Someday I will have a real job. Maybe.

Today I stood out in the rain for an hour, watched two little boys squabble over one of them cutting the other in line, received flowers, worked with a living saint, and now I am about to answer the phone and door about a million times. I got to be outside to hand out tickets for breakfast, the 2 little boys are actually older than 20 and one flung hot coffee in the other's face. A man brought flowers into the Inn and gave them to me saying, "I wasn't sure what else to do with them so I brought them to you." Brother Xavier is one of the kindest, most generous people I've ever met and he worked the morning shift with me. He is almost 80 years old and even though he has lived in the United States almost his entire life, he still has not mastered the English language. He ambles around the Inn, spreading his joy wherever he goes. He runs a scrap metal business out of the Inn, and has guys who collect random metal, which he then sells to the scrap yard, repaying the guys and buying tokens with the proceeds. He distributes tokens like some people drop crumbs. Every time you turn around, someone is at the door looking for him. He never complains, only laughs. This afternoon, I am working in the office, answering the phone and the door, checking mail for people, and letting people in to use the phone.

This coming weekend I will be going back up to Siena to recruit for FVM at the annual post-college service fair. I will be speaking at Masses on Sunday and at teh fair on Monday night. I will be back to work Tuesday afternoon. As much as I am loving my life and as happy as I am here, I am eager for a little break from the action.

Marathon training continues. I did a 3-mile run last week and was so thrilled. I am planning to do the Broad Street Run in May, which I thought was a 5K but, as it turns out, is actually a 10-miler. Needless to say, I have a lot more work to do, but I can't wait!! Bad weather this week has prevented much work, making it hard to run outside and hard to make it out to the gym since the roads are so icy. We finally got some snow last night! but then it turned to ice and now slush, so the city has basically shut down. Schools closed, the mailman didn't show, and our entire breakfast crew bailed. Last night, we were supposed to have 2 high school groups work the meal but neither showed up. The team got to cover the entire dining room, and it sounded like they had a lot of fun. I was outside playing in the ice and slush. I had high hopes for making a snow angel, but they were quickly dashed. We are staying warm, though, and trying not to slip and slide over the glare ice.

I have been thinking a lot about the future but, unfortunately, have not had a lot of time to take action. The next step is to contact people to talk about options and pros and cons about the things I'm considering. It seems daunting right now, but once I start I know it won't seem so bad.

We are looking forward to a nice, quiet Valentine's Day; Katelyn and I are trying to get Maureen and Ryan to go do something romantic so that we can celebrate single-girl style (chocolate cake, broken-heart cookies from Annie, loud non-sappy music).

A Day in the Life of a Volunteer

Some days I end wondering what exactly I did with my time. I am sure I am not the only one who does this. Today was a pretty typical day (if there is such a thing here), so I thought it might be interesting for you to see how I spent my time, so here goes:

8:05 wake up, roll over, toss, and turn until...

8:10-8:25 get up, get ready, begin day

8:30-9:15 Mass in the chapel at the Inn

10:00-11:00 work out at Holy Family University

11:30-12:00 lunch with Jamie and Mo (it's Fat Tuesday-we got Grilladelphia)

12:00-12:45 shower, get ready for the "work" portion of the day

1:00-1:30 begin the afternoon shift with Renee and coordinating for the meal-this entails finding out what the cook is making, what the drink will be, and how many guests we are planning for, as well as what other preparations need to be done for the meal

1:30-4:00 cutting 275 slices of pie and cake for the meal, answering the door and phone, checking mail, letting people in to use the bathroom, sorting whole desserts to give away, letting the men irrigating the garden into and out of the yard, organizing people to bag bread, accepting donations, attempting to help a man whose pants fell down in the middle of the office find a place to stay for the night that wasn't the Inn (I was unsuccessful, but at least I got him to leave), assigning jobs for the meal, bringing up toiletries and diapers to hand out

4:00-4:30 greeting the volunteers for the day, assigning them jobs, training the new servers, making sure that drinks are available, bread is put out, and food is ready to be served

4:30-6:00 handing out toiletries, giving out tickets for takeout meals, checking on the servers, mopping frosting off the floor from the desserts, finding a lightbulb for a guest who never came to get it, holding a baby, chasing down a man who stole juice, giving candy to kids, putting out more bread, answering questions for the servers, explaining to a group why they could not perform a play in the middle of the dining room during the meal and then training them to bus tables, keeping an eye out for a man who is wanted for rape, running up and down the creaky basement steps to get baby formula

6:00-6:40 overseeing sweeping and mopping of the kitchen and dining room, thanking and bidding adieu to the volunteers, shutting things off, putting things away

6:40-7:00 evening prayer in the chapel

My hours are not terribly long (except Mondays, which seem to last forever), but the intensity of those hours can be very high. Some days it seems like everyone who rings the doorbell has a sad story and it can be downright depressing. Other days, like today, hilarious things (like the man's pants falling down and the performers/volunteers arriving) happen and serve as reminders that life is not all, not even mostly, doom and gloom.

Lights, Camera, Action

Heat and electricity have returned to 1817-1819 E. Hagert. On Thursday night, we began with a prayer service during which we wrote our goals for the brownout, then we lit candles, turned off the heat, and settled in on the couch to maximize our body heat and tell stories. The first night was chilly, and I believe we each accidentally turned on a light or two, but otherwise we were successful. The team left on retreat at roughly the same time we turned the lights out, so the next day I coordinated with only Katelyn, Maureen and the New Zealanders at my disposal. A couple of groups showed up (one made its appearance about 15 minutes into the meal) as well as two of our guests who have recently begun helping out at meals. I was thankful for all the help, even though we only had 158 people to serve. This was the lowest number I've ever seen at the Inn, resulting from the day being disgusting and rainy, oh yeah, and the first of the month.

Once we all got home, it was naptime. I found, with the very low temperature in our house, that it was difficult to get motivated into any kind of productivity. We also decided that our car would be off-limits during the brownout so we were effectively quarantined, much like our first 6 weeks here. After naptime, Katelyn treated us all to a beautiful picnic dinner (we decided to continue using our refrigerator for the sake of nutrition and had stocked up on fruit and veggies on Wednesday) and we finished out the night with a house meeting and some Skip-Bo (if you have not had the pleasure of playing this game, I highly encourage you to go out and buy it). That night got a little colder, and during a quick trip to the Inn Katelyn and I discovered that it was warmer outside our house than in.

Saturday dawned sunny and cold, but the Inn was warm and welcoming. I was out in the yard and we had another slower day (238) so I had the chance to chitchat instead of yelling numbers across the yard to line people up to go inside. I talked with a guy from the Last Stop who had a message from God for me to have patience regarding my future; I met a man who tried to get me to take my gloves off because he insisted my hands were not cold, and he then tried to take me home with him (I respectfully declined); and I also got some quality Rocky time. All in all, a very good day. When we got home, we counted down until the heat could be turned back on, as well as recounted what we were grateful for in light (or dark) of our brownout experience. To celebrate use of our car, we met up with Joanne to see Atonement. I cannot comment on the movie yet as I am still going over and over it in my brain.

The team returned Saturday night, and were back to work in almost full force this morning. A strain of the flu has hit our staff and 3 have already been taken down. I am eating oranges like crazy and taking my vitamins. Tonight, we celebrate the Super Bowl with a potluck dinner party. Don't ask who I'm rooting for, because I would probably just tell you "the commercials." I will be bringing chips and my knitting.