I find it poignant that the shots that barely survived my Holga malfunction were taken just before the awful end to Holga Week, when many of us woke up to news of a new wave of violence in Palestine. I’d been jolted awake for some reason at 2:00 or 3:00 am that Saturday and spent the rest of the morning glued to my phone, scrolling through the news until it was time for morning prayers at the retreat I’d been begrudgingly signed up for — it was one of those work-related things I was technically allowed to say no to but couldn’t really not be there for.
The whole experience was eerie because I hadn’t been asked about my thoughts on Palestine and Israel in a very long time, and yet, I spent much of the ride there in that massive caravan you see in slide five talking about it, because the guys were curious about my thoughts. Maybe something was already in the air on Friday.
I didn’t really want to be there because I’m not typically the kind of guy who’d want to be at a “men’s retreat.” But it was actually very good for me – to have those conversations with guys my dad’s age and sometimes older. I think something about that forced me to process things a little differently, though we didn’t talk about what was going on at all.
The retreat was designed as a listening circle, where “listening is an act of revolutionary love,” and I think it did the trick.
A week later, I was stopped by a young woman who looked a little lost and distraught. She was wondering what was going on, and after some prompting, I asked her if she meant in Palestine. I asked if she needed anything and she said “just information exchange” before it dawned on her that I was offering to buy her something at the store. I think she would have been satisfied with the conversation, to be honest. We ended up getting ice cream and cigarettes and I think that part was mostly for me.
Click here to read what I posted on Day 1 & Day 2 of Holga Week, which ended on October 7.