on the road to beaufort.

48 weeks.

Today marks my 11th month at Camp E-Tik-Etu. It seems like a decade ago that I packed up Blanca with everything I owned and headed east toward the craziest adventure of my life to date.

I think I've become disillusioned with the program I am expected to implement each day with my kids. Over the last 11 months, I've seen more campers leave the program unsuccessfully than successfully, and I've seen more counselors leave unexpectedly than with proper notice. I have over 5,760 hours of memories that make me laugh, cringe, cry, steam, and ache. Every three months or so, I have looked for an escape route only to be pulled back into camp by the very thing that brought me here 11 months ago: campers who say (in their own way, of course) that they recognize the sacrifice I'm making and are grateful for my time and energy.

I've done the exact thing my mom told me not to do when I moved to the woods--I've fallen in love with a beach bum, and every week, I make the 3 hour trek to spend time with him in what I've come to consider paradise. Beaufort, North Carolina. Beaufort, a quaint waterfront town, is the third oldest in North Carolina. Complete with a fudge factory, historic homes, and various boats as small as a paddle-only dingy and as big as Michael Jordan's crewed yacht, Beaufort has stolen my heart.

As I approach my year mark in the woods, it's nice to know there's a place to go to escape from the madness in the woods. And as I grow fonder of Beaufort each time I visit, doors are opening that let me know that Beaufort is growing fonder of me, too.