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It was the loudest quiet Shelly had ever heard. Just outside the tent she could hear crickets chirping, frogs ribbiting and the wind rustling the trees. It was all so...LOUD! It was dark too. At night, she could barely see the shape of her hand when she wiggled her fingers in front of her face. She didn't like it one bit.
"Heather?" she whispered. "You awake?"
 There was no reply. Heather and Rosa had been asleep for almost an hour. Or at least Shelly guessed it had been an hour. She didn't know for sure because she couldn't see her watch – or the arm wearing it. She had tried to go to sleep. She shut her eyes. She tried lying on her stomach, on her back and then on her side. Still she couldn't sleep. She even tried flipping over and putting her head inside the sleeping bag and her feet on the pillow, but nothing seemed to work. The worst of it was the longer she stayed awake, the more she thought about home. "I'd be alseep already if I were home!" she thought miserably, and almost without warning, a big tear rolled down her cheek. Once she started thinking about home, she couldn't stop thinking about it. More tears fell, and she sniffled.
Suddenly she felt a hand on her shoulder. "Shelly?" asked a voice. It was a the camp counselor, Xi-Feng. "Are you okay?"
Shelly wiped a tear away, "I'm fine," she said bravely. All the girls looked up to Xi-Feng (prounounced like she-fong), who was from China. Xi-Feng was one of the international camp counselors who had come to America for the summer, and she was one of Shelly's favorite counselors. Shelly was embarassed that Xi-Feng had heard her crying.
"Come with me," Xi-Feng said, and Shelly followed her outside the tent. It was dark outside, but there was enough moonlight that she could see Xi-Feng's face. They sat on the steps of the tent platform.
"You are homesick?" Asked Xi-Feng. Shelly tried to deny it, but her sniffling nose gave her away. "Can you keep secrets?" Xi-Feng whispered. Shelly nodded. "I am homesick too!" said Xi-Feng.
Shelly was shocked. Xi-Feng was the bravest and the smartest person she knew. How could she be homesick?
"How far away is your home?" Xi-Feng asked.
"We live in Baltimore," Shelly said. "How far away is your home?"
Xi-Feng smiled. "I was on an airplane for an entire day just traveling here. It's on the other side of the world."
"That's far," Shelly said. Xi-Feng nodded. "How do you stop from feeling homesick?"
 Xi-Feng pulled something from her pocket. It looked like a rock. "I hold on to this." She showed Shelly the round object in her hand. It WAS a rock, brown and boring. Shelly didn't know what to think. "It's pretty ugly, right?" Xi-Feng asked, amused at Shelly's disappointment.
"It's just a rock," Shelly said.
"You think so?" Xi-Feng said. She turned the rock over in her palm to reveal the open side of the rock, which had been split open like a melon. Inside the hollow of the rock were hundreds of tiny, dazzling crystals. They sparkled in the moonlight. "It's called a geode. My dad and I found this one when we were on a trip in Spain. He's a geologist. I'm studying to be one too. Would you like to see a picture?"
Shelly and the Camp Counselor shared their stories and photos of home. By the time Shelly was ready to go to sleep, she had forgotten all about feeling homesick. She didn't feel homesick for the rest of the week, and at night she dreampt of China and mining for beautiful geode rocks.
Shelly enjoyed being at camp, but found she was a little bit homesick at night. Have you ever felt homesick?
What helped you get past it?
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