- It's really OK to sign up and see what keeps those 6th - 8th graders going all night. Even if you are old enough to be their mom (or even if a few of them call you mom).
- What keeps them going is 40% cool activities, 20% "I'd die if anyone takes a picture of me sleeping", and 40% large amounts of caffeine, last weeks Halloween candy, and cold pizza.
- You can gain a new appreciation for the abilities and insights of their 20 year old leaders. Stood stunned as a a very young leader stood in front of the locker rooms and loudly directed youth to the right side based on gender, because some of them think it's funny to head the wrong way, and others are already out of it enough that they are just following the person ahead of them, regardless what the picture on the door says. Old dogs can learn new tricks. Even ones who've been around the block.
- With a little wisdom and energy conservation you can keep up with the 20 year olds. Let them go up and down all the stairs to ride water slides with the kids - you stay at the bottom and help pull extra tubes out of the lazy river, or hang out with the girls on the lounge chairs who don't want to mess up their hair by getting wet. You'll learn a lot even by doing that.
- You do not need to change into a bathing suit. 6th - 8th grade girls (and boys too) are painfully body conscious. So are 40 year old women with spare tires. Difference is the water fun does not have to entice you the same amount.
- Remember to bring a camera next year, so that you look like you are doing something profitable after the extra inner-tubes in the lazy river have all been co-opted, and you are wandering around in jeans and a T.
The best lines in the leader manual came under the instructions for the waterpark:
- Do not let students fall asleep in the lazy river.
- Do not fall asleep in the lazy river.
- Also during training, when the 20 year old leading this says that they do not want any kids getting decapitated, control your imagination. Do not let these pep talks unnerve you - remember that you'll probably only need a band aid out of the med kit - or the bodily fluids clean up kit for the kid who ate too much pizza - at most. You can handle that, and if you can't, you get to find the same 20 year old who led training to do it.
- Take a turn in the back of the bus. You know, the spot where all of the leaders are avoiding because the kids are acting like the reputation that middle school students have. But don't take every turn there, unless you connect with some of that crowd. Allow yourself the joy of sitting with a sweet sixth grader whose goal for the night is to stay up the whole time and who will talk about favorite movies, books, and games to not nod off. And it's really super cool if they like Legos, Lord of the Rings and Star Wars just like you do.
- When that one kid is missing, again, from their turn in the bowling line-up, it is OK to sub for them. It is also OK to roll gutter balls and have totally-awkward-rusty-I-haven't-done-this-in-20-years form. It is OK to laugh at yourself, knowing you have given some very green 6th graders hope that they aren't the worst in the room. It is not OK to re-injure the rotator cuff - choose the 6 lb pink bowling ball that the little girl who weighs 60 lbs is using - It really is the smart choice, it's going in the gutter no matter how much it weighs so do yourself a favor on this one.
- Be thankful for youth who are learning, even the hard way, to use spending money. Be extra thankful for vendors and cashiers who are putting up with 300+ youth who are learning to do this at 2:30 in the morning.
- Watch for the coolness of a majority of those kids minding their Ps & Qs. Nothing is cooler than polite middle school students - especially if you are the cashier who ended up drawing the short straw on this event.
- Remember to bring your camera next year. And pat yourself on the back for having a few tricks up your sleeves too. That kid who was deciding to channel Miley Cyrus at 3am on the table at the bowling alley - well he listened when you said you were digging for your camera, so that you could send his mom a video. You might not know his mom, but the advantage of being 40 - is that you look like you might.
- While we are at it - other things to bring next year as a chaperon -
- a watch (yup, long story how you ended up out the door without one, but they do come in handy - especially because every 10 minutes a 6th grader will ask you what time it is),
- a pair of safety scissors. The "no weapons" rule undoes the use of the handy dandy pocket knife, but a pair of safety scissors is wonderful at trimming wristbands, opening water flats, and making snowflakes out of the game print out with that bored but craft minded young lady you had in 5th grade Sunday School class last year.
- home-made cookies, half price Halloween candy, or cans of Pringles - do not under estimate the power of a pod leader who has snacks for their kids (or how light your wallet could get if you look at the cost of buying for a group at a venue).
- face paint! The kids like to match their bus color - and the bowling alley has UV - time to test out those neat rave paints that I have in the kit!!
- a pen, because you need to write down the names of the kids in your group, your memory isn't what the 20-year olds is and it helps to refer back to that list - unfortunately if all you could grab was a highlighter lying on the floor- the only place you will be able to read said list is in the UV light at the bowling alley.
- Activities such as this, where 350 students, 50 leaders, snacks, and clipboards have to arrive in a timely fashion at various locations throughout the night on eight different school buses. . . . well it is a great opportunity to appreciate the incredible thought, effort, and magic put forward by the unseen gurus of all things organizational and color coded - Katee you rock!
- Cool parents tell their own offspring which bus they will be on, not so their kids can ride with them, but so their kids can choose to not ride with them.
- However, when you've stood in line for almost an hour to ride the go-carts, get to the top of the line to discover that you've lost your wristband and cannot do go-carts, laser-tag, skills maze, or bumper cars for the remainder of your time at the arcade - a hug from you mom is actually OK. especially if she buys you donuts to soften the blow.
- Middle school students, even the good kids, are not prone to cleaning up the bus at 5am - this is part of your job description - you're a mom and very used to this - so help out the 20 year old bus captain who really needs a break after his turn in the back of the bus.
- Remember to bring your camera, this all purpose tool comes in handy to capture the joy of being able to sleep under a table or in the hallway after having made it through the breakfast line.
- Hold onto those really cool things. Sam's grandpa - I want to be like you when I grow up. While I stand here at 40 - you're here a generation ahead of me - and you were riding the waterslides like a pro and showing the kids how to play pinball at the arcade. You definitely have the "coolest chaperon" award in my book.
- Tired 20 year old chaperons will stay an extra 30 minutes to watch the end of Monsters University, even after the kids have all gone home. Why?
- well they might not have seen it, because they don't have kids, and Avengers was probably higher on their to see list,
- but they are young enough to connect with the original Monsters Inc. movie,
- they are tired,
- and it's cool having done something like this and
- you can just enjoy hanging out with your friends for the last quiet little bit. A very wise program director let everyone have this moment, even though I am sure that he'd seen the movie with his children and equally as sure that he wanted to get out of there. But there was something magic about the moment -
- and it IS a great movie.
- It is OK when you get home and reach for a glass of milk, if you accidentally pour out the whole milk instead of the skim. You probably more than made up for those calories.
- For all the details we are in control of - there is nothing like spending the night with a bunch of middle school students to help you realize how much is infinitely out of our control, and it gives you a certain sense that the world is not swallowed up in that out of control chaos, but that God is working all the lines together and weaving a tapestry out of which kids make it onto which bus, which kids you connect with, which kids connect with each other, and what random events happen over the course of a single night.
