We all remember our last night as campers at Ramah. Whether you were in Nivonim, Gesher, Alonim, or Machon, something about that last night made it feel like your life was ending. You would never see your friends again. You would never step foot in your beloved middle-of-nowhere town again (for me, Palmer, MA), and you would never again be able to experience that magic of Ramah. I’ve experienced that very night three times now – as a Nivonim camper in 2007, a Nivonim counselor in 2011, Rosh Nivonim in 2013, and I’m gearing up to do it again this summer. But now, as I speak to uncontrollably sobbing Nivonimers on the last night of camp, my message is: “Your Ramah experience isn’t over – it’s just beginning.”

Without a doubt, I was absolutely transformed by my summers as a camper at Ramah. But I would say that I truly began to experience the power of Ramah in my post-camper years. As a staff member, I learned how rewarding it can be to transmit the Ramah experience, rather than receive it. My college life, in the Joint Program between Columbia University and the Jewish Theological Seminary, was saturated with Ramah. My junior and senior years of college, I lived with Ramahniks from Berkshires, California, Darom, and Wisconsin, and I learned that, even after finishing up my time as a camper, I could still make “Ramah friends” whose values, Jewish practice, and experiences were similar to mine just because they had grown up at Ramah. I began to understand the impact of the entire Ramah Camping Movement, connecting Ramahniks across North America.

And now, in the scary post-college world, I’m finding that Ramah makes the transition just a little bit easier. Reshet Ramah makes it easy for Ramahniks to come together through programs like bar nights, picnics, Shabbat dinners, and speakers. If you’re looking for something to quench your thirst for community in a comfortable setting – this is it.

Beyond organizational measures like Reshet Ramah, I’ve learned that those who’ve had similar experiences at Ramah camps around the country want similar things in their post-college lives. My current roommates and I (one of whom is also a Ramah New England alumna), host a Kabbalat Shabbat service and potluck dinner in our apartment about once a month. And of the 100 or so people in attendance, a high percentage are Ramahniks from many different camps, all looking for a Shabbat experience that in some small way reminds them of their shabbatot at camp. Some grew up together in the same bunk, others became friends at National Ramah training programs like Weinstein or Winer, and others are just meeting each other for the first time and quickly finding common ground. There is limitless potential for how we can all continue to incorporate Ramah into our lives.

Even as the numbers of my “camp friends” who actually work at Ramah dwindle, I am struck by the parallels between what I tell my crying Nivonim campers and my post-college friends: “Your Ramah experience isn’t over – it’s just beginning.”