{"id":3996,"date":"2023-07-13T21:26:13","date_gmt":"2023-07-14T03:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:10043\/?p=3996"},"modified":"2024-07-18T08:42:59","modified_gmt":"2024-07-18T14:42:59","slug":"business-owners-learn-to-choose-their-own-adventures-every-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/business-owners-learn-to-choose-their-own-adventures-every-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Business owners learn to choose their own adventures every day"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article originally appeared in\u00a0The Tennessean<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cGone to bed is the setting sun. Night is coming and day is done.<\/p>\n

Whippoorwill. Whippoorwill…has just begun. \u201c<\/p>\n

Say it isn\u2019t so. For generations of Nashvillians there\u2019s something missing this summer.<\/p>\n

For the first time in 50 years of summer fun, the beloved Whippoorwill Farm and Day Camp is quiet. Our traditional end-of-day song has been sung for the last time.<\/p>\n

No more horseback riding, creek hikes, roof ball games, rappelling, water fights, cookouts, or swimming in the pond. The canoes and kayaks are packed away, and the arts-and-crafts shack is empty.<\/p>\n

After five decades, the Gregory family who started the camp just outside of Nashville in Fernvale, Tenn., decided it was time to give the land back to the critters and plants that graciously shared the farm with thousands of kids for so many years.\u00a0 It\u2019s a well-deserved retirement for a family that\u2019s done so much for so many.<\/p>\n

My first summer going to Whippoorwill was in 1976 when I was barely 6 years old.\u00a0 I remember being nervous as my mom dropped me off at the bus stop with dozens of other kids I didn\u2019t know.<\/p>\n

After a 30-minute ride where the counselors led us through a beautiful rendition of the classic camp song “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall,” (OK, it was the ’70s) we drove through the creek, unloaded and made our way to the \u201ccouncil ring\u201d to start the day.<\/p>\n

I was immediately struck by how a day at camp was so different than a day at school.<\/p>\n

At school, from kindergarten on there was always a lot of structure.\u00a0 We were told when it was time to learn, when it was time to play, and when it was time to take a nap. School felt comfortable and predictable\u2014I liked it.<\/p>\n

But camp?\u00a0 It was the exact opposite.<\/p>\n

Every day started by signing up for anything you wanted to do. Every camper from the 6-year-olds to the seventh-graders could sign up for \u201cinterest groups\u201d allowing us kids to choose our own adventures for the entire summer.<\/p>\n

The first day I chose horseback riding, crawdad fishing, and zip-lining.\u00a0 The next day I did some tree climbing, rock skipping, and playing in the mud.<\/p>\n

Little did I know, Whippoorwill was not only fun, but it was preparing me for life as a business owner where choosing your own adventure is a skill in itself.<\/p>\n

Unlike at school, which almost by necessity requires a degree of structure, life after graduation is more like life at camp.\u00a0 The predictability of a set schedule gives way to a series of choices that we each make all on our own.<\/p>\n

Just like at camp, in the work world, choosing your path starts early.<\/p>\n

Go to college, or jump right into a career?\u00a0 Major in something you\u2019re interested in, or something practical?\u00a0 Take a job at an established company, or get involved with a startup?<\/p>\n

And then once you get settled into a job, no matter how much structure an organization has, the unpredictable nature of business can be more reminiscent of camp than school. At Whippoorwill I had to choose my interest groups each day. And at work, I must choose what I should focus on each day<\/a> to help our company.<\/p>\n

So, like many generations of Nashvillians, I will miss Whippoorwill. \u00a0It taught me how to be comfortable with a bit of chaos, and it gave me the confidence to make my own decisions.\u00a0\u00a0 And it made those lessons fun.<\/p>\n

Even with the camp winding down after so many years, I am grateful that every day at work feels like our camp song, \u201cWhippoorwill has just begun.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0JJ Rosen is the founder of <\/em>Atiba<\/em><\/a>,<\/em>\u00a0a <\/em>Nashville custom software development firm<\/em><\/a>\u00a0and <\/em>IT support company.<\/em><\/a>\u00a0Visit <\/em>Atiba.com<\/em><\/a>\u00a0for more info.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article originally appeared in\u00a0The Tennessean. \u201cGone to bed is the setting sun. Night is coming and day is done. Whippoorwill. Whippoorwill…has just begun. \u201c Say it isn\u2019t so. For generations of Nashvillians there\u2019s something missing this summer. For the first time in 50 years of summer fun, the beloved Whippoorwill Farm and Day Camp […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":3997,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[217],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3996","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-tennessean"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3996","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3996"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3996\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3996"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3996"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.atiba.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3996"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}