Monica shares the beauty of a camping weekend with friends from the Boston Community.
This past Memorial Day weekend we went camping with some friends in beautiful Cape Cod! New England weather is unpredictable and Friday and Saturday the forecast gave rain, and to top it off our one-year-old daughter was sent home from daycare on Wednesday prior to our camping trip with a fever. I put my heart at ease and decided to cancel. I told my friends that our family was out of the camping saga, and yet, I was restless! I told them that we would come and spend the day with those who would camp but that we didn’t have the energy to camp with a sick baby, the low temperature, and the not ideal weather forecast. I felt described by the sentence in the Gospel: “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak”.
My friend Tara decided she would go camping and bring along my daughter Lucia so she could join her friends. While this made me happy, I was still sad.
When we went to the Cape on Sunday and met all our friends at the beach, the weather was beautiful! The kids played together, we had lunch and enjoyed each other's company. It was a gorgeous day! When we went to get ice cream I was stopped by a passerby who asked me: “How do you all know each other? I did want to tell you that I was impressed by how well the kids played together and how nice it was to watch you adults interact with each other. You can tell you enjoy each other’s company. Who are you? How do you know each other?” I told him we are a group of friends from the Boston area and New Hampshire.
At the ice cream parlor I told the moms about this passerby and my friend Tara told me that another woman in the parking lot had also stopped her and asked who were all those kids on bikes heading off with adults to get ice cream. Driving back home, I was thinking about the strangers who noticed us at the beach. I was moved because it made me stop and ask myself: “Who are these friends of mine? And what is this restlessness to be with these friends that I find in myself? And why is it that our children spend time together in a beautiful way?” I came home so grateful to Fr. Giussani without feeling that I had missed out on the camping weekend. Instead, I found myself full of gratitude for the gift of friendship that was born out of the encounter with Him. Thank you, Don Giuss!
Monica, Boston, MA