Every person has their own group of favorite friends. These could be school friends, sport friends, family friends, or in Alexandra Lipets’ case, her camp friends. 

“Camp is my happy place,” says Alexandra when describing her camp experience. For her, camp was filled with laughter, freedom, excitement, and being with people she never wanted to part with. With each day consisting of memories that would last a lifetime, the scariest thing for her was for these precious moments to end. 

Away from camp, Alexandra is always busy. With either dance, school, or her piano exam coming up in October, she felt like she could never catch a break. She just needed a place to get away from all her stress- an oasis. Camp was just that. 

Now that camp is over, Alexandra and all her camp friends are working hard to stay close and not drift apart. With calls every night and sleepovers every so often, their friend group is not falling apart anytime soon. Although two of her closest friends live more than 3 hours away (one in Seattle and the other in Ashland), they occasionally drive up to Portland to hang out. Hanging out with camp friends is Alexandra’s favorite thing ever. 

Another happy place for Alexandra is her dance studio. Being a previous rhythmic gymnast, the transition to dance was hard, but she is very glad she did it. Alexandra describes the gymnastic environment as “very toxic” with constant body shaming and abusive coaching. She feels the dance environment is a much better fit for her. A background with rhythmic gymnastics was also very beneficial for dance because it gave her the ability to do cool tricks that no one else can do. With extreme flexibility, audiences are wowed by the way her body can bend and contort. 

A “happy place” is something every person needs to live and survive. Everyone has their own hardships and challenges and without a place they can call home, life is almost pointless. Every person needs to find their happy place, but for every person it can be different. What’s your happy place?

We are all looking forward to seeing what Alexandra ends up writing!