Is it juvenile to cling to the communities of our youth?

After attending Children’s Adventure Company as a kid, Ben Montoya joined the summer camp’s staff (Photo by Vladimir Chaloupka)

“I learned to trust nature as a place of community and comfort, somewhere to go when the world felt alienating.”
— Ben Montoya

For Ben Montoya, summer camp was more than just a place to play outside: it was his community, his tribe. As a teenager, he remained friends with fellow campers. And as a college student, he got a job teaching at the same camp he had attended as a child.

But when he went to grad school in New York City, he started feeling the need to wean himself off the camp community. He told himself it was time to grow up.

Then Coronavirus struck.

Quarantined in a basement with flu-like symptoms, Ben began to re-evaluate the role that community plays in our lives. On this episode, he shares his story.

Ben Montoya is Out There’s production intern.

In addition to finishing up his master’s degree at NYU’s Center for Experimental Humanities, Ben is a musician and independent podcast producer. He co-hosts a comedy podcast called I Chews You and works on a podcast about climate change called The Multispecies Worldbuilding Lab.

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