Holding Hands
by Amy LV
Students - Last week I was working at Sprucelands horse camp, and that is why I was not here for Poetry Friday. One bright afternoon, as campers rested after lunch, the "hill moms" (camp adults) decided to walk out into the mud with a flag we'd made out of an old t-shirt and some duct tape. Well, one thing led to another after we planted the flag, and suddenly it was an all-out mud war. All of us were covered in mud and laughing both evil and joyful laughs. We washed off by lying in a stream, letting the cold wash over us as we sang songs together.
After rinsing, we sat in a circle holding hands, just talking about friendship. Then, still hand-in-hand, we put our feet into our circle and laid back into the warm day, forming a circle of friendship that looked just like a sunshine.
Later this week, as I sat with my neglected notebook, that day's feeling of holding hands with friends came right back to me.
What is one of your favorite feelings? Can you think of a time when you felt very connected to other people? Jot a little list in your notebook of such feelings and times, because these are food for your writing life. I am starting such a page in my notebook today.
Muddy Hill Moms - How Grateful I Am to You!
Photo by Joy Warren
Speaking of notebooks, this week I am so happy to welcome Alan Wright over at my other blog, Sharing Our Notebooks. Alan shares his interesting insights into notebook-keeping along with a great suggestion for all of us to try. Please stop by and leave a comment to be entered in the giveaway of a surprise notebook. (I have not yet chosen it!) Teachers - I am pleased to say that Sharing Our Notebooks is filling up with excellent resources for your teaching with notebooks...plus it holds ideas for grown-up notebook-keepers too!
Violet Nesdoly is hosting Poetry Friday for her first time today over at Violet Nesdoly/Poems. If it's your first time visiting Poetry Friday, please know that all you have to do is head to her blog and enjoy the treats. And of course you are always more than welcome to link to your own blog.
Here's wishing you a week full of friendship and silliness!
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Love this! I wish there was a camp just for moms where we could be kids for a bit. Except no lanyard making!
ReplyDeleteLovely as always! What a wonderful thing it is that you still get to go to camp. I never had that experience as a child, so I'm with Keri - a camp for adults to play in the mud would be sublime!
ReplyDeleteHear! Hear! We need a camp for grownups!
ReplyDeleteWe could all head up to the mountains of NH or the coast of Maine, rent a big house, do camp activities and write.
When you wrote to me after the mud event, I thought it was the KIDS who had had the mud fight! I LOVELOVELOVE that I was so very wrong!
ReplyDeleteYour story about you and the 'hill moms' (love that term) is such a memory to remember, Amy. Your camp must have been such a great experience. And the friendship poem is lovely, a special feeling. I have friends that have been mine for many many years, & we start right in whenever we are lucky enough to see each other in person. You've captured that so well. Thank you.
ReplyDeleteLove this!
ReplyDeleteEvery time I come here, I get inspired -- by your poems, your work ethic, and your warmth. Thank you, Amy, for today's poem and all you do to help poets of all ages!
ReplyDeleteViolet N.