Finding Wisdom on a Trash Can

I didn’t expect to find a gem of wisdom as I was taking out the trash the other day, but I did. I had probably walked by this particular canister a hundred times, but this time I noticed all the writing. Maybe it had never been turned this way, or maybe it just caught my eye because the “graffitt” seemed different than the usual, “Dick loves Jane”, or “Gumberoos Rule” one can find plastered on cabin walls. This was different.

There, written in colored sharpie, a camper wrote this:

The offering was signed, but I won’t attribute it other than to say it was written by a camper who was 13 or 14 at the time. That’s a lot of wisdom for a teen. I was reminded again of what we, at Camp, and in the world, can learn from even the youngest amongst us. The best counselors I know have a lot of knowledge to share with their campers, but the very best ones also learn from their campers.

This is not a formal process. There is not an activity we offer called “Teach a Counselor Something!” Rather, it takes time, trust, connection- and often, a shared challenge or adversity. I think of Charles Shultz’s portrayal of the Peanuts Gang’s teachers- “Wa, Wa, Wa” and other unintelligible babble meant to instruct. I don’t know the circumstances that prompted this camper to share this- in permanent ink, but I’d like to think it came as a result of a counselor listening, engaging and encouraging this person as they worked to frame their young self. If it didn’t give rise to this particular instance, I do know that it has given rise to others like it-even if no one ever wrote about it.

This one simply declared:

Batman is the coolest super-hero that has ever lived!

Maybe not near as profound as the first, but I was delighted to be reminded that kids can still be kids- and wise, too.