Day 40 (already!) – Friday March 19, 2010
We did lots of shoveling today. I shoveled asphalt, dirt, compost, and hay/sticks (the last with a rake, technically); it was pretty awesome.
We headed out at 7:20, swung by the Parks & People office to meet a couple of work crew members we’d be joining (like the Gwynns Falls Trail crew but with target area Watershed 263), loaded their truck with tools, and followed them over to a community center in Watershed 263. Watershed 263 is a collection of neighborhoods in Baltimore which all drain into the same river which empties into the Chesapeake Bay. It’s also a target area of Parks & People for greening operations. Our morning work today was part of one of those greenings.
The community center outside which we were working has a full-day daycare inside. It has a playground outside. Due to the state of the area, the kids are walked four blocks away for playtime at a different playground at a nearby school rather than playing twenty meters from their classrooms. The school district called Parks & People to request help cleaning up the area. The current project involves converting the hillside outside the community center, a ten-foot slope from the fenced-in playground to the sidewalk, from an asphalt strip into a garden with “annuals, perennials, bulbs, and trees,” as P&P staffer Jeff described the vision to me. The asphalt had already been pulverized into little bits; our job was to load it and some dirt from the slope into big dump trucks to be taken away from the site. Over the course of two hours, we filled three dump trucks with asphalt pieces, dirt clumps, and about six bags of trash from the alleyway next to the center with the help of the two P&P work crew members who had joined us. Later, Abby would comment how we always got work done about an hour before expected. She’s worked with NCCC teams before and we’re still underestimated. When we say we get things done, we mean it (especially when we’re fresh and (semi-)rested at the beginning of first round).
We returned to the Parks & People office for lunch at 11:30 and found out we’d head out again between 12 and 12:30. By about 12:05, all of us except Roy were asleep. He stayed awake, Melissa slept five minutes, and the rest of us got about half an hour of naptime. I think I was the first one to close my eyes and probably the first one out. It was great to have such a nice midday siesta after (and before) a couple of hours of direct sunlight and physical labor.
We rolled out in the afternoon to what one pre-arrival description pegged as a ‘punk rock community garden’. The garden, alternately known as the Ash Street Garden and (the name preferred by the participants) the Baltimore Free Garden, was indeed run by a fairly punk rock group of which we worked with maybe six guys and one girl. They had acquired the garden, as one member explained to me, through the city’s Adopt-A-Lot program. Basically, they’re given a one-year renewable lease on the lot and need to make something good happen in that time in order to keep it. They had already cleaned it up, removing tons of trash, trees, and other detritus, and were now trying to get some things growing so the city won’t thank them for cleaning up this nice lot and take it away. They already had five raised garden beds finished in the top section and we helped create two more (line the desired area with logs then fill with compost) while two members planted seeds in one of the extant beds. While some of us moved the compost, which was a mixture of horse manure and newspaper (I found that pretty cool), others did assorted activities. Melissa and I were assigned to raking and transporting hay-like grass and sticks. We raked out the aisles between the garden beds then took many loads of that hay stuff and of already-cleared sticks and logs down a big alleyway hill to the street at the front of the lot. We then re-scaled the hill for the next load of logs. Our companion for the afternoon was what basically amounted to a small aluminum rickshaw, which our task assigner gave us for the job. It was fun to wheel our rickshaw down and up – especially down – the hill. Sabrina joined us towards the end then we all shifted over to a compost pile for the last half hour, loading up a bunch of wheelbarrows-full of compost for the sitting area of the lot.
As we headed home after swinging by the office to get tools for tomorrow, the general mood was quite fatigued. I felt full of energy after a great day’s work, but most of the team understandably needed some quality rest time after a full day of physical labor. We decided, because of that, to move PT from this afternoon to tomorrow morning and take the evening off. Melissa had said yesterday that she planned to go on a walk/run every non-PT day and that sounded like a great idea to me, so she and I headed out after dinner for a few laps around the OB campus. I spent the rest of the evening truly relaxing. I sat on the back porch chatting with Melissa, used the free wireless to catch up on email, talked to Rachel when she called between busy team happenings (she might visit Sunday after a Baltimore ISP!), and enjoyed delicious vanilla yogurt with dark chocolate M&Ms. I also showered to remove the ever-present layer of dirt that exists when you’re doing projects such as ours and read my book for awhile. Mmm, so nice.
It was another wonderful day here in Baltimore. I’ve continued to meet interesting people, including Faye this morning, who has lived across from the community center for almost three decades after growing up on a nearby street. Faye asked Jeff from P&P how to mulch trees and he offered assistance in transporting mulch if she orders it and in showing her how to mulch properly (donuts not volcanoes!). He encouraged her to get her neighbors involved, at which she rolled her eyes in frustration at their lack of response in spite of her repeated efforts. (She mentioned knocking on the door of a woman two apartments down and encouraging her to recycle.) Faye seems very disenchanted with her neighbors’ involvement in keeping their community clean and green, but also takes the effort to sweep out their street and learn to mulch the trees lining it. I admire that a lot.
We’ve got another full day tomorrow to top off this first work week so that’s all for now. First round continues to be fabulous.
Day 41 – Saturday March 20, 2010
We officially survived our first work week of first round! Today went from good to awesome in a fantastic way. Even morning PT was enjoyable, but the highlight was the best evening out I have had thus far in the NTrip.
Our work day today was shorter than usual – 10 to 2 – but we began our day at 7:30 AM because we had some PT to do. We had decided that Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday would be good PT days given our work schedule this round, but we’d pushed back our Friday afternoon session because a couple of people were totally drained after work yesterday (whereas I had felt surprisingly energized by a full day of physical activity…or physical labor, as some might call it). Thus we had a fairly early morning here at the mansion. It was nice, though, because I sat out on the back porch to eat some pre-PT yogurt and got to see the orange sun still finishing its rise out of the woods behind our house. Perhaps some morning I’ll wake up early enough to see the full sunrise. That would be lovely.
We did PT in a circle on the pavement in front of our front porch; it went quite smoothly. We did the usual five exercises, today’s selection being jumping jacks (or the side straddle hop, if you prefer), push-ups, the AmeriCorps squat, the supine bicycle (i.e. bicycle crunches), and the seated military press (‘raise the roof’ in workout form). PT has become much more chill since we gained distance from the Point – and UL Sean’s intensity – and it’s nice to settle into roles. Kathy is excellent at leading squats and arm movements in cadence, Amanda takes on jumping-jacks counting, and I monitor timed intervals and do many of our countdowns for stretching (a skill I think rugby captainship taught me). Our PT will evolve daily for the next few weeks at least, but it’s fun to start finding skills and routines together as a team.
After PT, we headed back into the mansion to prepare for the day ahead. I had my daily oatmeal then settled in to wait for Jamie, my much-adored housemate, who was coming to visit! Actually, she was coming with STL Jessie and some other CMs to steal Brandon away from us for a one-month composite team (a composite team being a team made up of members from a range of regular teams) with the St. Bernard Project in New Orleans. Regardless, I got to see her, which was awesome. I had a good 20 minutes with Jamie before we had to say goodbye to her and Brandon and head off to work. It was sad to leave them, but they’ll have a phenomenal time and will definitely be sending some wonderful updates our way from NOLA.
Our work day today took place at the Baltimore Montessori Public Charter School. We actually spent the first two of our four hours in a training with some other Parks & People affiliates and community members (there were about 15 of us in total) then the next two working in the schoolyard. (I use the term ‘working’ loosely because our service hours rarely feel like actual work, though I suppose they do in the workout sense of the word.)
The training was fabulous. It was run by a guy named Denzel who works at the school and does much of the growing and landscaping there. Between July and October of this past year, the schoolyard was transformed from an asphalt lot into a haven of young trees, raised garden beds, and grassy retreats, along with a big play structure for the kids. Denzel oversees all the trees, garden beds, thornless blackberry bushes, and such.
The topic today was How to Care for Fruit Trees. It was unclear to us why Abby would want her NTrip volunteers to have this training, but we learned a ton and it was very enjoyable. Hopefully that’s why she chose to have us attend. Among the things we learned are such tidbits as which fruit trees are easiest to grow and maintain (always choose pawpaw over peaches) and how to fill the space between multiple fruit trees (make a mulch donut around each then fill the rest of the space with an annual cover crop; the cover plants will both attract good insects, which keeps away unwanted ones and brings pollinators to the trees, and compost nicely in the fall to enrich the soil for the trees). The whole talk was engaging and made me want to garden stuff. I love that sort of inspirational lecture.
After lunch on the front steps of the building, we returned to the back schoolyard for a couple of hours of work. Our primary tasks were removing three trees – this took Melissa, Traci, and I roughly five minutes because the young roots, we quickly realized, hadn’t yet grown out of their original potted shape –, transplanting four raspberry bushes from one end of the yard to the other – us tree folks joined up with Amanda and Roy for that one –, and fixing and topping off with soil the raised garden beds filling one section of the yard. While Kathy, Jeff, and Sabrina worked with drills and screws on fixing up the bed walls, the rest of us shoveled soil into wheelbarrows from a big pile in the corner formed by two of the school’s walls then emptied it into the fixed-up beds. They were already half-full, but keeping them fuller gives the plants more and fresher soil to flourish, always a good thing. Our timing was perfect and we finished right at two.
We arrived back at the mansion about an hour before our firefighters, Lindsay and Chris, returned from training. They had been gone the entire first week for Wildland Firefighter training down in North Carolina but now they’re back as officially certified firefighters! Every team has at least one firefighter (and at most two) so we all got to regain members today, except for those teams whose firefighters have the first round as their fire composite team round (each firefighter will spend one of the four rounds on fire composite). Since Brandon left this morning, it’ll be a month (at least) before Wolf One has a work day as an entire team, but it was fun to have our first reunion with missing members this early into the year. We’ll have many more to come with Brandon gone and later fire composite and disaster call-ups.
Melissa and I had our daily walk/run in the late afternoon; we’d had PT but it was hours earlier so she agreed-slash-volunteered to go anyway. I much enjoy our walk/run time.
The evening was amazing. Sabrina had wanted to go for days to this pizza place called Joe Squared. She has a friend named Joe and wanted to take a picture of herself there and send it to him. As a math major and fan of pizza, I of course offered to accompany her on this venture. Roy also loves pizza and agreed to join us on our journey. Since we had three people, we were at capacity for taking the van so managed to avoid navigating confusing Baltimore via public transport and instead enjoy free and flexible govie travel in the Vanimal.
Joe Squared had a great atmosphere – lots of paintings and generally a good vibe – and the food was delicious. Sabrina and I split a Greek salad and a vegetable pizza, both of which were fantastic. As suggested by the name Joe Squared (or not, depending on how your brain operates), all the pizzas are square, which was fun. Dinner conversation revolved around water, favorite work days this week, and other wonderfully random topics. Towards the end of our stay, a guitarist started playing live music, which added to the awesomeness of the space.
We decided that dessert was a necessity to fill out our square meal so asked our waitress where we might find ice cream nearby. She offered that we could get ice cream at Cold Stone or other desserts at Paper Moon Café; Sabrina asserted that Cold Stone does not have real ice cream and we headed for the latter. Though Marissa had described the café when she came to visit, I was still amazed when we stepped inside. Eclectic doesn’t even begin to describe the décor. Pez dispensers lined the wall in the entryway, mannequins decorated with sequins and googly eyes settled in various poses throughout the dining areas, and action figures of every description watched over our table and the nearby counter seating. Almost every inch of space was filled with some sort of creative flair.
Our desserts were amazing – I had a yummy chocolate-peanut butter pie – and the conversation was even more so. I don’t know what set us off, but we had one point at which we all started laughing so hard that we were literally crying and having trouble breathing. I laugh so hard I cry frequently, but for all three of us to do so is incredibly rare. Needless to say, we had some fun. The sugar rush that hit as we left didn’t help calm us any and by the time we reached home we ended up all three sprinting up the stairs before Sabrina and I collapsed in a heap on the floor giggling about our ears (not) twitching. It was kind of amazing. We proceeded to do our daily self-selected chores to music before the sugar rush died down and we calmed enough to settle in to write (me), use internet (Roy), or sleep (Sabrina). The rest of our group (with the exception of Melissa, who recently returned from a dinner with other Baltimore-area TLs and almost immediately headed for bed) is still out on the town celebrating St. Patrick’s Day and the firefighters’ return, but we already had a full, phenomenal, and unforgettable night. I loved every moment.
Day 42 – Sunday March 21, 2010
Today was a bit too quiet, but otherwise quite enjoyable.
It was too quiet due to lack of ISP-ness – I miss getting my daily dose of service – but I rallied well with some practice driving the govie van on a morning target run and a fun afternoon visit to Marissa and the rest of Wolf 5 at their farm.
When I talked to Sabrina and Melissa before bed last night, both said (in separate conversations) that their bodies would wake them up on our usual schedule this morning and they’d be active by 8 or 8:30. I, on the other hand, planned to sleep in until the late hour of 9:15, for which time I set my alarm. So what happened? I was up at 7:30 and out of bed at 7:50 while both of them slept until ten…and they were still among the first of my teammates awake. I did end up having an absurdly relaxed morning, however, due to the hours of uninterrupted quiet time with my breakfast, a book, my netbook, and a 10-foot-tall open window through which wafted a cool breeze and the merry chirping of birds. I ate scrambled egg with veggies and oatmeal with apple, peanut butter, and honey, read more of Ender’s Game, and talked to AmeriFriends via text message. All in all, it was a wonderful morning.
At eleven, Sabrina, Traci, Melissa, and I headed to Target. Melissa and Sabrina both needed insoles for their boots, I needed van driving practice, and Traci needed to pick up her debit card from a pub they’d been at the previous night. I drove us to Target then on to Fell’s Point by the Inner Harbor. It was good practice for me and I have learning to do (don’t hit the brake on an automatic when switching lanes – there isn’t a clutch to adjust for that) but already feel more comfortable in our big 15-passenger govie van. I even managed the impressive task of spending 45 minutes wandering through Target without buying anything, though I was tempted by the bright pink duct tape and the assortment of giant coloring books.
We returned to the house around 1:30, just in time for me to finish my leftover Joe Squared pizza straight from the fridge. I spent the next couple of hours reading some more and generally feeling vaguely unsettled because I wasn’t out doing something at an ISP. When you’re this immersed in service, a day off is not necessarily the most relaxing thing.
Fortunately, we had a chance to venture out of the house again shortly before 4, when Melissa, Traci, Amanda, and I headed ten minutes away (12, according to MapQuest) to visit Wolf 5. They greeted us warmly then Marissa took us around on a lovely tour of the property. She gave us a full introduction to all of it: their accommodations, the nearby century-old house which their sponsor organization (The Samaritan Women) is converting into a residence for women who have been in abusive situations, and the farm on which they do about eighty percent of their work (the other 20% being fixing up the residence, she thinks). Marissa is a very thorough tour guide so we learned a lot about the place and their work, all of which was pretty awesome.
After our tour, the rest of my group headed into the house while Marissa and I settled into two chairs out back by a fire pit. It was wonderful to get to talk to her for awhile, just sitting and having a conversation in the pre-rain breeze without a million people around. I also found it interesting how my housemates and I immediately gravitate to one another when we’re together, a behavior I haven’t seen as strongly in anyone else. I think we’re all just a bit ridiculously obsessed with each other. I know we’ll each be like that with our teams in the not-too-distant future, which is fantastic.
Once Marissa and I had enjoyed a solid hour of catch-up time, it was time for us to head back to the mansion for dinner and chill evening time. I split a frozen veggie concoction with Melissa then she and I headed out for a walk (what one might call a modified walk/run, the modification being removing the run part) around our usual loop of the Outward Bound property. Upon our return, I proceeded to have a nice conversation with Chris on the front steps, talk to Kate on the phone for the shortest 20 minutes ever, read some more, and write. Altogether quite nice.
Now it’s time for sleep. The details are apparently still unclear, but I hear we have a good ISP lined up for tomorrow. Yay!
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