The Root Cellar, an innercity outreach in Portland, Maine, had a day camp throughout the month of July this summer, and on Thursdays, I would join them for a show and a workshop for the older kids, then a show and workshop with the younger ones.  The wotkshops covered basic juggling and balancing skills, balloon sculpture, homemade magic tricks and more. 

The children attending the day camp were almost exclusively African immigrants or children of immigrants.  That cross cultural experience is one of the things I love about this neighborhood in Portland.  But in the end kids are kids, and they oohed and aaahed when I produced doves and a rabbit, laughed at the humor of the the show, and of course, many of the little boys claimed they knew how all my magic tricks were done.  Some things are universal.

On my final day, the kids brought me an armload of oversized thank you cards that I am saving in my prop room.  Except for leaving Portland during the afternoon rush hour traffic, I enjoyed every minute of the five Thursdays I went into the Root Cellar in July.