Last night, I bridged from youth to young adult at the synergy bridging service of General Assembly. After, I went on to a zoom with young adults, as both one of them and not one of them. Last month, I walked across a bridge for a prerecorded zoom worship service for the church that I was born in, blessed in, raised in, and informally left over a year ago. Later this week I will record a homily about youth community and my experience with it for the church whose youth group I have been attending for almost a year. And next month I will deliver a bridging speech at the summer camp I have found refuge in, in the nature, the building, and certainly the people. My experience of youth community is large and long and seems to be wrapping up neatly in a bow. I did not feel prepared to leave, until I did, and yet I don’t and won’t feel ready. I don’t feel ready to engage in young adult community yet. I feel disconnected from youth community. And that is all okay. I am on the bridge.
For the final project of my physics class, we had to build the toothpick bridge. The pervasive toothpick bridge. Due to me fighting hard to not take physics my junior year, then my counselor insisting I had to take it my senior year, I was in a class dominated by juniors who still cared about their grades. They built these beautiful, strong bridges. One even held 200 pounds. And mine held 4 pounds. My bridge, who I affectionately called Bertha, was very nimble. I used very few toothpicks(I hadn’t realized the smart kids were making columns, duh), very little glue, and a whole lotta faith in my creation. And it held four pounds! I had already moved past high school, past physics and past putting metaphorical weight on the amount of real weight my creation of toothpicks and glue could hold. High school was easy for me to leave; I’ve been in classes with the same people since kindergarten, the same people who watched me eat yogurt for lunch before people ate yogurt for lunch and wear old fashioned dresses because they made me happy and loved Tuesdays because that was the day we had math homework, I didn’t connect with people when it was easy and then I really struggled when it was harder. My graduation was the culmination of 13 years based on where my parents bought a house, what courses I thought I could handle, and what students took the same courses. I chose barely anything about the community I inhabited.
But UU youth community! I fought for that community, and then those communities. I was the only youth from my church to engage in state wide rallies and summer camps, and I was one of two youth to engage nationally. I went to anything I could fit in my schedule. I tried to make friends with anyone who would be my friend. And friends I did make. And meaning I did find. I put my soul into Unitarian Universalism. I tried to change how youth engaged, to bring more people into the sanctuary I had found, to reinvigorate worship. For 4 years I have made all the difference I could. And in one month’s time, I will have sealed this chapter of my life. No going back, erasing my work to put something better in its place. The legacy I have strewn behind me will be a legacy. And that is hard. Because there is so much more I wanted to do. I wanted to solve the problems Texas UU youth are having. I wanted to put more on this blog. I wanted to do coming of age and take a pilgrimage to Boston. I wanted to restore the rituals that I did not get to partake in. I wanted to sing “I wanna linger” just one more time, and be smushed into a circle just a little to close for comfort, a physical reminder of how strong youth community can be. But I won’t, cause I can’t. And one day, I am sure I will not grieve my missed opportunities, but that day is not today, because today I am on the bridge, looking over my shoulder.
