Indeed. The future is bright. Now I just have to figure out what to do with it! The end is fast approaching and I want to make the best of this San Antonio adventure. How to do that...? I'm still waiting to find out!
This month's topics:
1.) The Sound of Silence
2.) Atlaaaahhhnta
3.) Dumpster Diving
4.) I'm SOOOOOOO sorry, Hector!!
5.) Siamese Dragonflies
6.) Poll Dancing
7.) The Not-So-Secret Garden
8.) Violence is Natural9.) Colors and Looking at the TV, and "rit"
10.) A new side of San Antone
1.) The Sound of Silence
I had the complete fortune of participating in a 2.5 day Silent Retreat as a requirement for the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. My community members and I rented two cars on Monday (May 2) and drove about 8 hours to Ponchatoula, Louisiana where we were joined by all of the Jesuit Volunteers serving in Texas (plus one JV from South Dakota) at a beautiful retreat center. We arrived, ate dinner, and then began our silence at about 8pm. Aside from two daily meetings with a spiritual advisor, we were silent for all of Tuesday, all of Wednesday and the beginning of Thursday. It was blissful. I loved being by myself and relishing in the sounds of my own thoughts undisturbed by any outside sources. Here are some highlights from the retreat:
-I drew a most elaborate mosaic on my left arm with washable markers on Tuesday morning and did not wash it off until Wednesday morning. I have photo evidence if anyone is interested. I was quite proud.
-I took four long naps on Tuesday and loved every minute of them.
-I went for a solitary nature walk and saw a dragonfly resting on a blade of grass. I proceeded to pick it up and hold it in my hand. It then started strangely attaching itself to me with the fuzzy parts of its "feet" and so I whipped it off with a bit of a shriek.
-On the same walk, I picked up a leaf that held three black grasshoppers. I watched in complete fascination as they each took their turn hopping off the leaf. I guess it had been awhile since I had been in a non-city environment... and therefore EVERYTHING seemed to amuse me.
-All meals were shared in a common dining hall by all 25 retreat participants and we had to maintain silence through the meals. As you can imagine, this created a rather awkward environment for all those involved. Well, one night I almost slept through dinner and so when I raced into the dining hall to see if the food had been put away, I saw at first that there was nothing being served on the usual buffet style table where the chefs had been putting out the food. In a state of panic, I yelled out "Oh NO!!!!" ... and then swiftly realized that I was a.) mistaken, the food had just been placed elsewhere and b.) the only one talking!! All eyes were on me, I could feel it, as I sheepishly dished up a plate for myself.
-I attended a silent peace vigil on Tuesday night and read diary entries from former Jesuit Volunteers who had participated in a similar vigil on their silent retreats. It was interesting to read about the issues that were high on those FJVs' lists. I really felt like part of a strong Jesuit history and tradition.
I would recommend a silent retreat to anyone who has the time and the means to participate in one. If your mind is open, you can benefit so greatly from it. I felt pretty refreshed when I left that place... and headed to Atlanta with my housemates!!
2.) Atlaaaahhhnta
So, after those days of silence, four of my housemates and I drove from Ponchatoula, LA to Atlanta, GA to visit the Jesuit Volunteer community there- also a house of seven girls. However, their house differed from ours in so many ways, I was left in a state of utter flabbergastation.To begin, our home in San Antonio is three times the size of the Atlanta home. We have nine bedrooms that could comfortably fit ten people, whereas the Atlanta girls have three bedrooms. Three girls share one of the rooms and they sleep with their beds side by side. So, they basically created a gigantic triple king-sized bed in which they all sleep together. I don't think I could handle that. I value my space when sleeping SOOOO much. Then, they have two bathrooms. We have five. They have one refrigerator- we have two (plus an extra freezer that we don't use but we could). We have four dining areas each complete with tables and chairs- they have a table in their kitchen. We have a full-sized chapel- they have a front porch. Ours is a two-story home, theirs has one floor. The list goes on...
And not only do they live simply by sheer luck of the draw (none of them chose to have such a small home), they also practice simple living voluntarily in far more ways than we do. They obtain a significant portion of their groceries from the dumpster. That's right, they go behind grocery stores, bakeries, and cafés and pick salvageable food from the dumpsters. They served us breakfast and dinner almost every day we were there and a majority of the food we ate (vegetables and fruits included) had been freshly "dove" from the refuse pile of one of their local eating establishments. What a great way to save money and prevent waste. They also had a bucket in one of their showers to collect the water that flows while one is waiting for the water to heat up. They use the water in the bucket then to either flush the toilet, water the plants, or mop the floors. They also religiously abide by the mantra- "If it's yellow, let it mellow. If it's brown, flush it down" which was a bit of an unpleasant surprise the first couple of times I went to relieve myself. And they are avid and thorough recyclers.
All this to say that they basically put our house to shame. They make us look like a collection of pretty pretty princesses living lavishly in our mansion of gold-encrusted banisters. I was so inspired by them. I think a lot of the drive for simple living in that household comes from the one JV who was raised in a Catholic Worker House so it might help if we had her living with us. But I don't think we've any excuse for not trying our hardest to live out the vow we took as JVs in August to live simply.
Atlaaaaahnta is spelled that way because for some reason I have trouble pronouncing the name of that city. I make the second "a" in the word sound like a British "A"- as in "argue" or "also." So it became a joke among my housemates and we would over-exaggerate the second "A" whenever the name of the city came up (which was quite a bit as you can imagine).
I was completely besotted by Atlanta. It has adorable neighborhoods with quirky antique shops, restaurants, parks, and cafés. Visiting the MLK memorial was powerful and I felt so honored to be in a place where history was made. The exhibit at his memorial that details the events in his life was very comprehensive and it blew my mind (again, I mean I had studied the Civil Rights Movement before) to think that our nation was in such turmoil barely half a century ago.
The other half of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps (JVs from Alabama, South Dakota, New Orleans, and Atlanta) had their silent retreat in Atlanta the week after ours so more than half of them came to Atlanta to party while we were there. It was a blast catching up with all of the JVs that I never get to see and hearing about their experiences. On Saturday, we all went to a large park near downtown Atlanta and regressed to the days of our youth. We played whiffleball, rolled down a hill (amazing), played frisbee, and laid out on scattered blankets. It was heavenly.
3.) Dumpster Diving
We were inspired by the Atlanta community when we returned to San Antonio and decided to endeavor to do something no San Antonio JV had ever attempted. Four of us hopped in Owen's car one night and drove from H-E-B (a Texas grocery chain) to Whole Foods to Banana Republic to a college campus in search of any rescuable food, clothing, furniture, or appliances we could encounter. Sadly it was only at Banana Republic that we came upon anything worth touching with a 20 foot pole. We found a manikin. A female manikin that we named Tiffany. We brought her home and set her up on a stand in our living room as motivation to continue with our search for useful garbage.4.) I'm SOOOOOOOOO Sorry, Hector!!
I joined a Spanish club recently per the suggestion of a friend of our community- Gee. Gee and I went to the first meeting on April 29th and met three friendly characters- Hector, Socorro, and Kristal. Gee had found out about this club through www.meetup.com. We spent about an hour chatting in Spanish with our new friends and then as we were leaving the café, we ran into the man who had organized the Spanish club meeting through the website. It turns out that he had been holding the meeting on the back patio of the café while we held ours inside. We weren't really sad to have missed out on that meeting though because we had enjoyed ourselves so thoroughly as a quintet.Well, our little group of five made plans to meet up on May 13th to continue practicing the cherished idioma. So, I show up to the café on time that day and find that only Hector has decided to attend the meeting. He and I begin conversing and all is going well. I explain to him that my housemates will be picking me up at 8pm and that I don't want to keep them waiting. Seven forty-five approaches and Hector begins telling me about his personal life. He lives with his partner, Bob and a dog. Somehow the conversation brings us to the discussion of a dog he once had who suffered from some sort of illness. The dog was in a lot of pain and had to be put down. Explaining the story to me greatly upsets Hector and just as he is about to describe the final trip he took to the vet with that dog, my housemates start calling me. I hold up the phone and make an apologetic face so that Hector will stop talking and allow me to answer the phone call. He doesn't quite get the memo at first and continues to talk and grow increasingly distraught.
Finally, I mumble "Sorry, Hector, I've got to take this, it's my housemates" to which he tearfully exclaims, "I'm sorry, I can't take this!!!" and runs away to the bathroom crying- leaving his notepad and dictionary on the table. My housemates tell me that they are outside waiting for me and so I sit wondering if I should wait for Hector's return or just leave him. I wait a few minutes and realize that he might be awhile on account of his excess of tears so I write him a note saying that I had to leave and how sorry I am. And I leave.
Was that a mean thing to do? I was just so confused by his behavior and didn't want to keep my housemates waiting. I haven't been back to the Spanish club since. :(
5.) Siamese Dragonflies
Recently a student at the After School Program told me that he had seen some siamese dragonflies. I asked him what he meant by that. He explained that he had seen two dragonflies that were stuck together... and he assumed they had been stuck that way since birth. I couldn't help laughing at his sweet innocence. What he was describing was a display of dragonfly mating... but I didn't tell him that of course. Although the kid IS fourteen and should probably know better!6.) Poll Dancing
That's right, I went poll dancing on Saturday, May 14th. You can watch the youtube video of it here: I appear about 25 seconds into the video.
7.) The Not-So-Secret Garden
I finally planted a garden with my coworker, James on May 14th!! We tilled a little plot in the backyard and planted tomatoes, flowers, and a bunch of random seeds that I got at a health fair a couple months ago. The tomatoes are the main feature of our garden because we (and by we, I really mean James) are conducting an experiment using some electroplates that James purchased off the internet. Apparently the electroplates are supposed to help plants grow larger and healthier if you plant them properly- directly under the plants. So we placed an electroplate (which is a piece of metal in the shape of an angel, painted purple, about the length of my pointer finger with the thickness of a coin) underneath one of the tomato plants and not under the other one. The two tomato plants were the exact same size and planted under the same conditions other than the electroplate. Oh, and James instructed me to talk to and name the plant with the electroplate underneath it but not the other plant.I'll update more on Atticus' development but I can tell you right now, two weeks after planting the garden, Atticus is far behind the other tomato plant's growth and I don't mean any offense to James when I say that I think he was totally ripped off! As for the other plants in the garden, they're not doing so well. The Texas sun dries up their already nutrient-forsaken soil and the two times that I water them daily doesn't seem to cut it. Also, one of the trees in our backyard keeps dropping enormous branches on top of my garden so a few of the flowers have been irreparably squashed. Is it so much to ask for a few plants to supplement our community dinners? My cucumbers and melons were growing but seem to be depleted of their initial vigor. I'm sad!!
8.) Violence is Natural
Thank you, Sabrina! My coworker, one of the coordinators of the After School Program, made a most upsetting comment to me the other day. She had invited a friend of hers to visit our ASP and teach the kids about illustrating comic books. The comic book friend brought in a large box filled with comic books and attempted to teach the children how to draw comic book characters. He had two tattoos of naked women on his neck but other than that I found him to be a friendly person with a talent for drawing.The next day, as the children were perusing the comic books, one after the other exclaimed "Whoa!" or "Eww, miss!!" to the point that I decided to flip through a book or two. Turns out that Spiderman and Superwoman are less than appropriate for elementary age children to be reading. There were images of sex, nudity, and violence on almost every page. One of the students, a 10 year old girl offered to review the comic books and weed out the ones that were "inappropriate." I asked her how she defined "inappropriate" and she replied that any books with nudity or violence in them would go into her discard pile. However, when Sabrina heard the girl saying that violence in a comic book was grounds for disposing of it, she remarked: "Well if that's the case, then you're going to have to get rid of the whole collection! They all contain violence." I asked her then how we should help the children process the violence that they were not only reading but also tracing and copying into their notebooks. I wanted to know how we could take steps to explain to the students that violence is wrong and the violence they were witnessing in the books was fake and not something to emulate. Instead, much to my chagrin, Sabrina replied that violence was "natural" and just a part of life. Therefore, we didn't have to explain it to or censor it from the children.
I was shocked and you had better believe that I reported the comment to my director immediately. She is a family friend of Sabrina's but was equally shocked. And when I mentioned that some of the kids had been renting the comic books and bringing them home, she nearly fainted. I told her about the man with the naked women tattoos and she about threw up. She then ordered that the comic books be removed from the ASP straightaway and sent out a memo to the entire staff declaring that James was in charge of the ASP and that no one else was allowed to make executive decisions about the program (including inviting random guests and distributing any sorts of materials to the children).
You may remember that I was singing Sabrina's praises when she first started working with the ASP. However, she's lost her touch. It doesn't mean that she can't regain it, but my goodness. She needs to use the power she has wisely. Many of the children ADORE her which gives her the potential to be such a positive role model for them. If she continues accepting and almost promoting violence among them, there is no hope for the future. I don't mean to be dramatic but come on! The kids see enough violence in their lives. They need our program to be a safe place where alternative topics and activities are provided for them.
9.) Colors and Looking at the TV, and "rit"
Here are some San Antonio-isms... I think. Well, these are funny things I've heard people say at least.-Colors: Instead of referring to markers, crayons, and colored pencils as markers, crayons, and colored pencils, I've heard people call them "colors." Especially at the ASP. "Miss, can you get me some colors?" "James, where did you put the colors?" "Ooh, I could probably use a color for my homework." I don't think I've heard the kids refer to their drawing utensils as anything other than that.
-Looking at the TV: It seems that the verbs "to watch" and "to look" sometimes get mixed up here when dealing with television. "I was looking at the TV yesterday when..." "I tell my kids not to be looking at TV all day..." It has to do with the Spanish translation of "to watch" and "to look"
-Rit: My coworker is always looking for the keys to the "rit" van. I think he means "red"...
10.) A new side of San Antone
My roommate and I went exploring today on the East Side of San Antonio. We attended a Baptist service and it was quite an experience! I was taken by the enthusiasm of the congregation and the pastor. Almost everyone was throwing their hands up in the air, yelling something like "Amen, amen, amen!" or "That's right," and standing up to cheer when they liked something that the pastor said. The pastor almost couldn't contain his fervor and his whole body convulsed as he shouted "Consecrate yourself for Jesus!" I was moved by a couple parts of the service and couldn't help but cry. I probably won't go back, but it was a powerful experience anyway :)
Then we went to a Creole restaurant and had some of Ma Harper's New Orleans cooking. We ventured to Martin Luther King's park (and memorial bridge) and then just drove through the neighborhoods. It was neat exploring a different part of the city that I have called home for the past 3/4 of a year. I hope to continue exploring until I leave in less than three months!!!
