Julie Chang Murphy
Sleepaway camp wasn't exactly part of my childhood vocabulary. My parents didn't believe in paying money for me to rough it in the woods.
Instead, summers meant Chinese school, then long afternoons upstairs in their restaurant, tinkering with the office equipment as they worked.
My "campfire" was the blue glow of an Xerox bulb as I copied my face and various body parts into high-contrast collages.
Fast forward three decades: My tween daughter was going to camp in the Adirondacks. While she was off tie-dying T-shirts and cannonballing into the lake, I discovered the program also hosts weekend camps for adult women, which take place later in the summer after all the kids have gone home.
When I signed up, I imagined practicing yoga, journaling, and maybe some meditative staring at trees to reckon with my current life stage. In my 40s, I've started to notice my peers splitting into two very distinct camps (pun unavoidable).
Some are bragging about "crushing it" — promotions, triathlons, kitchen renos in their second homes — while others quietly admit that they're phoning it in at work and in their marriages.
Should I be striving harder, or surrendering more? It's a confusing place to be, which might explain why I've been chasing the kind of clarity only strangers and nature can offer.
The women I met at camp, mostly in their 60s and 70s, changed my perspective on growing older
Julie Chang Murphy
When I arrived at camp, I realized many of the people around me were several decades older. I felt uncomfortable at first, like maybe I was too old for friendship bracelets but too young to join the wisdom circle.
Spending time with these women ended up being exactly what I needed, though.
By this point, most of them had lived through a whole bingo card of heartbreaks, diagnoses, and funerals. Still, while I was ensconced in my sleeping bag, they rose at dawn to claim the lake on kayaks and canoes.
They hiked trails without hesitation, pointing out birds not by sight but by song.
On the second night, a fellow camper elbowed me with a mischievous gleam in her eye and asked if I wanted to sneak off the island to get soft serve. I followed her to the dock, where a gaggle of women was already roaring with laughter.
These women hadn't gotten the memo that they were supposed to shrink off into the sunset. In fact, they were about to commandeer a pontoon boat with the energy of teenagers on a joyride.
Best of all, nobody talked about their age
Julie Chang Murphy
At camp, you're just a camper, straining to identify constellations in the night sky. Whittling a wood block into a spoon is demoralizing at any age.
Seeing my fellow campers completely immersed in these small, timeless moments quieted some of the noise of midlife.
I'd been torn between constantly optimizing my life and retreating into it, but maybe what really mattered was just paying attention and focusing on the present moment.
When the weekend ended, I went home under-showered and without having had a proper bowel movement — classic summer camp experiences I couldn't wait to bond over with my daughter.
I also carried something harder to name, though. I glimpsed a version of myself that didn't have to be confined by the narratives we are fed about aging.
On an island in the Adirondacks, the women around me lived as proof that women are never just one age. We're every age we've ever been, all at once.
Under the shade of centuries-old trees, I'm the girl learning a new song, a mom crafting something just for herself, and an elder sneaking dessert.
I thought I was late to camp, but maybe I arrived right on time.
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