Atlanta Union Mission

Despite the almost militant volunteer orientation, a Tuesday afternoon revealed disorder at Atlanta Union Mission. I was passed down the kids’ hall from absent volunteer coordinator’s office to empty middle school classroom to confused elementary school after school program before landing amongst the 2 year olds. How unsettling it must be to be a child there, with verdant volunteers coming to play or observe every few hours, and burned out staff and emotionally drained clients as more permanent attendants.

This flux manifested itself in the 2 year olds’ play. None of them stuck to a single activity for more than a minute. Book reading meant pinching fingers in the cold cardboard pages with haste to turn them. Nothing could hold the kids’ attention except experiments to get my attention.

At 5:00 pm, mommies came for pick up. Or most mommies came. The attendants left. I was left too, with Aaron.*

Aaron led me to snack time in the cafeteria. I was glad for his little hand in mine – it gave us purpose. Like the new kids changing class at school, crowds spun around us. We ate snack with a few familiar faces we had followed over. They left.

Aaron wanted to be held. I was glad for his barnacle grip – it gave us purpose. New faces came in the cafeteria and left. Bystanders told him to get down, he was too big to be held. My arms were starting to hurt. But he wasn’t too big, I was too small.

We all need to be held.

*His name has been changed.

Project Open Hand II

Rondo in Plastic Bags in Project Open Hand Delivery Sharp Major

White bag

Monday and Tuesday dinner

White bag

Monday and Tuesday lunch and dinner

2 cans of vanilla Ensure

White bag

Monday and Tuesday dinner

Black bag

Monday and Tuesday dinner for a senior

2 cartons of Milk! 2 cartons of Milk!

White bag

Monday and Tuesday dinner

White bag

Monday and Tuesday lunch and dinner

2 cans of chocolate Ensure

White bag

Monday and Tuesday dinner

Friendship Center

And Susan just smiled and smiled.

I thought she was another volunteer; short, grinning peacefully, and shaped like a soft diamond with her middle-aged weight settling around the middle. We entered the ceramics room together, encouraging others to join us. The slabs of fresh clay in moist plastic bas shot tingles of excitement and nostalgia down my arms. I’ve always loved art class.

Helen, a regular volunteer, sliced off hunks of clay and we all three eagerly kneaded the grey globs. “Susan was an art major,” said Helen. “In New Mexico, right? Do you remember the name of the school?” she joked.

“New Mexico State,” laughed Susan without missing a beat.

I didn’t see what was so funny, but Helen seemed to possess a flagrant sense of sarcasm and outspokenness. So I gave my best ha ha that’s funny/too bad /surprising/ off color ambiguous laugh and waited.

“Susan has Alzheimer's,” Helen explained matter of factly. “So if you see her wandering around, just point her where she wants to go.”

“Yup. That’s right.” Susan smiled sweetly. “I just smile!” …. “And wear pink,” she added and continued patting out her clay.

My ambiguous laugh had never met a legitimate Alzheimer’s "joke" before.

“An Indian dace!” Susan giggled , stomping her feet and letting out a light-hearted war cry as she slapped her slab into a pancake.

We chatted and discussed the Cala Lily-shaped vase she was attempting. She had been trying since last week to figure out how to craft it. I marveled at her lucidity, especially compared to some of the other guests at the day program for the mentally ill. I wanted Susan to be able to move her vase along, so I tried to show her how we could maybe wrap it around a small plastic cup as a mold. I was thinking that she, the multi-degreed art major, should really be the one showing me.

Somewhere between dipping water out of a cup to rewet the weary clay pancake and introducing another cup as the mold, Susan started to slip away. She dipped her fingers in and out of the empty cup over and over, searching for the water. She turned the cup over and over… still no water. She set the clay pancake in her chair and followed me to the supply cart across the room. I suggested we start over with a bigger pancake. She looked at me blankly.

“Here, add my chunk to yours, and squish them together.” I handed her the two pieces. She smiled and recived them, but looked at the clay and then back at me with puppy dog eyes. Good natured, but waiting for some hint as to why in the world I had bestowed her with this “bit of earth.”

“Just like we did before,” I said enthusiastically, “Like this.” I grabbed a small hunk to knead in demonstration, attempting to act like nothing was wrong as my heart sank for her. I patted a pancake. “See, an Indian dance!” My eyes twinkled (I hoped) as they searched hers.

“What?” she asked innocently.

I met two empty pools of hazel.

And a smile.

Project Open Hand

In the kitchen at Project Open Hand, I was isolated at the end of a long row of shiny silver worktables. There, I united over 600 wheat dinner rolls with mini butter tubs, sealing them in “whole-y” matrimony inside clear plastic baggies.

Right hand and left hand simultaneously grab roll and butter

Drop in baggy (mounted on a machine and inflated by a small fan)

Twist baggy

Whack baggy into mechanical sealer to close with obnoxious red sticky tape

Toss into large tub

I imagined the diners’ struggles to unstick the persistent sticky tape in order to access their dinner. Said sticky tape falls into that same frustrating category as the tape strip along the top edge of CD cases, which separates anxious listeners from feasting on fresh musical delights.

Roll and butter, twist, whack, toss

Roll butter twist whack toss

Rollbuttertwistwhacktoss

My hand hurts

Roll butter twist with other hand whack with other hand toss.

All the while I contemplated Industrial Revolution-era child labor, how I felt dizzy with the repetitive movements, and what it is like for the millions who do jobs like this all day every day for years. Worn out joints, frozen brains.

After creating frustration for hundreds of diners, I graduated to the meal assembly line as a Brussels sprout scooper. I felt ridiculous trying to make conversation with the Vegetable Medley Scooper and the Coconut Encrusted Miscellaneous White Fish Disher-outer. We seemingly had nothing in common except our task – which should have been enough- but I couldn’t break into their world, be on their playing field. I was a 3 hour volunteer among multi-year full time employees. A skinny white girl amidst rotund black women. I didn’t know the words to the hip hop remixes everyone was singing along to. I wanted to ask so many questions, to connect, to be a scooper in solidarity.

Had I been there longer, maybe we would have connected. But all I did was scoop my Brussels sprouts and pass the tray to Delores (who plopped on the veggie medley and tossed or added a few sprouts to my never perfect scoop). I felt debilitated by the awkward repetitions of roll/butter bagging and Brussels sprout scooping. If I did this every day what would I think about? Would I make the motions my own? I had an itching urge to shed all of my isolation and dance on those shiny tables, to break it down to the remixes on the radio.

Work and play in the ATL

I am settled into my home and my volunteer placement site in Atlanta, and I am loving it! My job and living situation are full of acronyms so here are a few definitions:

Officially, I am a YAV (Young Adult Volunteer) with the Presbyterian Church USA. YAVs live and volunteer for one year in one of 15 sites domestically and abroad. Katie and I are representin' in Hotlanta this year.

My site placement is with a nonprofit called DOOR (Discovering Opportunities for Outreach and Reflection). This organization plans short term mission trips for youth. These youth groups come to Atlanta for up to a week to volunteer in different human service agencies around the city and to participate in reflection, worship, and programming focused on various urban issues. I am the assistant coordinator, which means that I help with organizing DOOR fundraisers, coordinating DOOR mission groups, and overseeing Dwell (see below) community activities. Because the majority of the mission groups come in the summer, in the meantime, I am volunteering in the 30 plus nonprofit agencies that DOOR groups visit. (That is not a type-o, t-h-i-r-t-y organizations). This is my favorite part of the job because I’m getting a great overview of the nonprofit landscape here and am gaining insight into how different agencies approach the same issues. I could not have created a better placement!

I live in a very purple house that happens to be an intentional Christian community called Dwell, also part of the DOOR program. There are two Dwell houses in Atlanta. My 6 roommates, all older than me by 2-13 yrs, have different jobs around Atlanta; they have much to teach me! There is a nursing student, a 2 year old kindergarten teacher, 2 ordained ministers, a graphic designer, and a middle school youth group leader. We share meals, chores, living space, and participate in a year long curriculum. To sit at the kitchen table is to be swept up in discussions about social justice issues, diseases resulting from genetic mutations, dating woes, reformed theology, website layout, and potty training 2 year olds.

A typical day in the life of this YAV? Every day is different! The schedule keeps me on my toes and tests my self discipline because I am in charge of deciding when and where I will volunteer. Below is a snapshot of what might happen in a week, based on the 6 I have experienced so far.

Monday:

Volunteer at Café 458, a soup kitchen that serves its homeless clients in the style of a regular restaurant.

Paint doors for the DOOR fundraiser (Yes, 22 actual doors were used as display boards. They were heavy.)

Cook dinner for 7.

Community night discussion about hospitality to the stranger.

Tuesday Volunteer at the Open Door, an intentional community that serves brunch to homeless friends.

Play tennis with one of my housemates.

Attend volunteer orientation at Atlanta Union Mission, a shelter for over 700 men, women, and children.

Wednesday Volunteer at Central Outreach and Advocacy Center, an agency that provides IDs, birth certificates, and other services to homeless guests*

Go to a peace rally/lecture by Ann Wright marking the 8^th anniversary of the war in Afghanistan.

Thursday Arts and crafts with the mentally ill at the Friendship Center.

Pick up tools for a Dwell house repair work day.

Read and summarize Mission Trips that Matter, a book recommended for DOOR mission teams.

Go to the Atlanta Philosophical Film Festival (as weird as you might expect).

Friday Deliver meals to recipients of Project Open Hand food.

Get lost. Get stuck in traffic.

Stroll around the nearby park with our house dog, Kai.

Go to a neighborhood party with members of the other Dwell house.

Saturday Attempt to tame the weeds in the front yard.

Have dinner with homeless neighbors that live under the I-20 bridge.

Go salsa dancing.

Sunday Bike/MARTA to church with one of my housemates.

Visit with my cousins/aunts/uncles that live in Atlanta.

I am trying to be a sponge and I can feel myself being stretched by new ideas and experiences! Each day is a new adventure.

* Note the different language used to refer to the homeless at each different agency.