Camp Agape Vermont

Antoine arrived at Camp Agape in 2008, a reticent, wary nine year old with three years of loneliness and anger just under the surface. He hadn’t seen his mother since she began serving her prison sentence in Vermont when he was just six years old. Antoine lived in New York City with his “godmother” Tina, whose minimum wage job was the sole support for a household of seven. She had done a good job caring for Antoine, but she had just about reached the limit of her ability to tolerate his explosive behavior. Meanwhile, in Vermont, Kids-A-Part facilitated weekly telephone calls between Antoine and his mother. With the kind of amazing collaboration that is possible in Vermont, Kids-A-Part started looking for someone able to enroll as a Fresh Air family for Antoine. He could come to Vermont on the Fresh Air bus, visit his mother, and attend Camp Agape. I volunteered. The Vermont Department of Corrections transferred Antoine’s mother to the closest facility just for his visit.Antoine was the last child off the bus. I was in awe at the courage it must have taken for him to leave New York City and get into a car with a white stranger in rural Vermont. Every morning for a week, I walked him down the street to the women’s prison to get re-acquainted with his mom. Every day, it was terribly hard for him to go for the visit, and every day, it was terribly hard at the end to say good-bye. It was especially hard to stop the visits and go to this strange thing called Camp Agape.