When I was in ninth grade at Pimlico Junior High School, a friend started wearing a green tie to school, complete with a small Star of David pin.

He couldn’t hang out with me, because he had to study about some guy named Martin Buber. But the most important aspect of all this was a daily diary he had to keep, including the names of the teen-age girls he was planning to ask out on dates.

He invited me to a meeting once he went from pledge to “aleph.” All I know is that I too was soon wearing the green tie, and getting used to meetings run under Roberts Rules of Order.

There were blind dates, mixers, dances, heart fund marathon dances, basketball games, regional conventions at the Atlantic City Breakers Hotel, and “good and welfare,” where some of the funniest stories I’ve ever heard were revealed, most about blind dates.

And of course there was the Chesapeake AZA song. I can’t remember math and science from college and high school; I can’t remember names of relatives. I can remember every word of that song.

On Saturday night at Temple Emanuel, about 165 of us got together for a reunion including BBYOers from 1968-78. I saw peoples’ faces I had fixed in my mind from high school. And like everyone else, I tried not to look at name tags, hoping instead that recognition would be easy.

My wife, Lisa, was the president of Aliyah, BBG. We met because of BBYO, and stood with a significant part of the room when married couples who met in BBYO were asked to stand.

AZA and BBG were amazing organizations for all of us. We were 14 and 15, and we could run a business meeting, complete with “old business” and “new business” and “points of information.”

We had young teens fully running charitable events, and arranging functions involving car pools, bus transportation and housing. And this was before words like “Google, Internet, cellphone, Blackberry, IM and texting” became part of ever teen’s jargon. Some of these youth went on to become leaders in many different walks of life. I’m sure on Saturday night if asked, they’d tell you that a solid foundation of leadership was formed while they participated in BBYO.

What I loved about Saturday night, however, was simply a shared feeling. We had all been there together decades ago. We went with friends for ice cream at Father’s in Catonsville; ate at Sid Mandel’s or Mandel- Ballow; we had chapter names like Chesapeake, Aliyah, Balmap, JFK, Liberty, Martin Luther King, Marcus, Klein, Tijuana, BFG, Colonial, CHAI, Hamburger, Kaviva, Shalom and Speert. We loved to hang out on the front lawns of parents who would allow it, and we just seemed to click with another.

There wasn’t a worry about getting injured or addicted. There was just a feeling of safety, that this was the right place to be at this time in life.

And this current life as well. Many at that reunion remained friends through the years. Many of stayed in Baltimore, some others found their lives in other parts of the country.

Shelbie Hafter Wassel and her organizing committee did an incredible job. We made each other smile by just being together. I almost wish there was a Chesapeake meeting to go to next Sunday afternoon.
The good and welfare would be amazing.

So I’m worried about camp and campers.
And I’m asking all of us who can to pick out a camp of your choice, maybe even the one you attended, and send them a check that you can afford, even if it’s for just a few dollars.
Camp is the part of the foundation of Jewish life.
So many married couples met at one of many overnight summer camps or even day camps.
Camps are critical to the connections we make as Jews.
I attended Camp Milldale. Some of the best time of my life was spent at that camp. I remember counselors and bunk houses and camp songs. I remember riding the bus home exhausted from the swimming, softball, talent shows, arts and crafts and so much more.
Then I attended Habonom D’ror Moshava when it was in Annapolis. Again, some of the most important feeds to my Jewish appetite came from Mosh. I still sing some of the camp’s songs in my head and thank HaShem that I had that experience.
And finally, I worked as a counselor at Camp Greyrock. Same feelings only as a counselor, working with bunk.
With so many great camps in this area to choose from, it’s so important to Jewish continuity that we give. And in this day of the Internet, giving to camps has been made easier.
Again, I remember my dad taking me to Sunny’s Surplus to buy the trunk, rain gear, sleeping bag and canteen.
I remember sending letters home.
Care packages.
My first camp crush.
My counselor actually fought in the Six Day War, and he was an instant connection of Ahavas Yisroel or love for Israel for all of us.
Color wars, late night raids, painting the Shabbat Shalom sign, dancing, softball, basketball, swimming and even parents’ day.
Times are tough.
The economy is what it is.
But if we can send whatever we can send to these camps, then the children we are giving over our Jewish future and leadership to will have an opportunity to experience what many of us experienced.
Remember the one counselor who could sit at the Saturday night camp fire in the woods, and tell that scary story so that you screamed and held on to your best camp friends?
That’s what we’ve got to preserve.
Wearing white and singing Shabbat songs as we walked as a camp down to the river.
I’ll never forget those moments.
I want us to give our children, even during an economic decline, those same chances.

Of all the honorees from Wednesday’s JCC Hall of Fame class of 2009, I think it was the story of deceased Sgt. Isadore S. Jachman that had for me its biggest impact.
Sgt. Jachman was a member of the 101st Airborne, Company B, 513th Parachute Infantry Regiment.
These were the heroic soldiers who were often sent into the Allies’ most difficult missions in the European theater of war. They were dropped by parachute into France the night before the invasion of Normandy. They fought all the way through France, the Netherlands and then were there to take over Hitler’s private home and headquarters, known as the Eagles’ Nest.  Indeed, Tom Hanks’ produced an HBO mini-series based on the Stephen Ambrose book “Band of Brothers.” The “brothers” were members of Company E or Easy Company.
This was the Nazis last major offensive, and the loss of life in the freezing cold Ardennes, produced its share of unequalled heroism. This was known as the Battle of the Bulge.
Sgt. Jachman’s company was pinned down by enemy artillery and pretty much everything else the enemy could throw at them through the snowy forest. Two German tanks, however, posed the most immediate threat on his unit.
So now, Sgt. Jachman wasn’t known for his legal knowledge; he wasn’t headed to medical school; he wasn’t a champion of the financial world. He was a soldier who loved his family, his country and his buddies. And because of that it made perfect sense to pick up a bazooka from a fallen comrade, drew the fire from the tanks and discharged the weapon, hitting and disabling one of the tanks. This disrupted the enemy forward movement, and Sgt. Jachman protected the lives of his men by sacrificing his own life.
He wrote letters home prior to his death to his sister Sylvia. He told her that he was fighting in WWII to protect her, his country and to avenge the lives of the Jews slaughtered by the Nazis. How fitting was it that Sylvia would be there at the Gordon Center to receive her brother’s award.
He would posthumously be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor. And some 65 years after his death, Sgt. Jachman still is making us proud.
Sgt. Jachman was in elegant company Wednesday night. The Hall of Fame also honored Judge Ellen M. Heller, Morris W. Offit, Dr. Arnall Patz, Leon Sachs, Gilbert Sandler, Judge Simon E. Sobeloff, Henrietta Szold, Jeanette Rosner Wolman and Calman J. Zamoiski Jr.
They join the 2008 honorees of Jacob Blaustein, Shosana S. Cardin, Jacob Epstein, Dr. Louis L. Kaplan, Zanvyl Krieger, Joseph Meyerhoff, Dr. Daniel Nathans, Dr. Solomon H. Snyder, Walter Sondheim, Jr., Dr. Bert Vogelstein and Dr. Abel Wolman.
From this year on, the Hall of Fame will go to an “every other year” format of induction.