Friday through Sunday was a whirlwind of activity with the youth on our annual Fall Retreat at Cazadero. Four amazing advisors joined me to lead it, and each of us had borrowed or rented a minivan to drive up, chock-full of teenagers, music, and excitement.
The retreat was scary. From the drive up in the dark, with the teen girls in my van anxiously scanning the sides of the road for skunks, possums, wild boars, and Bigfoot… to the creepy and mysterious Story of Cazadero and the moment during our storytelling when a wind suddenly blew the front door wide open. Being in the woods in the wind, the rain, and the dark is scary enough itself. But we also did deliberate activities to focus in on our courage and strength together. For example, we had a ropes course in the morning which took us on tight-wires and through huge rope spider webs. Even a girl with a broken foot powered through bravely. And then on Saturday night, we did a simulation game which I had modified from the UN High Commission for Refugees’ game Passages. In it, we posited a 2050 future where the US was unstable and violent, but Mexico was safe and stable. The youth were broken up into families and tasked with trying to escape and make a new life in Mexico. Through limited resources, dangers all around, and a fair share of rapid-fire Spanish yelled at them in the dark by our “border guards” in the process of arresting and detaining them, they experienced a lot of fear – and, on the flip side, we also saw a lot of courage. In debriefing the game we found that not only was it a powerful tool to incite compassion for refugees, but it changed their perspectives on their own lives as well. A cracked i-Phone screen suddenly doesn’t seem like a big deal, and the ability to use one’s own language is something to be grateful for on a daily basis.
There is so much more I could talk about – from the delicious homemade food to the long hours of singing together – but this newsletter needs to go to press, and so I’ll leave you to check out our photos on Flickr. May we all be as brave as these great youth.
Every Blessing,
Talitha