I went to CTY for 3 summers. 5 sessions, 15 weeks, 95 glorious days.

What is CTY? It’s too glorious, too alive to be defined. But I’ll try. It’s a cult or it’s 600 nerds in summer school, it’s nineteen days in the summer but it’s generations lost in space, it’s friends and it’s family, it’s a camp. It’s a home.

And I love it here. Because this place is more a home than where I live the rest of the year. Because this is where I met my real family - my dad, my sister, the best roommate-slash-coparent I could ask for, a community I couldn’t have even dreamed of. Because - this is the closest to heaven that I'll ever be, and I don't want to go home right now.

I remember my first dance, the first time I heard those words and listened to people scream “DIE, LIVE, SEX, MORE” and watched a whole room dance to Tunak Tunak Tun. I remember doing the Mario dance for the first time and learning how to scream “WHAT’S A CIRCLE?” (and defining it perfectly) and seeing my first rave. I danced with a girl for the first time here, to Stairway To Heaven and Iris and Forever Young, and although we didn’t have some epic love story, I did fall in love here. With myself and all of you and this glorious place we call a home.

To summarize CTY: a slice of American Pie in this house that’s falling apart but damnit, we’ll hold it together with duck tape and love and caution tape and old plastic spoons, because this is the place where a little glowing friend always watches over you, this is the brightside of the world, this is where nobody loves you but we do.

Shoutouts- To my halls: Allison’s, Clarisavel’s, Sara’s, Clayla’s, Emani’s. To the Gayble. To my wives: Suzy, and Joanna, and Sasha. To my dad. To my roommates. To SKL and American Pie and KIVO man. And to you.

To not being as straight as you thought you were, to not knowing what circles are, to not taking off our clothes. To fires at midnight and sleeping at one, to awful food and instant ramen, to KIVO falafel and accidentally keeping Kosher. To awful improv and even worse Star Wars knockoffs. To GLOW, to silent football, to Mao.

To the next generation lost in space, may you always find your way back home.

So long, and thanks for all the fish. I like you, I love you, I CTY you. I love CTY and I love the Passionfruit.