My son is not at Blue Lake right now.
He was going to experience his first ever real music camp this summer, studying clarinet and being around fellow young musicians, in an experience that is formative for so many musicians and artists.
Blue Lake suffered from a significant COVID-19 out break among the staff in the days before check-in day, and was forced to cancel the entire two-week session.
Disappointment is the overwhelming feeling – among all the campers, staff, and faculty, I’m sure. No one wanted this to be the outcome.
But it’s the right decision, how ever hard it was to make. The risks to campers, but also the deeply understaffed camp would have made the experience far less than ideal, and potentially dangerous for immunocompromised campers and other kids at risk.
One of the facts of this particular moment in the pandemic is that we are still at a risk for loss of experience, quarantine, and the challenges that come from outbreaks. That’s a fact of life that we’ll all learn to manage and overcome, but in the meantime, disappointment is inevitable.
My hat is off to the staff at Blue Lake, who have faced their own disappointment, the prospect of disappointing hundreds of young people (and parents), and the angry calls and emails that comes from making this decision. It’s the right one, and it was incredibly hard.