Pink Glove Moments
Amy has this thing for pink. You already know about her pink boots. She also has pink gloves, given to her by her fellow "camp mom", Karen. At the time Amy was presented with the gloves, she welled up with tears as she quite often does.
Yesterday, several of us had our "pink glove moments" as we reach some point of inner reflection that can overwhelm. Paul, who coined the phrase, shared his with us. "Up until today, I thought of my work as just helping my buddy from around the corner do a little dry-walling in his place. I just realized that I am not from just around the corner."
The catalyst for emotion for many of us was the surprise arrival of a poster from Simsbury United Methodist Church. About ten feet long (I didn't measure it; it may be longer or shorter), it carried messages from home. "I don't feel like I deserve this," Paul said. He explained that he was just doing something he would expect to do, and not anything deserving of special
recognition.
Cassandra and Mel, touched and excited by the messages sent from SUMC
This touched a chord in me, having struggled all day, and really all week, with the fact that I have "the cushy job" in many respects--sitting at Java Joe's and writing rather than hammering, taping, mucking, sanding, and such. When I do join a work crew in progress I sometimes get the feel I am breaking in on some bonded territory--like a scalawag crossing union lines or something. For they have been there from the beginning, working on a continual process. Don't get me wrong--these are friendly, welcoming, caring people, many of whom who have been my friends for years. But there is this feeling we are here to sweat and somehow take on some of the pain we see everywhere. And somehow, swinging a hammer and coming back exhausted and filthy helps to do that in a more obvious way than writing and taking photos.
This makes me all the more determined to get this continuing story out, to do right by it, to make a difference. How can I help? is the constant question on my mind.
I'm pretty good at painting and refinishing, and decent at using power drivers and drills and in putting things together. [I struggle at taping and mudding, given that I was taught a different way of doing it (with mesh, rather than tape) than most in this group were taught.] As Providence would have it, there are no painting jobs ready to be done, and precious little assembly work. So it seems that I can do more good with words, and my team leader Mel, and his assistant, Jerry, recognize this.
Yesterday, I had the good fortune to meet up with my friend from way back, Barbara. We bonded in 8th grade when she moved to my hometown of Marshall, Missouri and sat next to me to sing in the chorus. She was the maid of honor when I got married, and the last time I had seen her was 12 years ago at her own wedding in New Orleans. Barbara, an RN, and her husband, a structural engineer, live in the flood-damaged (from the storm surge at Lake Ponchartraine) two-story house they are trying to make back into their home in Mandeville, LA.
[An aside here--Barbara was the woman who had picked up Miss Alice from the New Orleans airport and helped her pick up some of her belongings in her old apartment. Much of those belongings are in a Pod which remains in Barbara's driveway in Mandeville. For those who don't know who Miss Alice is, or how she came to live with me for 11 weeks, you can get a little hint by reading my unfinished blog called Chez DuBois.]
Barbara had driven over for the middle of the day to catch up with me, and we spent about two hours driving and photographing from Biloxi to Bay St. Louis (Gulfport, Pass Christian, and Waveland in between.) The experience nearly sucked the air out of me with the gravity and scope of it all. Miles and miles and miles of changed lives and landscapes. The phrase heard over and over again everywhere you go is "television gives you no idea what it is truly like here; you just have to be here."
Still, I am going to try to convey some of what we see here with a selection of the over 200 photos I've shot so far.
Yesterday, several of us had our "pink glove moments" as we reach some point of inner reflection that can overwhelm. Paul, who coined the phrase, shared his with us. "Up until today, I thought of my work as just helping my buddy from around the corner do a little dry-walling in his place. I just realized that I am not from just around the corner."
The catalyst for emotion for many of us was the surprise arrival of a poster from Simsbury United Methodist Church. About ten feet long (I didn't measure it; it may be longer or shorter), it carried messages from home. "I don't feel like I deserve this," Paul said. He explained that he was just doing something he would expect to do, and not anything deserving of special
recognition.Cassandra and Mel, touched and excited by the messages sent from SUMC
This touched a chord in me, having struggled all day, and really all week, with the fact that I have "the cushy job" in many respects--sitting at Java Joe's and writing rather than hammering, taping, mucking, sanding, and such. When I do join a work crew in progress I sometimes get the feel I am breaking in on some bonded territory--like a scalawag crossing union lines or something. For they have been there from the beginning, working on a continual process. Don't get me wrong--these are friendly, welcoming, caring people, many of whom who have been my friends for years. But there is this feeling we are here to sweat and somehow take on some of the pain we see everywhere. And somehow, swinging a hammer and coming back exhausted and filthy helps to do that in a more obvious way than writing and taking photos.
This makes me all the more determined to get this continuing story out, to do right by it, to make a difference. How can I help? is the constant question on my mind.
I'm pretty good at painting and refinishing, and decent at using power drivers and drills and in putting things together. [I struggle at taping and mudding, given that I was taught a different way of doing it (with mesh, rather than tape) than most in this group were taught.] As Providence would have it, there are no painting jobs ready to be done, and precious little assembly work. So it seems that I can do more good with words, and my team leader Mel, and his assistant, Jerry, recognize this.
Yesterday, I had the good fortune to meet up with my friend from way back, Barbara. We bonded in 8th grade when she moved to my hometown of Marshall, Missouri and sat next to me to sing in the chorus. She was the maid of honor when I got married, and the last time I had seen her was 12 years ago at her own wedding in New Orleans. Barbara, an RN, and her husband, a structural engineer, live in the flood-damaged (from the storm surge at Lake Ponchartraine) two-story house they are trying to make back into their home in Mandeville, LA.
[An aside here--Barbara was the woman who had picked up Miss Alice from the New Orleans airport and helped her pick up some of her belongings in her old apartment. Much of those belongings are in a Pod which remains in Barbara's driveway in Mandeville. For those who don't know who Miss Alice is, or how she came to live with me for 11 weeks, you can get a little hint by reading my unfinished blog called Chez DuBois.]
Barbara had driven over for the middle of the day to catch up with me, and we spent about two hours driving and photographing from Biloxi to Bay St. Louis (Gulfport, Pass Christian, and Waveland in between.) The experience nearly sucked the air out of me with the gravity and scope of it all. Miles and miles and miles of changed lives and landscapes. The phrase heard over and over again everywhere you go is "television gives you no idea what it is truly like here; you just have to be here."
Still, I am going to try to convey some of what we see here with a selection of the over 200 photos I've shot so far.
posted by Elizabeth Hokama at 9:24 AM
1 Comments:
Thank you, Kimberly. Your comments have truly made my day! My team mates have not had a chance to read anything on the blog, so the primary feedback I receive from them is the trouble that their family and friends are having with leaving comments. Hopefully, I've remedied that.
Know that you made a difference in *my* life today!
Elizabeth
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