EVERYTHING IS AOK
At camp for kids and adults on the autism spectrum, you appreciate small moments.
Each week during the campaign, campers and staff from Fresh Air Fund camps will share their memories in their own words. Martin Chambers, 29, is a senior counsellor at Autism Ontario Kids (AOK) day camp.
For every summer I can remember, I have worked at a day camp. I’ve moved around and taken some summers off, but for the last few years, I have put my sunscreen on at the Autism Ontario Kids camp.
I started at AOK for the same reason many teens pick a camp: I knew someone else there. From that first summer on, it was the most soulsatisfying job I ever had and it has been a career-altering experience.
The job itself is as hard as any other camp job: You have to deal with kids who may or may not listen to you, may or may not want to eat lunch, may or may not want to be at a par- ticular activity. They have likes. They have dislikes. They have things they can do. They have things they can’t do.
The obvious difference is that all of the kids and adults are on the autism spectrum.
Maybe I’ve jumped ahead. The Autism Ontario camp provides a summer program for children and adults with autism spectrum disorder.
The kids have the capacity to absolutely change your life just because you know you’re changing theirs. You’re taking these kids on day trips to experience things and places they may not ever have had the chance to explore. You’re giving them an opportunity to try new things that their parents may not have known they could even do. I’ve seen campers try climbing walls, get up close to zoo animals or face their fears by going up the CN Tower.
Some days, usually the really hot ones, you forget what the camp is to these kids. You forget that this is a place where these kids get to be like every other camper. They get to have the camp experience that everyone else has. There is no such thing as a “special need.” There is no judgment, no dirty looks and nothing but protection and a welcoming smile.
You might not see it on those long and hot days where the staff sweat through the monochrome camp shirts, but every one of them would not trade this experience for any other job, or summer vacation, or time off at a cottage.
Why do I love these kids? Each and every one of them has a story and a reason to come in every day. When they make each other laugh at some silly joke between friends, the laugh goes right to your heart. When the kids go to the zoo and see the animal they have been talking about for a month, it makes you just as happy as you know they are.
I love these kids, because even though on a good day they can’t tell you what they’re feeling, they have nothing but love in their hearts.
I love camp because at AOK, the small moments are big moments. You might just cheer up when a camper gets ready for swimming in less than 30 minutes. You might just talk about trucks or dinosaurs or TV shows all day. You might just smile when a camper comes back to give you a hug or turns around to give you one last goodbye. AOK makes you appreciate the small moments in life, because you never know if a small moment to you just absolutely makes the day of someone else.