flexibility and profound change

FLEXIBILITY AND PROFOUND CHANGE

June 2021

Dear Marwood Community:

As with everyone, it’s been a time of pivoting and profound change. Marwood is no different. We truly hope all of you are safe and healthy and are positively re-imagining what life entails now that we’ve hopefully weathered the worst of the pandemic storm. We wanted to let you know what the counselors and our Marwood community have been up to.

• Camp 2020 was online. While MarWired wasn’t the same as in person, the love and spirit showed up. And it was really quite lovely. Especially the live-streamed nightly campfires Julie and Steve built in their backyard with a backdrop of 60 Marwood T-shirts - one for every camper and counselor present. (This is the picture you see on the home page.)

• We started a private Minecraft server (java and bedrock versions!) just for campers to be able to game together. Current or recent campers can contact the registrar for details on how to get connected!

• After MarWired camp, we received feedback that the community would like more consistent connection. We decided to start holding monthly campfire check ins on zoom to give the campers a safe space to just “BE” and speak their truths. It’s been a wonderful touch point for many campers.

• Terry K., Amory and Carol all retired from being active counselors. They will be dearly missed and their indelible imprint and love live on.

• We brought on 4 new counselors over the past 2 years. 

  1. Craig (a parent of current campers) in 2020

  2. Erin (who will be our nurse) - new this year and former camper

  3. Jordan - new this year and former camper

  4. Emilie - new this year and former camper

• Updated our website (you’re reading our very first blog!)

• Reunion 2020 was also online!

• We started laying the foundations for a brand new Marwood Senior High camp to start in 2022 where we will be inviting all 5th and 6th year campers next year (the ones who are 4th and 5th years in 2021). More details on this to come as they evolve! Stay tuned for a future post!

• In March 2021 with the pandemic cases still rising, vaccine scarcity and CDC camp guidelines unworkable for our ethos, we made the difficult decision to do camp again online in 2021.

• At the beginning of May 2021, we planned MarWired 2.0. Fast forward 3 weeks later and EVERYTHING CHANGED again. Vaccinations for our age group were now available and the CDC guidelines also changed. When we started exploring the thought of doing in person camp, Camp Tuck was no longer an option for this year. PIVOT! We amazingly found a campground that is able to accommodate us!! Back to our roots in the Michigan dunes! We’ll be in Sawyer, MI which is right next to Bridgman - Marwood’s original home. So we’re planning camp with 2 months notice, in a new location. Yikes! We’re thrilled to be able to gather again in person and to start helping the campers heal through love and community. For this year only, we will be welcoming all 5th years back to camp for the first time in history.

So here we are, beginning of June and gathering all the love and energy we can to create a 4 day Marwood experience by mid-July. We’ve got this! We can’t wait to be in the woods again with campers.

The Marwood Spirit lives on and is flowing through all of us and all of you. Thank you for your love and support!

If you want to know how you can help, please visit our donation page at https://www.muuyc.org/donations