JHYM Retreat Staff Notes
I Can Hear it in You
Come & share the music that shakes and gives voice to the center of your being and experience what moves others!
JHYM Retreats * January 12-14, 2007 * Woolman Hill
Dearest Friends,
Hello, dear ones! Thank you so very much for your lives and generous spirits! As staff we are: Anne Anderson, Jason Bachand, Buddy Baker-Smith, Dave Baxter, Sara Hubner, Theresa Oleksiw, Kara Price, SKG Wendyl Ross, Harry “Scotty” Scott, Scott Sprague, and moi. I am also incredibly honored and delighted to welcome singer-songwriter Joe Crookston, who will be with us from Ithaca, NY. In addition, Mark Fraser, co-director of Woolman Hill and cellist, and Daphne Bye, Mark’s spouse and pianist, will be stopping in. Wow. Thank you, thank you, all.
I want to especially thank Jason and Theresa for joining us on staff for the first time. Some of you may have met Jason at Sessions last summer when he came to visit JHYM’s beloved staffer Kara Price. (If you haven’t heard their recent news, you’ll just have to wait until Opening Circle Friday night!!) He and Kara led one of the youth programs for the Connecticut Valley Quarter’s weekend retreat at Woolman Hill last fall. He’s a third year seminarian at Andover-Newton under the care of the United Church of Christ. Theresa is Durham (ME) Monthly Meeting’s Youth Minister and was part of JYM Sessions’ staff last summer. She is hoping that her involvement in JHYM will help get other Maine teens hooked into the retreats and brings with her scads of energy and skills. We are sooooooo blessed.
Speaking of blessings, our retreat is just about “full” with 33 attenders currently registered – and they are revved and psyched. This year’s core community is pretty much, to a teen, on board, with a number of others coming for the first time ever, or just the first time this year. I hope you are getting your beauty sleep this week.
I trust that, once again, this annual music feast will be a watershed experience in Grace and community. We’ve found that it is one of the most powerful ways for our JH’ers to authentically express that of God, beauty, hope, justice, peace, compassion and love. Our theme, I Can Hear it in You, comes from one of Joe Crookston’s songs, which I first heard last summer after experiencing a performance of his at New Bedford’s Summer Fest (great 3 day folk music gathering). Joe’s music beautifully communicates what I experience while doing this ministry, namely seeing and hearing beyond words that of God in each other. There is enormous power and Grace in these moments of recognition – between young people and between and across the generations in our community. It is enormously risky to let ourselves be heard and loved – and beyond compare when we are. I ask you, dear staffers and Friends, to join me in keeping your ‘eye on the prize’ – creating a safe and nurturing spiritual community where we can all find that of God in ourselves and in each other. Amen!
Timelines
Arrival: Buddy, Anneke and I will be arriving by 4pm and would welcome you anytime after that! Registration is at 7pm. I am begging everyone to try and arrive on time so that we have enough time to do all of the usual Friday evening program pieces AND enjoy a concert by Joe. I know – it’s a lot. But it’s an incredible opportunity and one I feel incredible clear about! So. I really need as many of you on staff to get there by 6:30 as possible. Let me know if this will be a problem.
Wrap-up: Jason has already let me know that he can’t be with us Sunday morning. I’m hoping everyone else can stay through clean up. Hopefully we’ll all be out of there by 1pm. If you can’t for some reason, let me know. My back is still in recovery – did it in big time after the back-to-back retreats in November – so your help is more seriously needed than ever.
DIRECTIONS TO WOOLMAN HILL ARE ON OUR WEBSITE.
Needed Items
* Music players that play both CDs and audio tapes. Please let me know if you can bring one. Every small group will need one! Help us not repeat the disaster last year that one small group had with a nonworking player!!! I’m also looking for a set of IPOD speakers that we can use.
* Percussion Instruments: Again, please let me know if you have any that you are willing and/or able to share with the community. (Don’t offer the antique violin, okay?)
(More) Thoughts on the Theme
Music is one of the most powerful mediums for expressing all of our hearts and souls’ experiences in ways that others can connect with and understand beyond words. Perhaps because our response to music is so NOT a head trip, we tend to rest easily in the certainty of what music we love and what music helps us to center and/or to express parts of life that are very hard to communicate otherwise. Music is one of humanity’s most-effective bridges between our reaching hearts and the Holy that we yearn towards.
Cloistered monks and nuns sing from the Psalter; Buddhists listen for the last moment of a bell’s ringing before the ensuing silence; Gospel trombone choirs wail while listeners are struck by the Spirit and faint; Muslims chant towards the East from wherever they are in the world; Hindi worshippers dance themselves into centered raptures; native peoples beat drums…..there is so much sacred musical worship in the world. (And that’s just a quick dusting of human beings – ponder birds, whales, and all other creatures’ responses to the new day and to one another!)
I continue to find music to be a particularly powerful medium and Opening for young people, one that is especially “easy” for them to use in witnessing to each other. Last year’s JHYM Music Retreat was an awesome event, primarily because of the depth and breadth of sharing that the young people themselves gave to each other in the small groups. Much of the “content” for this retreat will come from what all of us share with each other on a personal level. We’ll listen and experience all sorts of music – in our small groups, in the Saturday afternoon workshops, at the Saturday evening coffeehouse, and in and around or large group circles and free time all weekend.
Sharing what music truly touches the core of our beings requires great trust in the community, but if this is felt, it can do more to create a bond one to another than hours and hours of talking can begin to approach. It is essential that every small group create a feeling of mutual respect and an openness to the Spirit on Friday evening, so that our time of sharing on Saturday morning can be rich and deep. I ask you to please take some time this week, however you can, to pray and to rest your heart and soul in the Light so that you are able to help nourish the JH’ers listening hearts.
Program Details
Small Groups will meet 3 times over the course of the weekend: Friday evening /Saturday morning/and Saturday early evening. We will be divided into only 4 small groups – with 8 or 9 JH’ers and 2 staffers for each group. You’ll be in the same small group for the weekend, hopefully providing an opportunity for community within community!
Friday Evening’s Program: Building Trust
After some Opening Worship, we’ll do the usual names, program overview and theme introductions as a large group. In our large and small groups, we’ll do some activities and games that help us build our community. We’ll also hear information about all of the Saturday afternoon workshops and sign up for them. Then, we’ll enjoy a concert of music and sharing by Joe. (You have no idea what you’re in for!)
Saturday Morning Program: Songwriting
Joe will lead us in a large group circle that will be kind of a drive-by experience of this artistic process.
Small Group Circles: Sharing our Music
For many of us, the kind of music we like is a statement of who we are. This is especially true for young people. What we are trying to do in this small group is ask retreaters to hear beyond the identity, and to try to experience the music as a tool into a deeper place precisely because the chosen music has been that for someone else in our community. Thus, it is essential that each person feel safe and honored to share in a way that is heard via hearts rather than opinions or critique.
Do start with a very brief check-in around the circle, to make sure you don’t have stumbling blocks to take care of before everyone can be in Worship together.
Then explain the format: Each person has about 10 minutes to play their piece of music and to share something about why they chose the selection they did – why it qualifies as their “soul music.” Encourage everyone to be in a centered place for this time – begin with some Silence and use the Silence between for savoring and recentering. Leave some time for reflections and/or questions before going on to the next person. The trick for some may be having to wrap it up so that others have a turn. It will be important to have a gentle but mindful timekeeper so that everyone is assured of time to share. I will provide some clay for the tactile listeners amongst us.
At the end, I would ask that you have a bit of Silence in gratitude for what was shared, affirming the group’s presence one to another. These small groups will most definitely run over an hour – probably closer to an hour and a half.
Saturday Afternoon Program: Awash in Music!
We’re gonna turn Woolman Hill into a veritable Berkley School of Music. Junior Highers will have the opportunity to attend two 45 minute workshops. Those of you who aren’t leading a workshop will be essential in helping with them. ;-) If any of you have a strong preference for assisting in one (that you aren’t leading at that time) let me know asap and I’ll do my best to accommodate you! And if any of you have a late-breaking idea, you can let me know that, too, and we’ll see if there’s a way to make it work.
Session I (2:00 – 2:45)
Buddy: STOMP
Kara: Songwriting
Gretchen: A capella Singing Group
Mark: Rock Improvisation
Session II (3:15 – 4:00)
Buddy: STOMP
Anne: Painting to classical & jazz
Gretchen: Singing Rounds
Scotty & Theresa: Kazoo’ing
Coffeehouse Saturday Night:
After having a 3rd small group we’ll turn the Meeting House or the dining room into a performance venue and share many gifts, funny stories, skits, dance routines and more! I would like to encourage staffers to consider sharing something as well (we usually remain in the background for these things, but I’d like it to be a community-wide event this time, given the theme).
Music Jam Space
As we did last year, the Meeting House will be used as a jam space during free time. Scott Sprague was an absolute angel being the staffer of presence there most of the weekend last year, and has indicated he’s willing to be there again this year. He is in charge of making sure there are enough staffers there at all times – so please stop by and lend your presence as well – or he will come and find you! It’s really loud and pretty chaotic, but there’s amazing stuff that happens between the JH’ers!
A Note on Free Time
Junior Higher’s want free time, but most of them want it with structure so that they can be in community! As you all know, “free time” is not staff “free time” – especially this weekend. In order to nurture community with this group of JH’ers, all of us on staff will need to initiate group games (Apples to Apples, Egyptian War or other card games, or JYM Ball), inspire craft projects, encourage the creation of new Who’s Who Book pages, and engage stragglers into the mix in any ways we feel led – or the young people themselves lead! Please consider how you would feel most comfortable doing this – and go for it!
Staff Assignments
Registrar: Dave, are you willing????
Retreat Nurse: Sara – is this okay with you????
Who’s Who Book & Craft Table Elder: Theresa
Roving Outside Staff Coordinator: Scotty
Joe Crookston’s Elder: Anne
Name Tag Czar: ???
Group Game Leaders: Buddy & Gretchen
Coffee House Elder: Dave
Meeting House Jam Space Elder & Coordinator: Scott
Photographer: Buddy
Supreme Kitchen Goddess: duh!
Final note
Do know, dear dear Friends, my gratitude and love for each of you. I am really looking forward to our weekend together in community and ministry. Travel safely and be well. Come prepared to sing your heart and lungs out!
With love,
Gretchen Baker-Smith
JHYM Retreat leader
508-997-0940 * Gretchen@jymretreats.org