On the corner of Oak Street off busy 1st Avenue dawns new life. Years from now, holes in the ground will have turned into budding trees, planted by people reclaiming control of their own lives. Community events and volunteer days will utilize the area as it greens, and a once small act on a fall day will give back and serve as a timestamp.
Steps from an always busy Route 171 lies Way Back Inn’s main campus in Maywood. At Way Back Inn, clients seek to overcome addiction with substance use and gambling. The nonprofit invests in their clients through a holistic treatment approach, partnership and community outreach. Their mission is to curate a “comprehensive” and “personalized healing environment.”
Way Back Inn channeled its focus on partnership to assist clients in recovery and beautify its area with the help of Openlands, the Chicago region’s premier conservation organization. Openlands’ TreePlanters Grant allowed Way Back Inn to gather clients and community members for a tree-planting event on Nov. 1.
“We wrote the grant, and we were kind of connecting it to individuals in recovery. It’s very cathartic and therapeutic to actually get connected with nature,” said Chris Ward, an outreach coordinator at Way Back Inn.
“To be outside, to connect with others, to work together – to accomplish something.”
As a break from the hard work done inhouse to overcome addiction, clients at Way Back Inn step outside into green spaces and interact with surroundings. Sun poked through the clouds across the campus area and gave way to a “perfect storm,” as Way Back Inn executive director Anita Pindiur put it.
“We’ve been involved in some smaller, other projects, but we never actually heard of Openlands,” said Pindiur, “It was through President Vicky Scaman in Oak Park that we met with (former Trustee Susan Buchanan) and we were able to start this relationship.”
Openlands works to support the environment with an array of programs and projects involving education and hands-on stewardship in which everyday people can contribute. The TreePlanters Grant, one of Openlands programs, gives selected grantees the opportunity to plant trees in their own neighborhoods. Giving clients the ability to feel their environment, physically and spiritually, is a point of emphasis for Way Back Inn, so the partnership made sense.
“They have areas and zones selected that need trees and have that space that really needs a little bit more greenery,” the executive director said, “We just fell perfectly into that area, and we were also wanting, willing and had the volunteers to be able to do their work.”
Oddly, parallels can be drawn between the work Way Back Inn and Openlands do. Despite operating in very different areas, at their core, the missions are the same. Renewal, care, restoration. All concepts that can be applied to both people recouping lives lost to addiction and revitalizing land lost to big-budget development.
When clients embark on their journey at Way Back Inn, they experience nature in their hands. The simple joys Earth offers are rediscovered, or new, green hobbies are introduced. While cultivating their own recovery, clients cultivate their immediate surroundings in the process.
The Nov. 1 event provided fellowship and vitamin D for a single day, but the fruits of that labor will be realized for years – for the area, environment and all in recovery.
“There’s a lot to say about the beginning of planting a little tree, then watching it grow, sort of resembling what it’s like to begin recovery,” said Ward, “because it really is just a seed that gets planted at first.”
