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Utopia in the Forest at the Vegan Families Camping Trip

Kids can have empathy superpowers if we let them.

Darcy Reeder
3 min readAug 27, 2018
My kiddo, sleeping through train noise, in our tent at the Vegan Families Camping Trip

I just got home from 3 days in Larrabee State Park near Bellingham, WA. My kid and I made the drive for the Seattle Vegan Families Group’s annual camping trip. The hazardous smoke cleared just in time, and we donned our rain gear and celebrated at a group campsite with 10 or so other vegan families.

It was a seriously awesome time: epic views, vegan s’mores, kids and dogs (and grownups) running wild in a car-less wonderland.

What surprised me though, was that my kid, being her usual awesome self, seemed to be the worst at sharing and the quickest to fuss. It’s not that she was on hard mode, but that we were surrounded by the sweetest, most generous group of kids we could imagine.

I love all our other friends (it must be said!) and they are a kind bunch, dedicated to sharing and community and consent, and this all gives me hope for the future, but…

This vegan families camping trip was some crazy dream-like utopia stuff.

I think of my kid as the easy one. She’s 4 and we (so far) don’t have issues with hitting (or biting or otherwise hurting) or drawing on walls or toy-snatching. She eats her…

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Darcy Reeder
Darcy Reeder

Written by Darcy Reeder

Empathy for the win! Published in Gen, Human Parts, Heated, Tenderly —Feminism, Sexuality, Veganism, Anti-Racism, Parenting. She/They

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