Labor Day Weekend to Remember

Plum Delicious Labor Day Weekend

During my first session at a camp for heart patients, in 2001, I am one of three counselors in a cabin of nine to eleven year olds, on Catalina Island.   Tabbi, a vivacious nine year old who has already proven her social skills on the boat ride over, has an idea. We’ve just settled in, and are organizing our living space for the week end ahead, and from her top bunk, center of the room she says, “I know… how ‘bout if we all show our scars? I’ll go first.” Lifting her shirt, she says, “See, it’s a “T” where they did my heart operation and the little smile over here is where they put in my pace maker.” “Next?”  she beams, invitingly.

“Rainbow girl,” is up next, then the “tree girl,” the “straight line girl,” and several other configurations of scars where each of these beautiful young women has submitted to the knife for life-saving surgeries. Here we are, all together. Each girl is a member of a very special club, which no one would voluntarily join. What Tabbi does in the very first hour, and what camp is so good at doing, is to normalize the experience of being different. In life, in school rooms, at church, temple or Girl Scout activities, each of these beauties is odd one out. Here at camp, each is unique, yet part of a very select club. They all have this one thing in common: a surgical scar.

“Which one do you like best?” they ask us two adults and one adolescent Counselor In Training. “Well, it’s hard to choose,”  we opine. “Each is so beautiful and tells of a different experience, doesn’t it… although together they weave a similar story line, eh?” Tabbi and the others seem pleased with our answer. We go on to make up a cabin name, “Cat Boat” and create a cheer uniquely ours to share at the all camp meeting before dinner.

It is a Labor Day weekend to remember.    

Photo Credit: Mosa M-S and D. Laren