“Its all over,” some might say, thinking that their 4H fun has to be put off untill next year when camping season starts. But this isn’t the truth at all.

I’m sitting here at my house, in Hinton, pretty far from most if not all of my state 4-H friends. I’ve been laying around for a couple of days getting all rested up from my 5 camps this summer and I finally think that I’m back to speed. But even though I may be getting more sleep these days, have more time to relax, and plenty of alone time to think, I’m still not as on top of the world as I was at any point of being in camp or the weekends in between this summer.(another perk of ECI’ing is that everyone gets out of work on the same days, so you can hang out with all of your fellow Extention Camping Instructors on the weekends.)

But even though I’m not in camp right now or surrounded by all of my 4-H peers, doesn’t mean I can’t be poppin’ out loads of 4-H spirit like a madman.(Now pay attention, because this is where the title comes into play.)

4-H is kind of like energy. It never dies, its just converted into other uses. Such as a Hydro-electric plant changes energy from running water into electricity.

In this same fashion, camping season has come to an end. With the 4-H energy we’ve all gotten from our camps, we can take that home and use it to do club work in our counties, use it to go out of our way to keep close contact with your state 4-H friends, and use it to benefit your county camp with games, activies, and exercises you might have learned.

And with all of the energy that all of you brought to state camp, it has fueled the staff and camp planning comittees(oh that’s me) to assemble and use that energy to try and come up with the best possible camp that they can for next year.

You see, its really one big circle of non stop 4-H energy. And we’re puttin out so much that we can spread it to the world and still have more than enough to keep it poppin off inside the 4-H world.

Alright, I finally brought that symbolism back in to make a little bit of sense, so I’m stoppin here.

-Mel “Milwaukee Thunder” Johnson