The Youth Group, the Elderly
and The Little Prince

By Laetitia Palluat, Heart’s Home USA President
On January 7^th, as we cel­e­brated the three kings’ visit to our Lord, the elderly res­i­dents of Brooklyn’s Hopkins Center wel­comed the visit of the Heart’s Home Youth Group, who per­formed a play by St. Exupery: “The Little Prince."

Every Saturday, we visit the elderly of the Hopkins Center. After four years, the res­i­dents greet us with great smiles. We have become friends and they await our arrivals every single week! This Saturday, though, we wished to make it dif­ferent from the others and offer them a spe­cial gift for this fes­tive season. The Little Prince is about to visit them!

The youth group, along with some teenage friends from Manhattan and Brooklyn worked beau­ti­fully together to rehearse, to create the cos­tumes, and to build the back­ground. Finally, the day has arrived, and Lili has her petals arranged to be the rose, Bruce has his big belly and crown to be the king, Katherine is flying beau­ti­fully with her wings, Ray has his glasses on and his cal­cu­lator ready to count the stars, Thea has her fox’s ears perked up to listen to Constance, who looks just like the Little Prince.

In addi­tion to the youth, Claire, Florence, Francois, Agathe, Helen, Sarah, and Guilhem, who come on a reg­ular basis to visit the nursing home with us, are all pre­sent for the occa­sion. In a few min­utes, they are on every floor to invite our friends to the show. They gather around 50 of our friends. After a piece of music that draws every­body’s atten­tion, a great silence reigns in the room! This great crowd of wheelchairs and beds that carry so much pain, so many unending sleepy days, so much longing for some­thing else, all of a sudden, has qui­eted down. Everybody is expecting a vis­i­ta­tion. Everybody has ears and eyes wide open to receive fully this gift we are about to offer.

With a little emo­tion, the per­for­mance starts! As the wild birds start to fly, I see one of my elderly friends moved to tears at seeing teenage girls in their appear­ance of birds. And this is moving indeed: this group of youth, giving them­selves fully to provide a moment of joy to their elders. What a feast for them...and for us, so happy to share such a joy!

Saint Exupery makes this beau­tiful state­ment: "It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so impor­tant." Last Saturday, we did not waste our time; we just gave more impor­tance to each one of our friends, who are already so pre­cious!