Giving the People What They Want

I know that since my last amazing post about Mardi Gras, you have been anxiously awaiting my next one. So, I’m coming to you with it a little bit faster than I usually do, because I have a lot going on, and I just want to. Just trying to give the people what they want (another posting that is). Anyways, here it goes…

Partied out. Worn out. Exhausted. That’s how I felt after Mardi Gras. It definitely took me a few days to recover from the madness that had ensued the previous week. I was luckily given the Wednesday after Fat Tuesday off in order to rest up a little bit before going back to work on Thursday. Except to get go grocery shopping, I didn’t leave my house at all that Wednesday. My body hurt and I barely had enough energy to drag myself out of the house. I didn’t do much last weekend because I really just didn’t feel like it. Ha. Most of my other friends didn’t go out either. On Saturday night, I did go to a BBQ at my friend Amanda’s house. An interesting mix of people from work was there. I anticipated only staying for a couple of hours but ended up hanging out there for a lot longer than that. It was nice to relax, have a good dinner, and talk with people from work that I don’t always get to spend a lot of time with.

This past week at work I spent most of my time either in the office or working on the service project that I have to do during my term of service. The people who are on the AmeriCorps National Grant (I explained the difference between AmeriCorps National and AmeriCorps State in a previous posting), which includes myself, are required to come up with a service project which is separate from our normal jobs. I am working with four other people on this project and we’ve been throwing around ideas for a project over the past few weeks. Since I have been stuck in the office because of my foot, I have had time to explore some options for our project. A couple of weeks ago, I met with the Volunteer Coordinator at the Andrew Wilson Charter School in the Broadmoor neighborhood because we were hoping to use the school for our project. After meeting with Ms. Janice (just an fyi, people in New Orleans often call other people Mr. or Ms. and their first name; so people that I meet from New Orleans often call me Mr. Adam; it’s just a way of showing respect to people down here), she told me that she was going to talk to the principal of the school and get back to me on possible ideas for a service project. I set up a meeting with myself, Ms. Janice, the Principal (Ms. Sheila Thomas), and Cat (one of the girls I’m working with on this project) for this past Wednesday. By the end of the meeting, we had agreed upon an idea. After Hurricane Katrina, the building the Andrew Wilson Charter School was originally in had to be repaired (and later added on to). So for the past two years, there school has been in another building. For the 2009-2010 school year, they are planning move back to their original building. Our service project, which is going to take place on Saturday, July 11, is going to be to recruit around 100 volunteers to help pack up the school they are in now, and move everything to the other building. We are also hoping to use those volunteers to perform some minor repairs in the building they are currently occupying. The school is very excited that we are helping them out and I think the event has a lot of potential. In addition to the service day, we are going to be running a book and school supply drive. We are hoping to collect as many books and supplies as possible between now and July 11 and also have a place to drop off books and supplies on the day of the event. If you have anything that you would like to donate to this school, whether it be a book or school supplies or $5 for the project, anything would be very much appreciated. The five of us have to recruit the volunteers, come up with all of the funding for the project, promote/advertise the event, and try and get media coverage of the event. If you have any more questions surrounding this project, or want to donate, or have suggestions/comments, please let me know. Any input is helpful. I’ll keep you updated on the status of the project as it continues to move forward. At first I wasn’t excited at all about having to do a project, but I think it’s going to be a challenge to pull off and could end up being a lot of fun.

This project took up a lot of my time this week (mainly the early part of the week). I went to the doctor on Thursday to get a check up on my foot and he said he thought it was all healed. He took another x-ray of it and said he’d call me if he saw something. I never heard from him, so it looks like I’m fine. I went back to normal work yesterday and had a good day. Our organization hosts over 700 volunteers during the month of March because of college spring break. We have 260 volunteers coming next week. So our job yesterday was to prepare for the upcoming week. It was pretty hectic because people were running all around our warehouse. But it felt good to be back. It was 80 degrees here yesterday and I enjoyed working up a nice beastly sweat. I have had all of this energy stored up from sitting in the office that I was ready to get going again yesterday. The doctor told me to ease back into things with my foot but that didn’t really happen yesterday. I have to be a little careful about pushing it too hard right away because I can’t afford to injure it again. But I definitely plan on starting to work out again soon and unleashing some of that stored up energy.

Now that Mardi Gras is over and the AmeriCorps year is over half over, our program has started to think about its direction for next year. Cambria, one of my supervisors, has been having little focus group meetings (of about 5-7 people) at her house to discuss the future of the organization and where the AmeriCorps members see themselves next year. The meetings are optional, but I decided to attend one on Thursday night. Just to give you a little background on our organization, last year there were only 14 AmeriCorps between the field and the office. This year there are around 40 people. The organization has been growing at a rapid pace over the last year and we are still working to figure out the most efficient way to run everything. Communication can be difficult when there are only a few people in charge and a large number of people reporting to those people. It was nice to have a chance to sit down and offer my suggestions on how things can run more smoothly for the remainder of my term of service and for future AmeriCorps groups. It seems like the organization is hoping that 7-10 of the current AmeriCorps stay on for another year. I thought that was going to mean, that the people that stayed on would be salaried employees of the organization (making a small salary, but still a salary). But I guess that the organization is hoping that 7-10 of the current AmeriCorps do another year of service, with the only added incentive being an extra $100 per month towards rent. I think that is expecting a lot from people to do another year of service and I know that I don’t really plan to volunteer for another year. However, in this struggling economy, more people might do it than I think. The five of us at the meeting never got into what we are planning to do for next year, because honestly, I don’t think anybody has any idea. The meeting turned out to be very helpful for everyone. Cambria got ideas from us on how we thought things could work more efficiently, and we got an understanding of the direction of the organization. She said that we’d be having more of these meetings in the future if we wanted to.

I told myself when I first came to New Orleans that I wouldn’t begin to think about what I was going to do next until after Mardi Gras. Well, with end of Mardi Gras and this meeting on the future of the organization, I have begun to ponder my options. As of right now, I don’t know whether or not I’m ready to come back to Chicago. I always see myself ending up in Chicago, whether that is in a year or five years, who knows. Right now, I feel like I’m still pretty young and don’t have much responsibility in front of me. So this is the time in my life when I can take a couple of chances and see what’s out there. I have started reading a couple of books that I hope will help me find a focus and figure out where I want to go and where I want to take my career (in whatever field that may be). Deciding to volunteer with AmeriCorps and come to New Orleans took a lot of soul searching and consulting with friends and family. And I’m sure, whatever is next for me will require the same. I created this blog for my friends and family, the people that I am close with and know me best. So in saying that, to the people that know me pretty well, if you have any suggestions or ideas for me on what to do after my term of service is up, things you think I may like doing or suit me well, anything, please let me know. This is going to be another difficult decision for me and any input I can get from others would be much appreciated.

I hope you enjoyed this post and I will continue to try and write them more often. I enjoy writing them and I know that the people like reading them. Talk to y’all later.