Lawn Court Accommodation Service take camping trip with poem written on the experience
Together’s Lawn Court Accommodation Service is based Bexhill-on-Sea and provides 24 hour residential support to the people that live at the property. The residents at Lawn Court have their own Sports Club and another activity they undertake is camping trips in the summer. Service Manager Tony Lee-Peters describes their latest camping trip in the summer of 2022 here:
Camping trips are something we do a couple of times a year with our residents at Lawn Court in the summer.
The people who use our service look forward to going each year saying it feels like a holiday for them and a time to relax in nature.
The residents help to choose the camping site and get involved with the practical side of arranging their holiday. Some of them have even purchased their own tents and portable toilets!
Staff camp out too, offering support along the way and a sing song around the campfire. This year staff entertained the group with bongos and guitar playing!
Food, snacks and hot meals and drinks are supplied by staff and this year everyone also enjoyed takeaway coffees and croissants. Yearly camping is a much loved staple amongst both service users and staff. Feedback is always excellent and our service users always return with a sense of relaxation and contentment.
Following the camping trip Emanuel, who is one of the people who uses the Lawn Court Service and went on the trip, wrote a poem on the experience and was kind enough to share that:
An Ocean of Loving Care
A very large field of grass with wild flowers,
surrounded by woods, studded by tents:
our abode for a few days…
the song of birds, the bleating of sheep,
the brailling of a donkey,
bon-fires at night, plenty of good food,
an ocean of loving care:
this Dave, Joe, Marianne, and me
had from Polish Dan, and Russian-Tatar Alina,
we even celebrated our Creator
with a conversation about Him on the origin of life,
inspired by the stars above,
which we tried to name.
The good feeling lingers on, days later,
and it restored a little my love for mankind,
which had been destroyed by the news of
two world wars, the concentration camps,
child abuse, animal experiments…
These, my voices tell me,
are the work of the devil, father of all evil,
but, the problem of the existence of the devil is
something I can’t solve,
although, we mentally-ill people are all too aware
of the evils in the world,
for we crack under the burden of evil inflicted on us:
only love and justice can save us!
Thank you to Emanuel for sharing the poem and to Tony for sharing details of the trip.