oh, the city...

Chicago is where it's at!

30 Hour Famine

Awesome weekend. I've done the 30 Hour Famine before. Just not quite like this. In days past it has always seemed like a glorified lock-in. The kids come and get a kick out of taunting each other the whole time with stories of big juicy steaks, mashed potatoes and gravy, and a HUGE glass of sweet tea (I should stop there. #1 I'm giving myself away with the sweet tea line...it was probably me taunting...and #2 it's making me hungry...) They don't eat for 30 hours, but to take their mind off of the slight...seriously...slight...hunger pains, they spend their time watching the latest movies, playing on rented inflatables, putt-putting, or other things of the like.

Not this time. The kids were challenged...I was challenged.

We started the evening with making supper. No, not for us. We took what we made (or helped make, i should say) over to the local Salvation Army and watched as people that were really hungry came through the line with slightly wary, but definitely grateful eyes. A bunch of smiling, peppy high schoolers dished out the goods to individuals who I'm sure wondered what exactly our motives were. I don't blame them. I've done service projects in the past to make ME feel good. How selfish. But tonight, I think our kids were definitely going to get at least a little bit of a feel for what it's like to be...homeless...or hungry...or enslaved. Once the plates were piled high with food, the kids scattered amongst the crowd and sat down to conversations with strangers that would open their eyes to an important fact. These people were...people. Just like themselves.

After washing the dishes and leaving behind plenty of leftovers, we moved from our first stop to our second: Our Community Place. A local joint that has the dreams of becoming another "beacon of HOPE" in the Valley. Cardboard boxes were passed out to each of the kids as they were told, this was home for the night. They quickly began to build their "cardboard community", shelter for an evening. With cardboard boxes much nicer than any you would find in a local dumpster (i would soon find out just how sturdy they were- enough to withstand wake up kicks from the boys in the morning), they made temporary homes along with skylights, doors, and chimneys. It was fun to watch them be creative. We hoped to get the message across that this is life for some people, and not only when it's nearing summertime warmth.

Once our beds were in place, we all gathered around a projector screen where many kids saw things they'd never seen before. The story of the "invisible children" soon became the heartbeat of many as local high schoolers from Harrisonburg realized they wanted to do something about the injustice in the world. Watching kids walk for miles each day just to get a spot on a cold, wet, cement floor where it was safe...or at least more safe...seemed to strike a nerve. Silence followed, and kids made their way to their boxes shortly after, probably feeling overwhelmed, as I did, about the huge need, and their tiny existence. People needed their help. More people than just those at the local Harrisonburg Salvation Army. More people that were...people. Just like themselves.

With the sunrise came a new day. Running on very little energy, the kids spent the entire morning mowing, raking, pulling weeds, planting flowers, and trying to help where they could in the community. Not a complaint was heard.

Even the end of our fast was a learning experience. Instead of us all eating at once and all the same thing, we were split up into groups with red dots, yellow dots and blue dots. The red dots sat at a fancy table and were served pancakes, sausage links, fresh fruit, milk and all kinds of good stuff. They could have as many "second plates" as they wanted. They yellow dots sat at decent tables, had to serve themselves, and got to eat cereal and milk. When the food was gone, they were done. The blue dots, the large majority of the group, had to sit on the floor, and eat burned sticky rice with their hands. The point was to show that the majority of the world lives in poverty while a small percentage holds most of the wealth. It was astonishing to see it played out that way.

Through all of it, I think the thing that I learned the most was that we are all equal. We're all the same. People are people. The only difference between myself and a child in Africa who has nothing to eat today, tomorrow, and many more days to come until his bowl of sticky rice arrives to hold him over till the next meal comes days later, is that for some reason I was born here. Is that fair? Absolutely not.

I want to do something about it.

Quarter Life Crisis

It is when you stop going along with the crowd and start realizing that there are a lot of things about yourself that you didn't know and may or may not like. You start feeling insecure and wonder where you will be in a year or two, but then get scared because you barely know where you are now.

You start realizing that people are selfish and that, maybe, those friends that you thought you were so close to aren't exactly the greatest people you have ever met and the people you have lost touch with are some of the most important ones. What you do not realize is that they are realizing that too and are not really cold or catty or mean or insincere, but that they are as confused as you.

You look at your job. It is not even close to what you thought you would be doing or maybe you are looking for one and realizing that you are going to have to start at the bottom and are scared.

You miss the comforts of college, of groups, of socializing with the same people on a constant basis. But then you realize that maybe they weren't so great after all.

You are beginning to understand yourself and what you want and do not want. Your opinions have gotten stronger. You see what others are doing and find yourself judging a bit more than usual because suddenly you realize that you have certain boundaries in your life and add things to your list of what is acceptable and what is not. You are insecure and then secure. You laugh and cry with the greatest force of your life. You feel alone and scared and confused. Suddenly change is the enemy and you try and cling on to the past with dear life but soon realize that the past is drifting further and further away and there is nothing to do but stay where you are or move forward.

You get your heart broken and wonder how someone you loved could do such damage to you or you lay in bed and wonder why you can't meet anyone decent enough to get to know better. You love someone but maybe love someone else too and cannot figure out why you are doing this because you are not a bad person.

One night stands and random hook ups start to look cheap and getting wasted and acting like an idiot starts to look pathetic. You go through the same emotions and questions over and over and talk with your friends about the same topics because you cannot seem to make a decision.

You worry about loans and money and the future and making a life for yourself and while wining the race would be great, right now you'd just like to be a contender!

What you may not realize is that everyone reading this relates to it. We are in our best of times and our worst of times, trying as hard as we can to figure this whole thing out.

-unknown

Something to keep in your pocket...

I stole this off of Lisa...

It's like love that way; once you arrive, once you are firmly aground in a love, you begin to see that it has cracks and rough edges and dirty spots, pockets of toxins, less privacy, maybe, than what you had imagined. But if you are willing to remember the initial distant beauty of a love or a daydream, and if you are willing to live in that beauty up close even with all its imperfections...then the dream is yours to have. People who can remember that on a daily basis are lucky, because they get to spend their time swimming and kissing instead of always looking off into the distance, making up things that aren't necessarily true about places or people who are far away. It's almost too easy to avoid living the dream you are in while questing for one more perfectly imagined. Half of being a dreamer is dreaming and half of it is actually living in your dreams.
-off the map

...something I need to learn...