There’s a nostalgic post on Serious Eats that mentions “a weeklong school trip to a rustic retreat in the Catskills for some kind of environmental education and natural history program” and the pig that ate all the scraps. It brought back memories of a similar (perhaps the same) program I attended in Connecticut known as Nature’s Classroom. I remember that week of sixth grade extremely well because for some reason my parents decided not to pay for it, and in order to attend along with my friends I had to dip into my own savings (luckily my aunt gave me $50 every Christmas which I put in the bank). At a couple hundred dollars it was the first significant expense I had taken on myself. I paid for it so I could belong and not be the only kid left out. I wasn’t really thinking about any educational value. But I did experience it with a different perspective knowing that I had paid my own way. We made a geodesic dome, cared for fragile egg babies, learned sign language, took long hikes, sang campfire songs, and did skits. I didn’t leave much on my plate for the pig to eat.