If you drive north out of Pittsburgh on Interstate 79, you will make it to the city of Erie after about two hours. (One, if you drive the way I do...but I digress.) Head west on Interstate 90 for a half-hour. Eventually, you will come to the small lakeside town of Conneaut, Ohio. Take Broad Street north as far as you can, and then make a left onto Lake Road. Otherwise known as State Route 531, it runs along the Lake Erie shoreline, with only a few vacation houses between it and the steep cliffs that lead down to the waterfront. If you stay on Lake Road, you will pass a harbor, a park, a hospital and a gas station before finally approaching a slight bend in the road. On your right is a long slatted fence, through which, if you drive by at speed, you can see a large field with a massive tree growing in the middle of it. A baseball diamond and swimming pool sit on the right side of the field, and one oddly-shaped building resides at the base of the tree. Along the left side and back of this field are 22 tiny, low-slung white buildings with green-shingled roofs.
This little piece of land on the Lake Erie shore is, with the exception of my house, my favorite place on earth. Harry E. Sheldon Calvary Camp. Calvary. SCC. My home. I have been coming to Calvary since 1998; seven years as a camper, and two as a member of staff. This year, 2008, will mark only the second summer since then that I have not made the journey to the Erie coastline. The other was the summer of 2005, between my time as a camper and the start of my employment on staff.
At first glance, Calvary doesn't look that impressive. You can walk from the easternmost spot on campus to the westernmost in about five minutes. Some of the buildings are almost 80 years old, and they show it. The view, though, is spectacular. Not ten feet behind the female cabin line, the ground ends and the cliff drops a hundred feet to the waterfront below. The lake stretches out to the horizon, and on clear, windy days the whitecaps look spectacular. None of this, however, compares to the sunsets. From the clifftop, you have a perfect view of the sun as it sinks down into the lake. I challenge you to find a better place to watch the spectacle.
The location, the history and the facilities are impressive. What really makes Calvary unlike any other place on earth, though, is the people. For some reason, this little plot of land in Ohio attracts some of the greatest people I've ever met. The friendships you make up there are different than any others, because of that element you share with the other person; that indefinable Calvary spirit. It is impossible to put into words, but if you've spent any time up there, you know what I'm talking about. Several of the guys that I worked with up there were in my first cabin with me, ten years ago. That's what this place can do. It's amazing.
And I can't think of anywhere I'd rather be at the moment.
26 June 2008
21 June 2008
Sorry, Folks...
We are a volunteer center. We organize needs and assign volunteers to meet them. That's IT. We are NOT:
-the Red Cross
-FEMA
-the Indiana Council on Aging
-the Department of Homeland Security
-omniscient (unfortunately)
-the food bank
-Sears
-totally organized yet (give us time)
-capable of finding your Social Security check
-Medicare/Medicaid
-a babysitter (no, we have no jobs for a 7-year old)
-capable of cross-referencing files for the entire state of Indiana
-capable of giving you directions to anywhere in the county
-FEMA (seriously, stop calling us and getting mad when we're not)
-fond of being bitched at over the phone because you told us the wrong information
-capable of pulling an endless stream of volunteers out of our ass
-a FUCKING BABYSITTER (stop bringing your children, dammit!)
-capable of giving you money because you didn't get your welfare check
We have had many people expecting us to be all of these above listed things (as well as many more that I'm not remembering at the moment) on numerous occasions.
-the Red Cross
-FEMA
-the Indiana Council on Aging
-the Department of Homeland Security
-omniscient (unfortunately)
-the food bank
-Sears
-totally organized yet (give us time)
-capable of finding your Social Security check
-Medicare/Medicaid
-a babysitter (no, we have no jobs for a 7-year old)
-capable of cross-referencing files for the entire state of Indiana
-capable of giving you directions to anywhere in the county
-FEMA (seriously, stop calling us and getting mad when we're not)
-fond of being bitched at over the phone because you told us the wrong information
-capable of pulling an endless stream of volunteers out of our ass
-a FUCKING BABYSITTER (stop bringing your children, dammit!)
-capable of giving you money because you didn't get your welfare check
We have had many people expecting us to be all of these above listed things (as well as many more that I'm not remembering at the moment) on numerous occasions.
19 June 2008
Drainage
Franklin College
Franklin, IN
'Exhausted' does not even begin to describe how I feel right now. Let me explain. We are living at Franklin College in the small town by the same name, and running the Johnson County Volunteer Center out of one of the halls on campus. In the process, we have had to contend with an ever-changing command structure, local political drama, a power-grab by various local, state, and federal agencies, a constant flow of information that was shaky at best and completely wrong at worst, and difficulties with establishing lines of communication.
So let me begin by explaining exactly what my team does. We take requests from victims that need volunteer help to clean up from the flood damage. This could include removal of debris from basements, disposal of various waterlogged appliances, tearing-up of saturated drywall and floorboards, or simply cleaning the mud and muck out of a house. The local food bank and donation center also request volunteers to fill their staffing needs. Once we have these requests, we assign volunteers to complete them, and keep track of what tasks have been completed.
Sounds simple, right?
Not quite. Our first problem is finding enough volunteers to do the work that needs done; we have had difficulty trying to consolidate the various church groups, Scout troops, and individual volunteers and run them through our center, so that we can keep track of them and avoid sending people to complete jobs that have already been done. That particular problem is being solved slowly, as the word gets out that volunteers should come to us, rather than trying to do it themselves. The next problem is that the victims are rarely home due to the condition of their houses, and thus we are unable to send volunteers to the location. Disaster areas are prime targets for various types of unscrupulous fucks that would like nothing more than the chance to loot an unwatched house, so for liability reasons we don't send volunteers to houses unless there is somebody there to keep an eye on them and tell them what needs done. The third major problem that we tend to run into is transportation; due to lawsuit-averting Americorps rules, we cannot drive any other vehicles than our vans without signing a ton of waivers and such, and we cannot even drive our vans with less than three team members in them. This makes getting people from one place to another a MAJOR hassle.
And that's just the job as it is written. In reality, my team does FAR more than that on a daily basis. We have unloaded at least fifteen semi-trailers full of food, water, appliances, clothing, and other household goods. Some of my teammates spent a couple hours in a muddy crawlspace underneath a house, cleaning out saturated insulation. I and several others drove a couple van-loads of water to an isolated trailer park (I shall tell the story of Friendly Village in a later post). I have spent HOURS on the phone over the last couple days (with various victims, volunteers, the Red Cross, FEMA, the Indianapolis Council on Aging, ACCESS Transit, a large number of church groups, a Boy Scout troop leader, a couple of VERY nice older people who were stuck in a shitty motel with nowhere to go, at least two people who chewed me out for, I suppose, being unlucky enough to be the one to answer the phone, and fuck knows what else) in an attempt to establish lines of communication and get at least something done...with varying degrees of success. My phone bill is going to SUCK; for about three days, my personal cellphone was one of the two contact numbers for the entire center.
To add to the list of interesting things that happened to me since arriving here, I strained (read as: fucked up REAL good) my back hauling heavy-ass things off a truck, and thus am in pain whenever I try to do simple things such as, say, walking. Awesome.
Oddly enough, though, despite the fact that I have been running off of caffeine and momentum for the last couple days, I kinda like it...and no, I'm not a masochist. Why do you ask?
Oh.
Franklin, IN
'Exhausted' does not even begin to describe how I feel right now. Let me explain. We are living at Franklin College in the small town by the same name, and running the Johnson County Volunteer Center out of one of the halls on campus. In the process, we have had to contend with an ever-changing command structure, local political drama, a power-grab by various local, state, and federal agencies, a constant flow of information that was shaky at best and completely wrong at worst, and difficulties with establishing lines of communication.
So let me begin by explaining exactly what my team does. We take requests from victims that need volunteer help to clean up from the flood damage. This could include removal of debris from basements, disposal of various waterlogged appliances, tearing-up of saturated drywall and floorboards, or simply cleaning the mud and muck out of a house. The local food bank and donation center also request volunteers to fill their staffing needs. Once we have these requests, we assign volunteers to complete them, and keep track of what tasks have been completed.
Sounds simple, right?
Not quite. Our first problem is finding enough volunteers to do the work that needs done; we have had difficulty trying to consolidate the various church groups, Scout troops, and individual volunteers and run them through our center, so that we can keep track of them and avoid sending people to complete jobs that have already been done. That particular problem is being solved slowly, as the word gets out that volunteers should come to us, rather than trying to do it themselves. The next problem is that the victims are rarely home due to the condition of their houses, and thus we are unable to send volunteers to the location. Disaster areas are prime targets for various types of unscrupulous fucks that would like nothing more than the chance to loot an unwatched house, so for liability reasons we don't send volunteers to houses unless there is somebody there to keep an eye on them and tell them what needs done. The third major problem that we tend to run into is transportation; due to lawsuit-averting Americorps rules, we cannot drive any other vehicles than our vans without signing a ton of waivers and such, and we cannot even drive our vans with less than three team members in them. This makes getting people from one place to another a MAJOR hassle.
And that's just the job as it is written. In reality, my team does FAR more than that on a daily basis. We have unloaded at least fifteen semi-trailers full of food, water, appliances, clothing, and other household goods. Some of my teammates spent a couple hours in a muddy crawlspace underneath a house, cleaning out saturated insulation. I and several others drove a couple van-loads of water to an isolated trailer park (I shall tell the story of Friendly Village in a later post). I have spent HOURS on the phone over the last couple days (with various victims, volunteers, the Red Cross, FEMA, the Indianapolis Council on Aging, ACCESS Transit, a large number of church groups, a Boy Scout troop leader, a couple of VERY nice older people who were stuck in a shitty motel with nowhere to go, at least two people who chewed me out for, I suppose, being unlucky enough to be the one to answer the phone, and fuck knows what else) in an attempt to establish lines of communication and get at least something done...with varying degrees of success. My phone bill is going to SUCK; for about three days, my personal cellphone was one of the two contact numbers for the entire center.
To add to the list of interesting things that happened to me since arriving here, I strained (read as: fucked up REAL good) my back hauling heavy-ass things off a truck, and thus am in pain whenever I try to do simple things such as, say, walking. Awesome.
Oddly enough, though, despite the fact that I have been running off of caffeine and momentum for the last couple days, I kinda like it...and no, I'm not a masochist. Why do you ask?
Oh.
12 June 2008
Major Hydrological Event?
UPDATE: The National Weather Service is classifying the flooding that has struck Iowa, Indiana, Wisconsin, and Michigan as a 'major hydrological event'. It is what is known as a '500-year' flood, and by far the worst that has hit the area in human memory. Thousands of people have been displaced, hundreds of roads and bridges have been washed out, and more rain is forecast for this weekend.
This is why we have been pulled out of Texas. Tomorrow, we will be arriving in Franklin, IN where we will be working at the local donations warehouse and the volunteer center for two counties south of Indianapolis. The team will be staying at Franklin College, and organizing donations for displaced families, as well as doing administrative work and dispatching volunteers. As of now, we are slated to be deployed for 30 days.
This is why we have been pulled out of Texas. Tomorrow, we will be arriving in Franklin, IN where we will be working at the local donations warehouse and the volunteer center for two counties south of Indianapolis. The team will be staying at Franklin College, and organizing donations for displaced families, as well as doing administrative work and dispatching volunteers. As of now, we are slated to be deployed for 30 days.
09 June 2008
Disaster Relief
UPDATE: Due to the extensive flooding in the Midwest, I have been put on notice to prepare for disaster relief deployment. We will be leaving Beaumont in the next 24 hours, and will be spending anywhere from three weeks to 30 days in Indiana or Wisconsin. Since disaster relief is a priority, I will NOT be back in Denver for the campus transition week, NOR will I be back from June 27 to July 6th during our summer break. It is unknown yet where we will be going, what we will be doing, or what sort of communications ability we will have there, but please call me at (412) 480-0104 if you have any questions.
08 June 2008
Sod It All
Controlling my emotions is very important to me. Like anybody, I will experience a wide range of varied emotions at one point or another. Unlike most, however, I do my best to prevent them from manifesting. In no way am I comfortable sharing how I feel; I would much rather just deal with it inwardly and endure. This is a change from that status quo.
I fucking hate Texas. We have been here since April 24, and will not be leaving until June 19. Due to our three-day transition week in Jackson, we have missed out on the full transition week and accompanying weekend that most teams are given, as well as the travel time both ways between. All told, this accounts for almost two extra weeks at this project, as opposed to every other team in our unit and all but about five from the entire Denver campus. Combine that with the oppressive heat and humidity (heat indexes over 100 degrees), the absolute dearth of activities nearby, and the total lack of things within walking distance, and I am sick and tired of his goddamned state.
The project itself is also pissing me off in a number of ways. Our new site supervisor, Rory, is a laid-back and funny guy that does his best to remain involved with us during the workday. He tends to look towards several people, myself included, whenever he needs a job done; the three or four of us are his go-to guys (all of us are male, incidentally) . This has created resentment and bitterness towards both Rory and those of us who he looks to within the rest of the teams. They raise allegations of sexism, despite the fact that there are several guys between the two teams that he does not ask for assistance. They apparently have yet to consider that the three/four of us constantly ask him if there is anything he needs done and are the first to step up whenever Rory or the other supervisor needs people to do a job. Furthermore, once we are given a job, we finish it; others are more inclined to stand around and chat on site. Of course, when I attempted to raise these points, I was immediately met with responses of 'Obviously you don't have a problem with him; you're a guy!' No, you fucking fools, WE STEP UP.
And that brings me to my last, and possibly biggest, source of stress: my team. Not only do many of them congregate aimlessly and chat, then wonder why the supervisors don't immediately look to them...they also turn relatively small incidents into HUGE dramatic episodes. (For example: when the kitchen at the temple was being used to prepare food for a big festival this weekend, the cooks accidentally misplaced a piece of Tupperware belonging to one of my teammates. Apparently choosing to ignore the fact that it could be replaced for a dollar at Walgreens, she absolutely flipped shit; she questioned every single one of us regarding its whereabouts as if we had deliberately stolen and destroyed, say, her cellphone. She then proceeded to complain and bitch about the Tupperware for no less than three days, constantly airing her disgust that people would be using, in her words, 'our kitchen'. She also apparently chose to ignore the fact that it was in no way our kitchen; we were very graciously being allowed to use the kitchen free of charge by the Buddhist monks, who were organizing the aforementioned festival). It is this kind of minor, petty shit combined with spoiled, selfish people that drive me up a wall. I have been talked down to like I was some sort of underling (from both the girl described in the Tupperware story and another power-hungry Corps member, not a team leader) and treated like I was a four-year-old (from a different Corps member only a few years older than I). I have been living with this team continuously since the beginning of our time in New Orleans (around March 4th) and am counting the minutes until I can get away from them. (Disclaimer: there are some people on my team that are hard workers and very cool about things. This little rant does not apply to them).
So, I will do something that I normally loathe, and lay my feelings out. I am physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted. My patience is frayed thin; it takes a good deal of willpower every day to avoid going off on a Denis-Learyesque, bridge-burning, alienating rant punctuated by me laying my fist through a wall. I have not seen my friends from Denver in four months, and have not seen or hung out with my friends and fellows from back in the 'Burgh in five. Despite the fact that I am halfway through the program, I still have no idea what I want to do afterward, and little in the way of usable skills to get me there. To be honest, I'm very lonely down here; apart from one or two people on my team and a similar number on the Perry Point team, I don't have anybody that I'm close enough to to talk with and really want to hang out with.
Sod it all. June 27th. June 27th. June 27th. I'll just keep telling myself that, and hope it lives up to what I need it to be.
I fucking hate Texas. We have been here since April 24, and will not be leaving until June 19. Due to our three-day transition week in Jackson, we have missed out on the full transition week and accompanying weekend that most teams are given, as well as the travel time both ways between. All told, this accounts for almost two extra weeks at this project, as opposed to every other team in our unit and all but about five from the entire Denver campus. Combine that with the oppressive heat and humidity (heat indexes over 100 degrees), the absolute dearth of activities nearby, and the total lack of things within walking distance, and I am sick and tired of his goddamned state.
The project itself is also pissing me off in a number of ways. Our new site supervisor, Rory, is a laid-back and funny guy that does his best to remain involved with us during the workday. He tends to look towards several people, myself included, whenever he needs a job done; the three or four of us are his go-to guys (all of us are male, incidentally) . This has created resentment and bitterness towards both Rory and those of us who he looks to within the rest of the teams. They raise allegations of sexism, despite the fact that there are several guys between the two teams that he does not ask for assistance. They apparently have yet to consider that the three/four of us constantly ask him if there is anything he needs done and are the first to step up whenever Rory or the other supervisor needs people to do a job. Furthermore, once we are given a job, we finish it; others are more inclined to stand around and chat on site. Of course, when I attempted to raise these points, I was immediately met with responses of 'Obviously you don't have a problem with him; you're a guy!' No, you fucking fools, WE STEP UP.
And that brings me to my last, and possibly biggest, source of stress: my team. Not only do many of them congregate aimlessly and chat, then wonder why the supervisors don't immediately look to them...they also turn relatively small incidents into HUGE dramatic episodes. (For example: when the kitchen at the temple was being used to prepare food for a big festival this weekend, the cooks accidentally misplaced a piece of Tupperware belonging to one of my teammates. Apparently choosing to ignore the fact that it could be replaced for a dollar at Walgreens, she absolutely flipped shit; she questioned every single one of us regarding its whereabouts as if we had deliberately stolen and destroyed, say, her cellphone. She then proceeded to complain and bitch about the Tupperware for no less than three days, constantly airing her disgust that people would be using, in her words, 'our kitchen'. She also apparently chose to ignore the fact that it was in no way our kitchen; we were very graciously being allowed to use the kitchen free of charge by the Buddhist monks, who were organizing the aforementioned festival). It is this kind of minor, petty shit combined with spoiled, selfish people that drive me up a wall. I have been talked down to like I was some sort of underling (from both the girl described in the Tupperware story and another power-hungry Corps member, not a team leader) and treated like I was a four-year-old (from a different Corps member only a few years older than I). I have been living with this team continuously since the beginning of our time in New Orleans (around March 4th) and am counting the minutes until I can get away from them. (Disclaimer: there are some people on my team that are hard workers and very cool about things. This little rant does not apply to them).
So, I will do something that I normally loathe, and lay my feelings out. I am physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted. My patience is frayed thin; it takes a good deal of willpower every day to avoid going off on a Denis-Learyesque, bridge-burning, alienating rant punctuated by me laying my fist through a wall. I have not seen my friends from Denver in four months, and have not seen or hung out with my friends and fellows from back in the 'Burgh in five. Despite the fact that I am halfway through the program, I still have no idea what I want to do afterward, and little in the way of usable skills to get me there. To be honest, I'm very lonely down here; apart from one or two people on my team and a similar number on the Perry Point team, I don't have anybody that I'm close enough to to talk with and really want to hang out with.
Sod it all. June 27th. June 27th. June 27th. I'll just keep telling myself that, and hope it lives up to what I need it to be.
07 June 2008
Sayonara
Say farewell to the relevancy of the Clintons.
That's right ladies and gentlemen: Hillary Clinton has finally bowed to that which has been obvious for almost two months now, and has suspended (read as: ended) her campaign for president. It's questionable whether it's already too late to stave off a mass defection of her supporters to John McCain, thus sinking Barack Obama's chances. If that happens, it's quite possible that, far from being the heir apparent of the Democratic Party that she was even a year and a half ago, she will end her political career (and make no mistake, it will be ended) as hated and reviled as Ralph Nader after his refusal to submit all but handed George W. Bush the White House in 2000.
Fare thee poorly, Hillary; may you trip over your Texas-sized ambition and break your fucking neck.
That's right ladies and gentlemen: Hillary Clinton has finally bowed to that which has been obvious for almost two months now, and has suspended (read as: ended) her campaign for president. It's questionable whether it's already too late to stave off a mass defection of her supporters to John McCain, thus sinking Barack Obama's chances. If that happens, it's quite possible that, far from being the heir apparent of the Democratic Party that she was even a year and a half ago, she will end her political career (and make no mistake, it will be ended) as hated and reviled as Ralph Nader after his refusal to submit all but handed George W. Bush the White House in 2000.
Fare thee poorly, Hillary; may you trip over your Texas-sized ambition and break your fucking neck.
05 June 2008
Believe
Alas, the curtain has fallen for the Penguins' 2007-2008 season tonight. The Detroit Red Wings have come away with their 11th Stanley Cup victory after a hard-fought 3-2 victory over the Penguins. My disappointment is obvious, but I'm also proud and excited. The Wings had been the best team in the league all year, and after dropping the first two games disappointingly, the young and inexperienced Penguins put their backs to the wall and gave Detroit a fight over the next four, including a triple-overtime victory in Game 5. The two early losses gave both the team and their fans a chance to show their character; neither gave up at any point. Even as the final seconds of Game 6 expired, the Penguins crashed Osgood at the net and came within inches of scoring a tying goal with literally tenths of a second remaining.
Why am I excited? Potential. The Penguins rampaged their way through the Senators, Rangers, and Flyers before going down fighting to the Red Wings. Marc-Andre Fleury played heroically throughout, including an absurd 55-save performance (24 of those coming in overtime) in that aforementioned Game 5. Sidney Crosby, Jordan Staal, Marian Hossa, Ryan Malone, Sergei Gonchar, and the rest of the team had fantastic performances at one point or another throughout the course of the playoffs, and even Evgeni Malkin, who had virtually vanished after the regular season, made his presence known with a Stanley Cup goal. The team is generally young, unbelievably skilled, and WE WILL BE BACK.
Thanks for a great season, boys.
HERE WE GO PENGUINS.
2007-2008 Atlantic Division Champions
2007-2008 Eastern Conference Champions
Why am I excited? Potential. The Penguins rampaged their way through the Senators, Rangers, and Flyers before going down fighting to the Red Wings. Marc-Andre Fleury played heroically throughout, including an absurd 55-save performance (24 of those coming in overtime) in that aforementioned Game 5. Sidney Crosby, Jordan Staal, Marian Hossa, Ryan Malone, Sergei Gonchar, and the rest of the team had fantastic performances at one point or another throughout the course of the playoffs, and even Evgeni Malkin, who had virtually vanished after the regular season, made his presence known with a Stanley Cup goal. The team is generally young, unbelievably skilled, and WE WILL BE BACK.
Thanks for a great season, boys.
HERE WE GO PENGUINS.
2007-2008 Atlantic Division Champions
2007-2008 Eastern Conference Champions
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