up for taking a bus to SW Virginia, I know that you won't regret it. They are great folks and you'll have a good time). It's free, food is covered and any gear you need they can supply. It's very satisfying work and I mean it when I say that the per capita coolness and goodness of the people who do trail crew is higher than any other group I've ever come across. Basically, it'll be free for the duration of your time there with only the expense of getting there and back. Please email me with any questions you have that I could help with.

gbinal

I would recommend Tom Brown's http://www.trackerschool.com, which delves into wilderness survival, philosophy, nature and self-sufficiency. After you've made fire with a bow drill, cleaned a fish, gone to the sweat lodge, made snares, built a debris hut, etc., you will feel like you can conquer anything. But the most remarkable thing about this class is the awakening. I felt like I developed an awareness of a whole new world that I didn't even know existed. We get so caught up in the mundane details of everyday life that something like this really shakes things up for most people. They do actually warn you not to quit your job or do anything else drastic once you return to regular life. You will have to work very hard at this class, though, it pretty much goes from 7 a.m. - 11 p.m. for a solid week. very little downtime. But you learn so much. And the firemaking thing is a cool trick to demonstrate for your friends. Flintknapping is also taught, and that's pretty cool as well. I met people of all age groups while I was there. I think we had four or five countries represented as well. It was an incredible experience.

Ostara

I'll nth the "travel" suggestion. You sound like you would really benefit from something like http://www.wwoof.org/ (internationally or http://www.wwoofusa.org/), NOLS, and the like: something that is meaningful, social, fun, and involves at least some travel, but with enough structure to make sure you get what you are looking for.

Forktine

I never really traveled in college, and I regret it. You probably should. Especially if you're in an out-of-the-way place, learn to drive (or, just earn some money for busses/taxis) and hit the road. A friend of mine hitched from Florida to Oklahoma last summer, and had a blast. I suspect that was patently insane of her, but, you could probably use busses and etc. to approximate the same experience with somewhat less sketchiness.

Alterscape

Flip through Kevin Kelly's http://www.kk.org/cooltools/ for some inspirations with regard to cheap travel, backpacking, cycling, etc. Absolutely get your driver's license, but don't feel you have to use it much. (If possible, learn to drive stickshift too. Just a skill you should have.) Flip through the local adult-ed brochure. Take a sign language class. Learn to weld. Call up a distant relative and arrange to stay with them for a week or two, just to be there. Take the bus or train. Work for cash while you're there. After two weeks, call another relative or friend, some distance away, and repeat.

Myself

Bike across the country and make the http://www.burningman.com your last stop (Burning Man alone will change your life). Fly back home just in time for the new semester, with more incredible stories than you could ever imagine.

infinityjinx

Bicycle across the USA. I did it this past summer, and it was a life-changing experience. I'm 40, and I wish I'd done it twenty years ago. I rode http://www.adventurecycling.org/ http://www.adventurecycling.org/routes/transamerica.cfm, a route that has been in existence for 30 years. If you are at all interested in doing something like this, you should check out the CrazyGuyOnABike site, which has tons of tour journals. I kept a journal there for my trip this summer, but here are some links to some other peoples', which are probably more interesting than mine: http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/?o=lt&doc_id=723&v=2c4 http://www.crazyguyonabike.com/doc/?o=lt&doc_id=1291&v=2up&term=santee&context=all

JeffL

You need a Vision Quest and that begins from the inside. You are at a transitional period right now- you seek purpose. Not unusual. To find it you need to only know yourself. My advice... try yoga, meditation, take some psychological tests and find out what you are all about. Myer's Briggs is a pretty good one to start with. There's a few free ones online. I don't think you are ready for travel aboard. Wait a year. You have some more growing up to do, people to meet, a license to get THEN places to go. I certainly don't recommend traveling anywhere by yourself, it is something that is better shared. You are going to change expontentially over the next ten years. What seems important now won't even be remembered a decade from today. As a test, think back to being ten; anything stand out that causes concern? Life works out as time goes by. Don't fret.

bkeene12

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