Reconnecting with friends--and myself

Stoking the fire

Millie's famous eggs on the grill. (Not exactly roughing it)

Happy in my PJs!

Great minds....

Thank god there's a doctor in the house

A little light reading...

Gotta love low expectations. This past weekend, the plan was to meet up with about 14 friends (adults and kids) for a quasi-camping experience in the Berkshires. The place: Kutsher's Sports Academy, a summer camp that, coincidentally, was down the road from where I went to camp for 7 years (Kutsher's Camp Anawana). Back then, the two camps were in the Catskills. Now, Anawana is defunct, and the Sports Academy has a new home in Great Barrington, MA. In the non summer months, the camp lets the cabins and the grounds and the friend who organized this outing downplayed the digs: bunk beds, hard mattresses, iffy heat, etc., etc. So I must say,  I had some trepidations about the comfort level. But my hubby and I arrived on Saturday morning to find warm and spacious cabins, roaring fires, cozy rugs (which our intrepid organizer friend had actually brought from her mom's house, who happened to live  nearby) and my husband and I, being the last to arrive, scored the a completely empty cabin next door to the group, which meant we could immerse ourselves in the party dynamic and retreat when we needed to. The weekend weather forecast was gloomy, and there, too, my expectations were surpassed: Instead of gray skies, we had crisp, sunny fall days with a sudden thunderstorm at night (the perfect background for gathering around the indoor fire, over which we still toasted S'mores.). We hiked on the nearby Appalachian trail, grilled steaks and sweet corn, played tennis, ran, napped, sang around the indoor fire to a guitar played by a very charming and precocious 14 year old, talked and talked and talked and talked about everything from politics to hormones to relationships to sex to parenting, slept late, read the New York Times, paged through magazines and basically had plenty of hours to catch up with each other--such a luxury. It made me remember why I love my friends (again), and appreciate those who have the endurance to organize these kind of unwieldy group trips. (Not I. It takes many, many emails.) I feel refreshed in body and soul and heart and ready for the work week. Oh, and the whole thing cost about $50 for the weekend. Gotta love that.

The group on the deck of the cabin.