11.15
It's the early morning and I've been watching the droplets of dew race across the van window. I'm thinking about how fresh and ambiguous everything is in the morning, as new beginnings tend to be. The fog blankets the fields of the fairgrounds we're staying at, dew covers the ground and the windows. Then, before you know it, it is daytime and the fog clears and windows dry. The strange comforting uncertainty of the early morning fades.
The team has been getting a bit discouraged, because the government lowkey sent us all the way from California to Florida to loiter in gas station parking lots and do free landscaping for old people. Grant expressed to me last night candidly that he feels like his time here is being wasted. While I understand where he is coming from, I don't share the same perspective. I don't feel my time is being wasted at all. I have learned slowly not to have expectations for just about anything. This makes me much happier. Grant once told me that he thinks I am one of the most "perplexingly happy" people he's ever met and that he wants to learn from that. I like being seen as happy, I like to keep things light. I am proud of the good outlook, or the "happiness" I seem possess most of the time. I believe much of this happiness is a product of resilience, something I am even more proud of. I'd much rather be called resilient before I was called happy.
Anyway, we've spent the last few days weeding gardens and looking for people to help. This left us antsy and hungry for "real work." Today answered our prayers and made us realize work isn't all it's cut out to be ;) Rohan and I got separated from our team for the day, and found ourselves at a house with the remains of an entire dock in their backyard. We spent the entire day hauling pieces of lumber up the woman's backyard and into the van, then unhauling the lumber on to the street. At one point the van got stuck in the mud, and Rohan and I spent about an hour trying to get it out while the rest of our team thought we died. By 3 pm, all of our bodies were seriously hurting and we could barely function but we kept! going! For the sake of America! (And the very nice homeowner who gave us snacks and drinks and talked to me for a half hour about dogs). All in all, it was good to actually get out in the field while the rest of our team had to sit in the van all day. I did my best to appreciate every single moment of it, tthe homeowner's smile, the shaking of my forearms and the way the hand-like plants seemed to be waving at me in the wind. Now I'm laying in my cot and my bones are tired but in the best way.
I like being here. I like our family dinners and the wide open spaces of the fairground. I like watching my teammates all play cards about five feet away from me while I lay in bed. We wake up together, get changed together, eat together, find comfort in the discomfort together and hug each other after we're apart. It's a bit later now and we all just ran around this huge rodeo arena pretending we were ghost hunters. Winnifred and I laughed so hard we almost peed ourselves. We flashed our headlamps around, ran up and down the bleachers, and howled at the moon. We are squeezing all the joy out of life that we can muster.
These people I'm with can take the least homey place on earth, a fluorescent abandoned reception hall with garage doors where real doors should be and cots that aren't much better than the floor, and they can make it feel like the most brilliant place on earth. For that I am eternally thankful.
~V
The team has been getting a bit discouraged, because the government lowkey sent us all the way from California to Florida to loiter in gas station parking lots and do free landscaping for old people. Grant expressed to me last night candidly that he feels like his time here is being wasted. While I understand where he is coming from, I don't share the same perspective. I don't feel my time is being wasted at all. I have learned slowly not to have expectations for just about anything. This makes me much happier. Grant once told me that he thinks I am one of the most "perplexingly happy" people he's ever met and that he wants to learn from that. I like being seen as happy, I like to keep things light. I am proud of the good outlook, or the "happiness" I seem possess most of the time. I believe much of this happiness is a product of resilience, something I am even more proud of. I'd much rather be called resilient before I was called happy.
Anyway, we've spent the last few days weeding gardens and looking for people to help. This left us antsy and hungry for "real work." Today answered our prayers and made us realize work isn't all it's cut out to be ;) Rohan and I got separated from our team for the day, and found ourselves at a house with the remains of an entire dock in their backyard. We spent the entire day hauling pieces of lumber up the woman's backyard and into the van, then unhauling the lumber on to the street. At one point the van got stuck in the mud, and Rohan and I spent about an hour trying to get it out while the rest of our team thought we died. By 3 pm, all of our bodies were seriously hurting and we could barely function but we kept! going! For the sake of America! (And the very nice homeowner who gave us snacks and drinks and talked to me for a half hour about dogs). All in all, it was good to actually get out in the field while the rest of our team had to sit in the van all day. I did my best to appreciate every single moment of it, tthe homeowner's smile, the shaking of my forearms and the way the hand-like plants seemed to be waving at me in the wind. Now I'm laying in my cot and my bones are tired but in the best way.
I like being here. I like our family dinners and the wide open spaces of the fairground. I like watching my teammates all play cards about five feet away from me while I lay in bed. We wake up together, get changed together, eat together, find comfort in the discomfort together and hug each other after we're apart. It's a bit later now and we all just ran around this huge rodeo arena pretending we were ghost hunters. Winnifred and I laughed so hard we almost peed ourselves. We flashed our headlamps around, ran up and down the bleachers, and howled at the moon. We are squeezing all the joy out of life that we can muster.
These people I'm with can take the least homey place on earth, a fluorescent abandoned reception hall with garage doors where real doors should be and cots that aren't much better than the floor, and they can make it feel like the most brilliant place on earth. For that I am eternally thankful.
~V
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