Madelyn at Girl Scout Camp

My Girl Scout didn't need me. That was the best part of our overnight with a couple hundred girls at a ranch (yes, a ranch in Shanghai!) about ninety minutes from here last weekend.

Madelyn has struggled this year with feeling confident on her own, wanting me to stay with her at friends' homes and classes she's attended. We have prayed with her and prayed for her about this issue all year. Slowly, over the past months, she has been growing in confidence.

This past weekend seemed to me like a huge step forward in growth for her. Yes, I was her group leader, and yes, I was in the same cabin as her. But she didn't walk with me or want to sleep in the same room as me. She didn't choose to sit by me at meals. She made new friends. She took risks, like speaking in front of the group and even creating and performing a skit with a small group of girls that they performed in front of several hundred others. She mingled. She wrote poems with the other girls and read them aloud to the group. She walked in the dark back to our cabin with another girl, not me. She tried a cool game where she had to jump in and out of moving bamboo rods in front of lots of other girls. She laughed. She sang silly songs. She participated in relay races. She didn't sit by me on the bamboo raft ride around Monkey Island. And she didn't sit with me on the bus either to or from the camp.

I contemplated this growth with mixed feelings. Of course I love to spend time with her, and it is bittersweet to have her choose to be with someone else over me. But watching her joy and confidence apart from me this weekend was such a joy. I think I grew to appreciate who she is better, seeing her as a whole person apart from me.