Aug 23rd: stretching and loosening

 I spent a good amount of time this morning stretching and using a tennis and lacrosse ball to massage. I'm really tight all over. Should take about a week or so to get everything worked out. I'm not in any pain but my range of motion has decreased a lot and I feel tightness in a lot of places. 

I felt really good on my run yesterday. It was hot and sunny and I had run 11 miles the day before but the extra rest and sitting inside gave me a lot more energy than I've had the past few months. It was really encouraging to see improvement that quickly. 

I did some art because I have a lot of canvasses lying around and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out. I have this little toy duck that I've carried around every place I've lived since moving out for college and I did some squiggles and blobs and things and put the duck in the center in a hot tub/void kind of thing. It was fun to make.

Today I'm going to do a little hike with Janey and catch up. I haven't seen her in months. Maybe over a year. It's been too long. Then I might run with Corey in the evening. 

One thing I think a lot about at camp, and I'm sure I've talked about this before, is the idea of an emotional/attention economy. Everybody comes in to camp with a certain set of emotions and ideas they want to express as well as a level of need and a preference for what they want to receive. A lot of being a counselor is managing that economy. As a counselor it's important that you command a certain amount of attention and have something to offer because

1- you are potentially a big part of a camper's experience at camp

2- if you aren't commanding any attention then that void is going to be filled, most likely, by kids that want attention and, broadly speaking, they aren't always the kinds of people you want setting the culture and attitudes of a group. 

Based on absolutely nothing but a hunch, my guess is that people tend to want to offload negative emotions onto others and receive positive emotions and attention from others. Which, I don't think is a very helpful model to go off of. You wouldn't walk around trying to sell trash in exchange for candy or food or money. If you want to receive something valuable, (positive attention, respect, admiration, friendship, etc...) you're going to have give something valuable. The advantage as a counselor is that because you're in a position of authority, for most people you're attention and actions are going to have inherent value. It's like you're printing the money. 

I'd love to do some sort of game at camp where we treat counselors as stocks and somehow create a marketplace where they could be traded. The kids kind of already do it when they talk about "favorites". If you do something good they'll say you're their favorite counselor and if you do something bad they'll threaten that you're no longer the favorite. If we could formalize it somehow that might be fun or interesting.