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20 Signs Summer Camp Helped Make You the Queer Girl You Are Today
You were going to be the queer girl you are today whether or not you went to summer camp, but occasionally you look back and recognize signs that those days communing with nature (especially at that all-girls' camp), may have helped expedite matters. Here are 20 signs that summer camp helped you become the lesbian you are today.
1) You kept this uniform and wear it in private.
2) S’mores are an aphrodisiac.
3) So is the scent of bug spray mixed with kerosene and campfire.
4) You try to get your girlfriends to do the Bunny Hop at parties.
5. You still get sad and jealous thinking about the time the cute girl from Tent 7 slow danced with some random guy from the boys' camp.
6) You secretly loved being held captive by the cool girl from the rival unit during Capture the Flag.
7) To this day you prefer to eat your Frosted Flakes with this.
8) Furniture for your adult bedroom includes a camp trunk at the foot of your bed.
9) Friendship bracelets are 'fancy' jewelry -- and you're 34 years old.
10) You still fantasize about playing the Kristy McNichol character in a musical theater version of Little Darlings.
11) You sob uncontrollably whenever someone lights a candle and sings “Linger" or "Tell Me Why."
12) People hate you around ski lodges and chimineas because you get uber-competitive about making your one-match fires (no accelerant, of course).
13) And, you also annoy your friends by name-dropping the proper terms for firewood (tinder, kindling, fuel) whenever the opportunity arises.
14) At dinner parties you inevitably try to entice your female friends to levitate you during a round or two of “Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board.”
15) You fashioned your last harness out of macrame.
16) Your idea of a great romantic date is to hop in a canoe and row her out into the middle of the lake while singing “Leaving on a Jet Plane.”
17) And if the date goes really well, you decide to do breakfast on the lake in that same canoe.
18) You're heart flutters when you see a grown woman in a Speedo wearing a whistle around her neck, because this was your first crush.
19) You're perfectly fine with the idea of sharing a two-foot wide cot with another girl for 8 weeks (because you're 'scared of raccoons'), even though your perfectly comfy cot is an arm's length away.
20) Even though you're not a Girl Scout, you knew the Girl Scout Promise you learned at camp would one day come in handy.
Tracy E. Gilchrist is the VP, Executive Producer of Entertainment for the Advocate Channel. A media veteran, she writes about the intersections of LGBTQ+ equality and pop culture. Previously, she was the editor-in-chief of The Advocate and the first feminism editor for the 55-year-old brand. In 2017, she launched the company's first podcast, The Advocates. She is an experienced broadcast interviewer, panel moderator, and public speaker who has delivered her talk, "Pandora's Box to Pose: Game-changing Visibility in Film and TV," at universities throughout the country.
Tracy E. Gilchrist is the VP, Executive Producer of Entertainment for the Advocate Channel. A media veteran, she writes about the intersections of LGBTQ+ equality and pop culture. Previously, she was the editor-in-chief of The Advocate and the first feminism editor for the 55-year-old brand. In 2017, she launched the company's first podcast, The Advocates. She is an experienced broadcast interviewer, panel moderator, and public speaker who has delivered her talk, "Pandora's Box to Pose: Game-changing Visibility in Film and TV," at universities throughout the country.
