And she's gone!

Eldest daughter left for sleep-away camp yesterday. I couldn't bring myself to take her to the bus stop; she asked me to then reconsidered when I told her I'd cry in front of her friends. The words had barely come out of my mouth when she raced downstairs to find her father, to confirm his availability.

This child has been away from us before. In fact, at nine weeks she spent seven days at Grandma and Papa's house. (Dave won a quota club trip and we went to Puerto Rico. It wasn't our best trip, my hormones were way out of control, but I went. It's important to support your spouse in their accomplishments if you want to stay married and I was really proud of him.) Since then she's overnighted there many other times, at friends' houses, and at my sister-in-law's house. Yes, this child sleeps around. Happily.

And this is not her first year at this particular camp. Last year she went for a week and begged to go back for longer this summer. So after a tremendous amount of coordination between the families of the friends she made last year, three of the five of us settled on a session that worked. This was no small feat.

This picture, taken a year ago, has a good and complicated backstory. Take notes as you never know when I'll take down this post and there will be a pop quiz. My daughter is the second from the left. To her right is Wendy's daughter. Wendy and I have been friends since we went to a different sleep away camp, in third grade. To my daughter's left is a girl who became friends with Wendy's daughter the summer before. My daughter goes to Religious School with the girl on the far right. Her mother and I met the year we were 16, on a trip to Israel. She, Wendy and the girl on the far left's father all met at this sleep away camp in junior high. Did you follow? Jewish Geography at its best.

I miss her. Sort of. I miss her in anticipation that she'll be gone for nearly two weeks. Does that make sense? The house seems empty already.