Even though we haven’t done much work so far, we have met some great people in this community. We had a discussion today about our expectations with working with Acadiana CARES as well as what we thought of the house and Lafayette. I started to think about my past experiences with service and realized that the AmeriCorps NCCC opportunity is a great way to experience a variety of different service areas. A majority of the work that I have done has involved disaster relief and local organizations, so being able to work in other communities and with organizations that are different from what I am used to is great.
This past weekend I spent time at home for Chris’ wedding and was surprised at how strange it was to be home, and how hard it was to readjust to real life. It also made me realize how much of an affect Amerilife is having on me. The people I have spent the last month with and the places I have been have become part of my home.
Day 37: So I was cut off the other day when I was trying to update my blog, so this is the continuation of that day. We have had two more days of work at Acadiana CARES, and I am thrilled with what we have done. The past 2 days I worked with John and Nate building 56 feet of fence. It was really great to learn how to do a new skill. Along the fence there were 2 large gates attached. We learned how to frame and cover these gates. I could go on and on about how to build fences, but I won’t bore you all with the details. It feels great to have a sense of accomplishment and to be able to see the progress you have made, especially when those who are supervising you are impressed with your work.
I’m learning that for the first time in my life I feel truly proud of what I am doing. This work is both meaningful to me as well as the communities I work with. It is something that I love telling people about. In college I felt many of the things I was doing were routine or mundane, whereas this experience is impacting my life directly; both good and bad.
Tonight we went out to dinner with the director of Acadiana CARES. He took us to a local Greek restaurant near our house and fed us more food than we could ever imagine. We talked with him about the organization and the population we are working with. It was amazing to hear how he and a few friends started the organization our of their cars in the 1980s and slowly built the organization to what it is now (receiving $9.6 million of grants every year.) I was awed at his knowledge about the HIV, AIDS, and substance abuse populations and inspired by his personal story of substance abuse. As sappy as it sounds, I hope that one day I feel the passion and interest in what I am doing as he does with his everyday job. This year will be a huge piece of beginning that process for me, and I am excited to learn more and more about populations that I have yet to encounter. As much as I felt I was cultured or desensitized to so many communities, I realize that I still have a lot to learn and experience. That’s why NCCC is so great. I will be able to develop both my physical, emotional, and mental skills and knowledge immensely over the next 9 months.
We leave on Friday for Vicksburg for FIRE TRAINING! I hope to be able to update a bunch over the next week as well as upload some pictures and such.
Day 39: It's Friday and we are back on campus. Thankfully we have internet and I can update. Below are a bunch of a pictures that I took over the last week. I hope you find them entertaining :) (For some reason they were uploaded in reverse order. I tried to show the progress we made this week on some of the projects.)
There are pictures of a 40 ft fence we built along with a 16 ft fence with 2 swinging gates, and my teammate Katie using the gas powered auger. SO COOL!
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