the words for what comes next:

an open letter from sam rise, on their departure from Girls Rock Philly.

When it comes to big changes and big events at GRP, I’m often tasked with finding the right words to say. 

My favorite place to listen for them has always been in the closing circle with you. Arms around each other, heads and hearts together, I reflected your revelations and discoveries back to you, so you wouldn’t think you’d imagined it all. I reminded you of your magic, when the violences of the world threatened to erase us, or our memory. We’d lead a call and response behind a closed curtain or stage a door, and fill the minutes ahead of showcase with our voices, and every ounce of magic we could muster.

Through uprisings, elections, and a global pandemic, within every tiny universe that is born and reborn at Rock Camp, I’ve had the privilege of inviting you to take your place on stage, and in our work of remaking the world. Today I’m at a loss as I form another sort of closing circle:

March 18 will be my last day as Program Director at Girls Rock Philly. I’ll be locking up the way I have at every camp and event for five years with this team; the first and last person through the door.

This is not how I imagined leaving GRP. Circumstances recent and recurring demanded a transition, and I knew at the end of last year that I would step away from this role sometime in 2022. I didn’t know that I’d be writing to you with so little notice, and so little understanding about what happens next.

This organization’s leadership- I include myself in this– could not come together to honor the huge decisions and transitions that we faced at the year’s end, including staff departures. The unfinished nature of our work during my time as program director haunts the doorway as I go, and I regret that I won’t be here to see your beautiful work through.

It will take some time before any amount of talking, or explaining will meaningfully address your questions or worries. For now, I’ll say that you have made my life a miracle; your courage and power and wisdom drive me to keep loving, keep fighting, keep challenging, keep failing and failing better to learn, toward liberation in our lifetime.  
I’ll never give up on the world I know is possible, because I have lived it, in every camp, with you.

To our Youth and Teens:

No words could ever be able to truly thank you, or account for the sadness I feel at leaving GRP on these terms. I can never make up for the ways the world will undermine you, or cause harm in your name, but I must encourage you to keep challenging, and questioning and stretching the limits that anyone would impose on your revolutionary work. Turn your volume up, and know how much you are loved, appreciated, respected and admired.

I am always here for you– whatever you need from me, know that you already have it.
If you doubt for a second my care for you–in this moment or any other– call on me.

This is not our goodbye. I don’t leave you when I leave this role.

Remember: this organization belongs to you.

I have often been your representative in spaces where you deserved your own seat, and
I want to remind you as I go that anyone in a position that claims power or authority owes it to you.
Your music, your joy, your grief, your humor, your energy are the marrow of the work we do together. This org cannot exist without you. I hope this–and any organization that aspires to serve you– will keep you at its heart, and keep its eyes trained on your vision. It is not our job to discourage, or defer, or mold you- it is our job to ensure that our work is shaped by you, and to support your leadership.
You embody the heart and soul of Rock Camp;
it’s yours to leave and return to, to rebuild, however it serves you.

To Our Adult Campers:

Thank you for being willing to be transformed, to give yourself permission to wonder about the best of you, and sing it into being.  For gifting us your vulnerability, and your beginners’ minds, especially into adulthood. Thank you for being more gentle with yourself, for leaving toxic relationships, for negotiating that raise, for voicing one less ‘sorry’ when you had nothing to apologize for. For coming back to camp in every iteration you said yes to.
Rock Camp is an embodiment of your new ways of seeing ourselves, and the world.

To Our Caregivers:

Thank you for entrusting your children into our care, to create safe and brave spaces with and for them! Thank you for always reminding me we don’t have to be perfect to be powerful…and for creating magic by choosing each other, every time. Thanks for showing our youth that many adults are willing to protect them; to break down their own limiting beliefs so that all of us can be all the way free. Thank you for learning alongside us.
Rock Camp is an embodiment of your profound Love.

Thank you for showing up with your curiosity and contagious joy. For building an infrastructure that maintained the most sacred space I’ve ever occupied. For starting as future friends, and leaving a beloved community. For the ways we’ve held each other through our impossible griefs and transformations. For trusting me when I arrived- not because I had the right answers, but for my willingness to find them, alongside you. Every camp sign and power strip, every tuner and bucket line, every nap you took! You make our work feel limitless.
Rock Camp is an embodiment of your generosity of spirit.

To Our Co-Conspirators:

Thank you for reminding me that music is above all else a Transformative Force, a vital technology in our work against violence. Thank you for reminding me that people make music- and that our work must center the leadership of the people whose voices we most need to hear. Thanks for reminding me that no matter how much energy we expend running back and forth bridging the gaps, how clever or creative our temporary solutions–if we don’t practice collective navigation by the same North Star, we’re just lost together.

Rock Camp is the embodiment of the imaginative action you call us to take.