Time for an Update

Yes, I admit it, I've been neglecting the blog.

We wrapped up in Missouri, I got a cold, we drove back to Denver, I've slept for the last week... and well, that pretty much brings us up to date, right?!  I guess I'll give a few more details :)

It seemed as though our two weeks in Missouri was the perfect amount of time for us to be there.  We arrived with the goal of doing initial disaster response; we wanted to get the immediate needs taken care of.  And as a team, with the community's support, we did just that.  Homes that were un-insured or under-insured had immediate needs taken care of (i.e. taps on roofs) and construction debris was moved to public dumpsters the county was funding.  The last few days there, we transitioned into a Long Term Recovery Committee (LTRC).  A few community members took over the disaster response effort and will work to get the people affected by the tornadoes back on their feet.  They will operate quite differently than we did with the initial response.  Instead of matching up volunteers with immediate homeowner projects on a day by day basis, the LTRC will will work with individual homeowners to get their needs taken care of.  The LTRC will work with large donations (Our VRC did not handle any money) to get homeowners necessary funding and materials to get them on their feet.  In a sense, the LTRC will act as case workers for each homeowner.  I know they will do a great job, too.

We left on Friday morning, and I woke up with a sore throat that progressed into a nice little cold by the time we arrived back in Denver after our two day trip.  Of course, we arrived back in Denver on St. Patrick's day, so I couldn't just go to bed and get a good nights sleep!  Laura, Melinda, and I got tickets to the Celtics/Nuggets game at the Pepsi Center and then we headed downtown for a green beer.

Melinda's a Celtics fan, so we cheered for them.  They lost.

Monday rolled around and we had our one day of paperwork to do.  Usually we have a whole 'transition week' with meetings and paperwork, but we were lucky and got it condensed down into one day.  We debriefed and presented our Oklahoma project to the staff and then did a question/answer about disaster.  Typically for debriefs we present with one other team to our unit leader and one other staff member.  Well, people were pretty interested in what we had to say as we had just about the entire staff there and a lot of the office Team Leaders.  Put a little bit of pressure on us, but we did just fine.

The rest of the week has been relaxing.  I'll sum it up in pictures:

We shaved Amanda's head!!  She raised money and shaved her head for the St. Baldrick's foundation which raises money for children with cancer.  It's a St. Patrick's day thing, so we did it right when we got back to Denver.  She looks good with a bald head!

Downtown Denver.  Got a new book at the bookstore with Laura and Max, then headed to the park on a nice day to read.

Happy hour!  2 for 1 glasses of wine, sign me up.

And this is what i've spent the majority of my time doing.  The weather has been beautiful, so I've spent some quality time on the hill behind campus reading and looking at the beautiful mountains.  Can't complain.

And that brings me to now.  Updating this blog with a tasty iced latte (thanks to the wonderful gift cards I received over Christmas, I'm still using them!).  

I head for the airport at 5:30 am tomorrow morning.  My first flight is to Dallas, and then I'm off to Jackson International where Jessie, my temporary TL for the round will pick me up and take me to Eudora, Arkansas to meet my new team. I'm a bit nervous, as I've never really talked to any of them, but I know it'll be just fine.   By the time I get there I'll really only have a month and a half on project.  I talked to Jessie the other day and she said I'm going to be in a pre-k classroom.  Quite the change from prescribed burning every day to spending it with little kiddos.  I'm not sure which will tire me out more, my bet is actually on the kids.  I haven't started packing yet, I'll get there eventually.

By this time tomorrow I will have been in 8 states in the past 5 months.  And will have lived in 4 of them.  I'm getting good at the packing game!

The long days feel like weeks, yet it seems as though we just arrived yesterday.

We just learned the ropes and tomorrow we're opening the VRC ourselves.

We're running on fumes, but the good work we're doing is getting us through.

It's outrageous to think we've already been here a week today.  Like I mentioned, it feels like I've been here for a only a day, yet as long as a month all at the same time.

I got out in the field leading volunteers again yesterday.  That was when it really hit that what we're doing here is really something.  I was assigned to a house with some volunteer teachers who had the day off school.  Up until this point I had only been moving construction debris to dumpsters, but today was a little different.  These teachers and I were helping this homeowner move what was part of their home into a dumpster.  Within the pile of construction debris were shoes, sweatshirts and Christmas ornaments.  We moved this persons life into a dumpster.  It was a feeling I've never felt before.  It really spotlighted that the tornado in Stone County changed lives.  We weren't just sawing up trees, we were throwing destroyed Christmas ornaments into a dumpster.

Two weeks ago this was someone's home.  Now it's in a dumpster.

Now, it's not all work for us.  We've found time for a little fun and time to unwind.  Last night we had free tickets to Dixie Stampede.  Seriously, look it up.  It was so much fun.  Mom- You would have liked all of the horses in the show.  Tomorrow we are in charge of the VRC from 9:30 to noon, and then we're getting the afternoon off!  I get to sleep in, and I have the afternoon off, woah.  Nick, my TL is coming over to our county to check out our housing, but other than that my only obligation is to relax.  Looking forward to it for sure.  We also have free tickets to an IMAX show, so maybe we'll check that out.

Life is good.  Crazy, but I guess I wouldn't have it any other way right now. I'm missing familiar faces, but I'll see them soon enough.  I'm tired, but I'm loving what I'm doing.   

Disaster Update

I don't know how to start describing what life has been life for the past six days.  Adjectives that come to mind include: swamped, immersed, exhausted, and fulfilled.  Among many others, of course.

We arrived in Branson on Saturday.  We headed straight to the Volunteer Reception Center the AmeriCorps St. Louis team has set up and was operating out of.  We were briefed on what was going and how we were going to be used.  They decided to split us up with half in Taney County and half in Stone County.  

I am on a team in Stone County working with 3 of the AmeriCorps St. Louis members running the Volunteer Reception Center (VRC) there.  Nick, my Team Leader has designated me as an Assistant Team Leader (ATL) along with one of our team's two ATL's, Alex.  He and I are the leaders of our group of 5.  

Our first two days we worked 7 am to 7 pm with briefs and debriefs before and after work.  We also had a half hour commute back to our housing in Branson.  Long days with little sleep.  Monday we switched hours to 8 am to 5 pm and my team of 5 moved into a church here in Kimberling City, MO so our 16 hour days have turned into 10 hour days, something I am thankful for.

Our jobs at the VRC include Volunteer Intake, Project Coordinating, and being Field Leaders.  I've been able to try my hand at all 3 and find them all enjoyable.  

Volunteer Intake includes greeting volunteers who come in and getting them set up with intake paperwork.  Also getting them name tags and wrist bands.  All of the damaged areas are blocked off and people can only get into them by going through a National Guard checkpoint.  This is to prevent looting.  Volunteers can get in with a wrist band.

Project Coordinating includes getting volunteers set up with work sites to go to, contacting homeowners to find out what work needs to be done, and making sure they have the resources they need.  We also prioritize what houses we work on based on insurance coverage (we work on uninsured or underinsured homes) and demographics.  We place a high priority on the elderly, single parents, and the disabled.

Field team leaders are out in the field making sure volunteers have work to do, are being safe, communicating with homeowners, and are getting things done.

I have mostly been in the office, but have gotten out in the field a little bit too.  The volunteers we have coming in are great and are a lot of fun to work with.  The day I was out in the field leading, when I got back to the VRC the Intake Coordinator said some of the people I had worked with that day had come back in and commented on how great I had done as a leader.  Made me feel good.  :)

Like I said, we've moved into a church here.  The Kimberling City Methodist Church is taking VERY good care of us.  We've got cots set up in the basement classrooms of the church with plenty of room.  We have a man named Richard who comes in each morning and has a hot breakfast ready for us at 6:45 am.  So far breakfasts have included pancakes, biscuits and gravy, and a ham and potato bake.  I'm excited to see what tomorrow morning will bring.  When we get back around 6:30 pm at night someone has already heated up one of the many casseroles that have been brought to us in the refrigerator.  We also have a table full of baked goods.  I never thought I would gain 10 pounds doing disaster relief.

Right now we have March 15th set as our last day of work here.  We are planning on traveling back to denver on the 16th and 17th.  Having Sunday the 18th off.  Debriefing and office work on the 19th and then off work until the 26th when we will be heading out to our 3rd round projects.  I am scheduled to go to the Cultural Center in Eudora.  

Our VRC is in an old, empty grocery store.

Amanda at the project list.  We have the board practically memorized.

People have been great about donating lunch for our volunteers.

We had a baseball team bring in a pallet of water for our volunteers!

It's crazy, but disaster really has brought out the best in people.  We're really feeling the love of the community.  They are so grateful we're here and thankful their neighbors are willing to help out with clean up and recovery.  In the six days we've been here, we've become a part of Kimberling City, MO.

Much Needed Update

UPDATE:  This was supposed to post on the 3rd, but my internet connection must have been faulty.  I am now in Missouri and am working overtime doing disaster.  I'll write sometime soon when I haven't put in a 16 hour day!  I'm going to try to get 7 hours of sleep tonight!

The last two weeks we've been busy busy busy doing prescribed burns.  It's been so much fun dragging torches and watching the fires.  I'm amazed at how much I have learned about fire behavior.   It's so interesting.  This past Thursday we had a crazy burn.  We had to get a variance to be able to do our burn because of wind, but eventually got approval.  It then got even more windy and we ended up with tons of spot fires, where the fire jumped over the road that was our line.  Because it was pretty dry out as well, these spots blew up pretty quick and had to act fast to get them surrounded and out.  It was a tiny taste of what wildfire response will be like this summer.  I'm hooked.

I have some pictures on my camera, but unfortunately my cord is in my pack, packed away in the back of the truck.  If things had gone according to plan, my team would be rolling into Denver tonight.  That's not quite the case, as life has become quite interesting.

In AmeriCorps NCCC, they tell us that the only constant in change.  My team is a prime example of that at this moment.  We were originally scheduled to have Thursday off to pack, and then take off for Denver Friday morning and arrive on Saturday.  Plans changed however when my team asked for, and got approval to stay an extra day in Oklahoma to work on a huge 7000 acre burn scheduled for Friday.  We decided to forego our day off and work Thursday on a burn down South.  Friday came and we were excited to do the big burn, but ended up disappointed when it was too windy to burn.  We would have even been able to use a helicopter to light it.  Crazy, huh!?  It ended up being a little bit of a blessing because we found out we were going to have a lot of work to do pretty soon.

Thursday night when we got back from our burn, we had a team meeting where Nick, our TL told us plans had changed.  Instead of leaving to go back to Denver on Saturday, we were instead headed to Branson, MO to do disaster relief.  If you've kept up on the weather lately, you know about all of the crazy weather and that Branson was hit with a tornado. We are currently in Fatetteville, Arkansas loading up on groceries and getting some internet before we get to Branson later this afternoon.  We will be there for a minimum of 5-7 days, and a maximum of 30 (i think).  We don't know what  we'll be doing, but we will be working with the St. Louis Emergency Response Team (ERT).  We will be housed in a cabin near Branson.

Life is pretty crazy.  The team as a whole is excited to be going, but with reservations of course.  It's hard to adjust when we were so close to being back in Denver and were excited about our upcoming Shuffle round and new projects.  We know we're capable of helping the people of Branson, and want to do what we can to help.  I personally am so excited to be going.  I came into AmeriCorps wanting to get some disaster relief experience, and am so grateful I'm going to get it.

I'll try to update again when I can, but as you may have inferred, I have no idea what to expect for the next 5-7 days!