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When Your Time Comes
Young men embrace leadership and, too soon, death
Two weeks is a long time at a youth crisis shelter. When I returned to my weekly workshop last night after a two-week break, there was only one person in the group who I'd seen before. He was the same young man, let's call him Kevin, who I'd asked to leave the session a month or so ago because he couldn't control himself — and I wasn't having a good day either.
Last night Kevin sat apart from the newcomers, next to me on the opposite side of the table. The transformation from weeks before was astonishing. First, another young man who was always egging him on had been placed elsewhere ("He cried when his friend left," one of the staff told me later). It's hard to lose someone you connect with, but for Kevin his friend's departure seemed liberating. Add to that the fact that he was now the only veteran, the most familiar with the material and our procedures. He was ready to stop being the class clown and step up as a leader.
Kevin is not highly literate, but he was not in the least embarrassed anymore about reading out loud. He seized a poem we had read before and bumped through it, sounding out the syllables until he remembered what the word was and then trumpeting it out loud. Kevin has a gift for what is known in show biz as "vocal color." He may not sight read well, but he has a delivery that shifts from deep bass to soprano, from dead serious to silly, from shout to whisper, in a way that usually requires years of training with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Rather than trying to steal the scene, this week as the veteran he was the star. The rest of the group accepted this as the way things must be in this session, whatever it is.
Last night Kevin sat apart from the newcomers, next to me on the opposite side of the table. The transformation from weeks before was astonishing. First, another young man who was always egging him on had been placed elsewhere ("He cried when his friend left," one of the staff told me later). It's hard to lose someone you connect with, but for Kevin his friend's departure seemed liberating. Add to that the fact that he was now the only veteran, the most familiar with the material and our procedures. He was ready to stop being the class clown and step up as a leader.
Kevin is not highly literate, but he was not in the least embarrassed anymore about reading out loud. He seized a poem we had read before and bumped through it, sounding out the syllables until he remembered what the word was and then trumpeting it out loud. Kevin has a gift for what is known in show biz as "vocal color." He may not sight read well, but he has a delivery that shifts from deep bass to soprano, from dead serious to silly, from shout to whisper, in a way that usually requires years of training with the Royal Shakespeare Company. Rather than trying to steal the scene, this week as the veteran he was the star. The rest of the group accepted this as the way things must be in this session, whatever it is.
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23:52 EST, 20.Nov.07
13:41 EST, 20.Nov.07