You know how formulaic sitcoms go:

The main character (no doubt a fat guy in a t-shirt, matching flannel, skinny wife) gets a visit from a long lost friend whom you ve never seen before.

They went to the same summer camp. They immediately (with a backdrop of canned laughter) launch into an old camp song that only they know.

While most of it is made up some of this is true camp songs that is. While writing yesterday s blog, I realized that I remembered a lot from my Camp Jewell days. One of those things is our Sunbeam Song. Now the girl campers were Sunbeams, the boys, Explorers.

The song, well, here goes:

We re Sunbeams born,
We re Sunbeams bred,
And when we die,
We re Sunbeams dead.

So rah, rah for Jewell,
Rah rah for Jewell,
Rah rah for Camp Jewell.

C mon Sunbeams girls, let s fall in line,
Find a trail and hike it anytime,
Swimming and canoeing, ay, ay, ay,
Camp Jewell and all, it s sports we are, we are, we are
Camp, camp, camp, camp all the time
Good health we all will quickly find,
Fair place, square place, sis boom bah,
Rah, rah, ra-a-ah.

We re the Sunbeam girls you hear so much about,
People stop and stare at us whenever we go out,
As we go marching, can t you hear the people P-L-A-Y,
You ll hear us shouting,
The girls of Camp Jewell are on their way-ay-ay, hey!

I know there are a group of girls who remember this song, my bunkmates for years, Diana, Susan, Jill, and others I can t remember. We didn t have a secret handshake. But those are years of my life where bug juice, Triangle Lake, and long siestas fill my memories.

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