Silly songs

The boys at Crane Lake will never be
Tall dark and handsome and six foot three
The boys we call our own
Will have glasses and braces and smell of B.O.

Is it possible to forget these lyrics?

I go to Crane Lake Camp so pity me
There’s not a boy in the vicinity
And every night at 9 they lock the doors
I don’t know why the hell I ever came before

I’m gonna pack my bags and home I’m bound
I’m gonna turn this camp right upside-down
I’m gonna smoke and drink and neck and peck and what the heck
The hell wwith the whole damn camp

One more. Substitute any couple’s name for granny and grandpa:

And there was granny
Swingin’ on the outhouse door
Without her nighty
Grandpa never had it so good

Forgot about this one, ’til Meryl sent this today. Can you remember the hand motions?

To the tune of Zoom gally gally
Food waiter waiter waiter
Food waiter waiter
Food waiter waiter waiter
Food waiter waiter

Oh give me something to eat
So I won’t fall flat on my feet

Okay, I know you want to know the hand motions. I have to do it first to remember. Hold on.

Okay:

Fists on table
Thumbs on table
Pointers and middle fingers on table
Pointers and pinkies on table

At least that’s what my hands remember.

Friends, friends, friends and B&W together

I didn’t think I’d have to do this but apparently it is possible to forget these lyrics.

Friends, friends, friends
We will always be
Whether in fair or in dark stormy weather
Camp Crane Lake
Will keep us together
The white and blue
We will e’er be true
Love will pervade us till death separate us
We’re friends, friends, friends 

It wasn’t until today that I knew what the word “pervade” meant. It means to permeate, which makes sense in this context so apparently the word I have always sung while shrugging my shoulders in confusion is correct.

Another song along this lines:

Blue and white together we shall not be moved
Blue and white together we shall not be moved
Just like a tree that’s standing by the wa-ah-ter
We shall not be moved

A favorite CLC memory

It wasn’t any one night. It was every so often, and it was always so special and magical. Maybe it could have happened anywhere and it’s just one of those carefree times of childhood.  But it happened at camp, so that’s how I remember it.

We used to lie on our backs at night in front of Studio–me, maybe a girlfriend, my brother, and Bobby Price. Maybe Mitch Feldman instead of my brother, maybe just me and Bobby and my brother. Though he would later be my boyfriend for about a minute, at the time Bobby and I were young enough that it was all very innocent, when just being near each other made us feel happy. All we would do was lie there forever (Where was evening activity? Why were we allowed to do this?), staring at the sky, waiting for a falling star.

There was nowhere we had to rush off to; we had the luxury of having no cares or worries to urge us to go somewhere, do something.

I have never seen a night sky as perfect as the sky at night in front of Studio at Crane Lake. ”Busy” is the best way I can think to describe it; with no city lights for 50 miles to pollute or dilute it, you could see every star and planet the heavens had to offer.

 The best way to find a falling star was to look nowhere and everywhere at once, allowing your eyes to lose focus and stare at nothing, while being accutely aware of any movement of light in any part of your range in vision. We were so young, and the sky so old, so old that ancient stars that were years dead came to life to dance one time, and for us.

“If you could read my mind” alma mater

From Meryl:
(starting with the part – I don’t know where we went wrong..)
….
I never thought that I would feel this way
But now I’ve got to say that Crane Lake’s got it,
We believe in friendships long
Even when camp ends they’ll still be going strong.
…
Crane Lake is our home
A place where we can find
Joy and peace of mind.

Unga badunga

Based on Gary Marcus’s list and Meryl’s recollection of something called Effel the beffel teffel (or some such), I think perhaps these two pieces go together so you end up with:

Leader: Unga badunga
(group repeats each line)

Iggy ga diggy dig*

Effel the befel tefel

Ooh Aah

Go Blue

Beat White
All together (clapping with each word): Go Blue Beat White!

I would never in a million years have remembered this on my own.
* This line supplied by John Schacter.

Now if only I knew what this phrase came from:

Peep diddly oten doten bo bo ba ditten datten (shhhh)

Well, I just followed a hunch and found the complete “lyrics” to the above. It may come from being a bluebird/camp fire girl, not CLC, but if the words “Flea Fly Flew” mean anything to you, it’s from CLC. Here’s a link to various forms of the lyrics. The key to finding it was the word “navista”

http://www.9thhuddersfieldscouts.org.uk/Scouting/Scoutcraft/Campfire/DAC’s%20Songs.pdf

I do, on the other hand, know where this phrase came from:

Comfy twaja umph snoddibot

Some counselor Meryl and I had cozied up to–I think from Scotland or Ireland–told us this was the term used for a troll. I think he made it up on the spot, but he taught us the expression and quizzed us on it regularly throughout the summer.

Various Color War cheers

Remembered another one:

W-H-I-T-E  on to victory

W-H-I-T-E now I sing to thee

Fight fight fight fight never give in

For the White team, will win

Remembered another one:

Sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh

Sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh

W, h, i-t-e

We’re gonna have a victory

So come on white team

Don’t give in

Fight with all your might and we are bound to win

Sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh

Sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh-sh sh-sh

Another one, to Turkey in the Straw

We’re the white team
We’re the white team
We’re the better half of the color scheme
We can dance we can prance we can tell it at a glance
That the other team doesn’t have a chance

We can make a basket any time you ask it
We can make a home run any time you want one
We are always on the beam
So let’s give a cheer for the great White team.

Here’s one Meryl sent:

Like an egg, we will beat the blue
Like potatoes, we will mash them too
Make them feel like they’ve been boiled all day
Win color war – the cookbook way.

A favorite of mine, to the tune of Jingle Bells :

Lick, lick, lick, lick oh…
Lick the blues, lick the blues
Till they’re no longer there
Oh what fun to be the one to make ‘em disappear oh
Lollipops, lollipops, that’s all they really are
They may be sweet but we repeat they won’t go very far

This one was cool. I can’t pick out the real song name. It’ll come eventually:

Rebel wheels
Are going round and round as we march along
to the happy song and we know
that we are sure to win cuz the Rebels never will give in

This from Meryl:

Hi li hi lo hi hep hep hep
The blue team men have pep pep pep

(Repeat)

For we’re blue team, proud of our name
And we will march on to glory and fame
Our heads are held high, victory’s in sight
(something like-) Come on team, let’s fight, fight, fight.

You’re a good man Charlie Brown fight song(?)

It’s so weird. You know, I’m just walking around in the kitchen and this song just comes into my head. Where do these things come from? I don’t know.

Don’t know the year, not even sure if it’s a fight song or a Color War song. I got this much of the lyric

We have entered this sing night
With the knowledge* that we will go far
Yes it’s clear to the rest
That we are the very best
And we’ll prove that we are

Then it goes into “You’re a Grand Old Flag”–lyrics a total mystery. Except I remember the lyrics Mad Magazine put to it, so I give you that instead:

You’re a fat old hag
You’re a high-flying bag
But you’re still my true love Betty Lou
You’re an emblem of
The land I love
Your complexion is red, white, and blue

Overweight and big in your ill-fitting wig
(mystery line)
And if old aquaintance be forgot
I’ll escape from that fat old hag.

* Whoever I was standing next to when we sang this, pronounced the word “knahledge,” one version of the NY accent that was so strange to my Boston ears.

A sparked memory

I was reminded of this when talking with Larry Sperber at the party in New York. I had remembered that Larry was the senior girls’ group leader in ‘75, but I didn’t remember the circumstance. At the party, Larry told me he’d called Ed halfway through the summer and said he wanted to come back to camp. Ed said, “Well, the senior girls’ group leader just quit. Would you like to do that?” And, much to the delight of the girls, he accepted. How cool was it having a guy group leader? Very cool.

What I hadn’t remembered, and of course Larry wouldn’t have seen, was what we did to the previous group leader that caused her to quit. She was the nicest woman, named either Betty or Barbara, or something hopelessly uncool. She was the shape of an apple and always wore a smile. I think she thought that the closer she was to a cheerleader in demeanor, the more cooperation she would get from us. Mind you, we were 13 and 14 year old girls and jaded, old-time CLC-ers.

We ate her up alive.

Essentially, the senior girls went on strike. Even when our counselors managed to get us to go from one activity site to another, we refused to participate. I particularly remember being at volleyball, plunking ourselves down on the grass en masse, and ignoring Betty. She still had on that perky smile as she pleaded with us to get up and play, tears in her eyes.

Now I can’t guarantee this part happened exactly so, but I think I stood up and tried to get people playing. But I don’t think I was 100% heroic. Not that I want to drag Meryl into this possibly false (and mean) recollection, but I think we did a tongue-in-cheek performance, lampooning Betty’s cheerleading. We did get people playing volleyball, but I think we were making fun of poor Betty as much as we were participating in an actual activity. And I’m going to say that she was clueless enough to be grateful to us.

She was gone within the next few days. It was sad. I felt bad for her. But, really, she never stood a chance.

Next: How my bunk disposed of our dreaded counselor Shari.

Bunk 1 bunk skit 1972 or 73

The date is easily verifiable–I’m just too lazy to go to the next room to check my yearbooks. Thanks to Meryl for the missing word.

Well, this is unusual to remember, but I wrote it (or co-wrote it) and my words are my children, and how can I forget a child?

To the “You Deserve a Break Today” McDonald’s theme

Bunk 1’s always late
We make Lynne Cramer wait
Tell us what does it mean?
It means Susie must scream

Every night out she goes
And she says we’re real low
We’re obnoxious and bad
Which makes our counselors sad

And at movies, we’re real pests
But at night time, we’re the best
We are bunk 1
We are bunk 1
We are BUNK 1!

Fight Song snippets

To the tune of “Hello, I love you.” Definitely 1969:

L-C boys are winning tonight
L-C boys are out of sight…

Sub-senior girls (1970?)

To the tune of the Noah’s Ark song:
So Don, and Ed, and Sid come and hear our song
And something a spirit …
We’re 25 and (clap) thousands strong
Sub-senior girls are here.

(My sister probably remembers every word of this one.)

Per request:

Does anyone have the lyrics to the winning Senior Greasers? I’m told it was to Sounds of Silence, which does not ring the slightest bell with me. I remember only the part that went, “Each night I ask the stars up above…Why must I be a senior greaser in love?”

All I can remember from the famous Camper Workers in ‘75 (which beat out us senior girls) was the line (to Wouldn’t it be nice?):

With the turtlenecks at night we hide things.

This was quite nicely choreographed, as I recall, and they all pointed to their necks when they sang that. I guess the other part of it was to California Girls, i.e.:

I wish they all could be Camper Worker girls…

This was supplied by Gary Siegel.