We are going to Sacramento!
On Saturday, we found out where our first project will be taking place and what it will entail. The initial reveal that our team would be one of the seven or eight teams to not get to travel anywhere for our first trip caused a collective sigh (filmed). After we learned we would be working with the local food bank throughout the holiday season and that the project has been very solid in the past in terms of having enough work to do and getting an immense overall sense of satisfaction, we began to get excited.
Obviously the idea of staying in Sacramento instead of getting to travel into the Oregon wilderness or to beautiful Catalina Island seemed a little disappointing, but in all reality this project is perfect. It’s not like Sacramento is by any means ‘home’ yet. I moved thousands of miles to this city to which I’ve never been less than three weeks ago. I think there’s a little more exploring to do. It will be nice to be able to get into the flow of the day-to-day workings of all that a project entails without having to get completely uprooted. We are almost guaranteed to only have one local project (fingers crossed?) and this is actually the shortest project out of the four. (For anyone who doesn’t know, this program is composed of one month of training followed by four projects at varying locations around the Western US. We go out for six to eight weeks at a time with our eleven-person teams and stay near the project worksite. Some teams went to LA; some went to Wyoming or Montana. Etc.) So I’m happy. Being anything else is a waste of time anyways.
My understanding of the project is that we will not only be helping in collecting and distributing food for the food bank; we will also be working in a warehouse and helping to facilitate educational projects with the site. Apparently there is a lot of work to do. I don’t see how this project could possibly fail to be fulfilling, as the amount of work and time of year to perform it are perfect.
On Saturday, we also performed our first real service project as our team went to an elementary school in Sacramento and began to build a garden from the ground up. We worked with one other team and around twenty volunteers and mostly just tilled soil and removed grass roots. We also cemented posts in for the fence that is to go around the garden. If we have time this weekend or in the upcoming weeks, we may send some, or all, of our team back to help continue working on the garden. The project sponsors were extremely gracious as they constantly thanked us as well as provided hot chocolate, coffee, and snacks throughout the day for the workers. Chipotle also donated dozens of burritos, chips, and salsa for lunch (a much appreciated surprise). The weather was overcast and cool which was great for working all day outside. Overall it was a wonderful first experience performing a real task with our team and seemed to bring us even closer.
On Wednesday, our team, along with six others, will be traveling to Camp Mendocino for four days. The camp is located four hours away in the mountains towards the coast. We haven’t learned too much about what we will be doing yet, but according to the teams who got the opportunity to go last week, it sounds like a memorable experience. What I know about the trip is that it will be much colder than Sacramento, there will be no cell phone service, we will be staying in cabins and showering in outside showers, and we will be helping to restore the park as well as using it for team-building exercises. I’m sick of using the word ‘excited’ for everything but right clicking and scrolling to ‘synonyms’ is cheating and I can’t really think of a better word to describe it. I’m excited (eager?).
If there is one thing I’ve learned about this three-journal-entry experience into journaling it’s that I don’t really enjoy the chronological, ‘this-is-what-I-did’ form of writing. I love writing. I know it’s important to update people on what I’m doing from time to time, but I’d rather just, for lack of a better term, ramble. Also, even though this trip is radically different than anything I have ever experienced, there will become a point where the day-to-day things become just that. Instead of updating the status of my physical doings, I’ll be much more satisfied reporting what I’m thinking on the particular day. (And not reporting, but rambling.) I think it’s more revealing and interesting to know what a person is thinking rather than what they did. I hope you agree.
Onwards!
I wrote the last entry beginning on Monday (10/18) and finished mostly on Tuesday. Coincidentally on Wednesday, one of the activities dealt with grouping personality types on a team—a topic that completely disagreed with what I had written over the previous two days. (Uh-oh). Rather than using one of the scientifically proven tests or avoiding the topic altogether (I’m still trying to decide which I would have preferred), the program decided to clump people based on the question, “With what type of animal do you most associate?” Are you a lion? An owl? A lamb? Cause you aren’t a human. To be fair to Big Brother, there was a moment where the activity was described in the barbarically, metaphorical way that we were putting ourselves in rooms of a house, but there were open doors in which we could take to transition between the different types. The emphasis of that metaphor seemed to be by my estimates 3 or 4 percent of the overall project (+/- 3 or 4 percent). If a guy walked up to me with frizzy, orange hair, a big, red nose, giant shoes, a white face with a ridiculously large smile painted on, and wearing a blue extravagant one-piece with large white buttons on it and said “I am not a clown” and then proceeded to make balloon animals, perform silly magic tricks, and scare kids, I wouldn’t tend to believe that little part he threw in the middle. I imagine what most people got from that project (and by imagine I am basing this on how people were talking about it afterwards), was that they are that type of animal. “It’s just my personality type so perfectly.” Nothing is more frustrating to me than this idea. Trying my best not to digress into repeating my last post, it just isn’t good for groups to function this way. People don’t grow and groups don’t function fully by having individuals reminded that they only bring certain things to the table. I am obsessed with the idea that if a person is open-minded he or she can do anything or be anyone. Ants can’t.
Side note: I understand that I or no one will ever accept or agree with everything someone else ‘makes’ them do. If that is the case you don’t have a pulse. Also, this does not mean I’m in anyway mad at the program or ‘want my money back’. I am just passionate about the idea of not generalizing people and this activity seemed to promote just that. As I’ve grown and participated in numerous environments and groups (as we all have), I cannot say I’ve ever been consistent in my chosen animal type, as I think getting the most out of a group requires its members to be flexible and take different roles as the situations present themselves. And, no, this doesn’t make me a chameleon. Stop it. (Animorph? Perhaps. No they were always one particular animal. I’m just a human.)
Double side note: I cannot stress how much that being able to disagree makes one a human. And although we all wear the same clothes and constantly get told to tuck the backs of our shirts in, we still cannot accept a sense of monotony. I may be (am) wrong about a lot of things but I embrace getting corrected or as most people put it—learning. Growing is about learning and changing and perhaps there are people who like the comfort of being devolved into a fox or an ant, but I can’t stand for it.
I discovered the late writer, David Foster Wallace, last night by accident. I watched an interview he did with Charlie Rose back in 1997 and I’m hooked. He wrote the book Infinite Jest, which is considered one of the most important modern or perhaps post-modern novels. I am ordering it online today. He is hard to describe, because he was so superiorly cognizant of everything and it seems that only his words can tell his story, but in a few words—his brain just worked differently. As I’ve only watched that interview and read a few short things by him, and since at this time yesterday I had no clue that he existed, I don’t want to act like I am an expert by any means, but I definitely recommend looking him up. Also if you find the clip of John Krasinski (Jim Halpert from “The Office”) reading one of Wallace’s writings, you should watch it. It is hilarious and most likely reminds you of a situation you’ve experienced, and it will probably make you leave wanting more.
The most relatable idea I heard David Foster Wallace talk about was when Charlie Rose got him talking about why he doesn’t write many argumentative essays. Not directly quoting, but the gist of Wallace’s response was that in his mind it would take somewhere between five and six hundred pages of writing to completely argue for any side of a debate. I agree so wholeheartedly with that statement. It frustrates me when I can’t completely get out what I want to say even though I know what it is in my head. Writing is a little easier than responding in conversation, but time and energy bounds, plus the idea that after a while, no one is going to want to read your meticulous, repetitive, preachy crap become critical elements of consideration. Debate is frustrating because it often creates more angst than compromise, but it is important. Open-minded people gain so much from debate. However, don’t try to debate a lion. Or a weasel. Or a kangaroo.
In an attempt to keep these posts short(er), and be able to get things up more often, I will end here. If it was at all confusing the state of my mood or my opinion of the program in which I am in, I am genuinely pleased to be here. I accept the disagreement I’ll have at times. (Instead of putting “, but” or “despite the fact”, I won’t continue that sentence because there isn’t a feeling of needing to overcome the conflicts. There is more an idea of embracing them and that with them things become whole. People grow and learn each other. That’s being a human.) I greatly appreciate my team, team leader, and all the other people I have met here and I am in anticipation as to what will happen next.
Instead of ending on a quote, I will write a poem that I probably don’t have the intelligence level with which to get away. However, I imagine if I were ee cummings, I would be able to write something like this and it could get published. (If you don’t know who ee cummings is/was look him up.) It is about my favorite quality—open-mindedness. Here is my first attempt at ee cummings style poetry. Bear with me.
Open Mindedness
By: Scott Curran
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