The Best Day of the Month

Today is my favorite day to work at the Cahokia Area YMCA each month. This has nothing to do with work itself, but is more about the more to do with this Y’s identity and role that it plays in this area as a community center. I have said this before, but want to repeat that before working here I viewed Y’s as simply “swim and gyms”, but my view of Ys has changed. The one that I work at is equally about being a community center as it is a place to work out. We offer teen mentoring, leadership, and volunteer programs for teenagers many nights a week, after-school child watch after where children can get their homework done (and receive help with it)and play while parents work-out, and specific workout classes and other activities for the older people in the community. Today epitomizes the community center aspect of this Y.

The AOA (Active Older Adults) holds their monthly potluck at my Y on the last Wednesday of every month. So this means that once a month I get to enjoy a large meal and spend time in the company of some of the older men and women in the area. The monthly AOA potluck is more than just a time for older people to get together, talk, and share a meal together, but it also offers an opportunity to take part other activities as well. These have included pumpkin carving, tips from a police officer about how to stay safe when shopping and out and about during the holiday season, planning and coordinating for our Healthy Kids day and other upcoming events at the Y.

I did not realize until a few years ago how much I enjoyed talking to older people, and that it seems like I would always come away learning something. It could be about past history from their lives, about the life of a small town community, or some other wisdom. It seems like it is always a positive experience. (Today’s conversation highlights included memorable snow storms in the area in the last thirty years, how they can correlate with an increase in population nearly a year from now, and about credit card scams and bank system compromises.) This realization did not come to me easily. I believe it started in high school when I volunteered with older women at a Catholic Charities second-hand store. But, it really took hold late in high school and throughout college as I became closer with my grandmother. I continue to feel an absence in my life with her no longer around (see Sometimes You Can’t Make It On Your Own) but am glad that I was able to really get to know her well in the last years of her life. I am grateful that I “grew up” in the sense that I was able to move past seeing her as someone who much older, old-fashioned and mostly disconnected from the world from which I lived, to a view of her as a normal adult who I could connect with about the past, life from the Great Depression to the 21^st century, family life, and many other amazing things. I felt like I could talk to her about events in my life, her life, or in the world, and that it was not much different than talking to anyone else. I wish I could have always held that view and always recognized the real value felt for spending time really getting to know and learning from my grandmother, and other older people instead of having what I believe is a typical young person’s view that many of us go through that they are simply older, out of touch, and generally ok to be around (but not for too long) and taking their presence for granted. I am glad that I have the opportunity every month to continue to be engaged in that part of learning and personal growth. (I must admit, however that once a month is great, I’m not sure I could do it every day.)

I continue to fill blogs with ways in which this year and experience has contributed to my personal growth, but there is a one way in which working at this specific Y contributes to what could be a new direction for me. I feel fortunate that my Y has made itself a community center; it is a place where normal people from completely different age groups, backgrounds, etc. with real issues and stories can come together, because it is the first time I feel involved in an actual local community. I have not felt any investment in, or true grasp of an adult-sense of local community up until this point. I mentioned in my last post how I am becoming more drawn to state politics, but, taking it down another level, I feel myself becoming more interested in the inner workings of towns, cities, and communities. I find myself desiring to learn more about how certain neighborhoods are affected by different policies, how one decision in a community affects the real life people, and what changes really mean on a basic level. (I promise much more on this new interest in blogposts in the future). As my boss says “city politics is where all the real action is”. It will be interesting to find out where this action and interest leads me. Perhaps you will find out with me.

YMCA Advocacy Day

I love politics. I don’t think that comes as a surprise to anyone who knows me. My interest in politics has always been on a national level. My first truly distinctive memory of politics came when I was in seventh grade and stayed up late into the night glued to the television during Election Day in 2000 as Dan Rather covered the election for CBS News. I believe that was the first time that I was really cognizant of national politics and the impact that a day like that has on the nation. It was the first time I really was aware and thought that real changes would occur because of the way people voted, and how and why people in each state vote the way that they do. This interest only expanded while living and studying in Washington, DC as I spent more time studying international politics. Even though I am not there now, I continue to be fascinated with national politics, and take time each day reading online to up to date with the latest political news. It was easy for me to embrace an interest in national and international politics. However, during this same time I have mostly neglected state and local politics. This year is changing that, and I am beginning to pay more attention to local and state politics.

A few weeks ago my boss asked me if I wanted to attend YMCA State Advocacy Day at the state capitol in Springfield, IL this past Wednesday. I did not hesitate; of course I wanted to go. So, this past Wednesday became one of my favorite days I have worked at the Y this year. I wasn’t quite sure exactly what we were going to be doing while in Springfield, but I figured it would be a good opportunity for me to learn about the political and policy side of the YMCA and how it advocates for those things in its recently rebranded tagline “for youth development, for healthy living, and social responsibility”. This day was a day in which staff (mostly CEOs, CFOs, and Branch Executives) from YMCAs all over the state of Illinois came to Springfield to meet with their local legislators, update them on what the YMCA s are doing, and seek their support with new initiatives.

The day began with the Illinois State Alliance of YMCAs recognizing a few State Representatives or Senators with “legislative champion” awards for the work towards youth development and other areas where the Y works. The state Senator who represents much of the area serviced by the YMCA of Southwest Illinois, including Cahokia, was presented with one of these awards. (Of the four legislators who won awards, he was the only one to show up to personally accept the award during the presentation. Later on, a few of us from the YMCA of Southwest Illinois met with him.

When we made our way to his office, I was stunned to see his nameplate on the door with a plate saying “Senate Majority Leader” under his name. I had no idea that the state Senator that represents the area where I work held such a position. We waited in his office for a long time, as the meeting he was in before ours ran late, and then he had to step out for a brief committee meeting (none of this came as a surprise to anyone as it is Congress) but our meeting was well worth the wait.

The Senator has a particular passion for the youth of the area and for college mentorship and readiness programs. He runs a program in which each year he takes two trips of between 40-50 high school students from six or seven high schools in this area on about a week long college tour visit through multiple states to visit around 10 colleges on each trip. One of these trips is geared towards underclassman and one towards seniors to see many of the schools for which they have already applied. Representative of many of the students in the area, the majority of these schools are HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). The Senator shares the belief with my boss that each student possesses the ability to be motivated to succeed academically; that there is something that will propel that person forward towards accomplishing something that is greater than them. They both believe that setting attainable expectations, seeing these schools and being told that these places are within reach, will motivate high school students to aspire towards these goals, succeed, and attend these colleges.

I felt that our meeting with the Senator was especially beneficial to me, since one of the larger projects that I have been working on while at the Y has been writing grants for our College Readiness programs, and specifically to obtain funding for college tours of the same nature. (See Ordinary Time Part II) I left this meeting feeling particularly re-encouraged about the work that I am doing after hearing about a similar program to ours that operates successfully. The Senator said that the program’s success rate is at or above fifty percent, which means that half if not more than half of the students who participate in his tour program attend schools that they visit. Compared to the stats in the area and that I mentioned in Ordinary Time II, this is a very good success rate for this area. Many of these schools are not easy to be accepted into either such as Howard University and Hampton University (which President Obama gave the commencement address at this past year). The meeting with the Senator gave me something I could use in these grants--while it sounds like common sense that seeing colleges is a way to motivate students to do well to attend, it is not easy finding data or proof of this success in a way that could be used when writing a grant. His program provides me with the example that I was looking for.

The meeting with the State Senator provides a stark contrast with the only other time I have met with an elected legislator at their office. A few years ago, I met with the US Congressman from my home area in Washington, DC. That meeting felt more like an exercise in civility and a brief meeting with no real purpose other than a meet and greet with a photo, and I came away from one feeling an emptiness that does not typically occur when I think of politics. To be fair, that was a US Congressman and I didn’t have a true purpose or objective, unlike Wednesday when we did have a purpose. That may account for something. But, this year I am starting to feel my boss’s passion for local politics and really buy into his beliefs that local politics is where everything takes place and where all the true people are. As a local, state politician, the issues represent more distinctive faces of real people, and you must be truly accessible to the people you represent. Our State Senator proved this again at the dinner reception for the Senators and Representatives of all the areas in the state that closed Advocacy Day. The Senator, who is the Majority leader, was again the only one to attend. We talked more about his college readiness program, and I talked to him a little about and the much reported on struggles with the state budget and the steps that Illinois is taking to remedy it. During this time I could not believe I was talking to the majority leader, but it also seemed like any normal conversation that I could be having with my boss or a boss at another job or with my parents and their friends or anyone else.

This was my first real taste of state politics, the first time I have ever given it a real chance. From this time I know I will take much more of a keen interest on this subject.

Humbled

“We're just ordinary people; we don't know which way to go. Cuz we're ordinary people Maybe we should take it slow.”

John Legend- “Ordinary People”

I was humbled a couple weekends ago. It came during two specific but very different occurrences over the course of the day, and reflects a reoccurring theme throughout this year.

The first came while attending a St. Cecilia Jr. High girls basketball game in which my housemate Chino coached. While watching two teams play in the game before St. Cecilia played, it became apparent that not only was one team much better than the other, but that it was led by two specific players. I watched the same two plays over and over: the team would either rebound the other team’s missed shot, pass to one girl and watch her dribble and outrun everyone on the floor to make a right-handed lay-up, or, the same girl would dribble the ball around waiting for everyone to move out of the way, and then dribble the ball with her right hand in for a lay-up. In my head I thought that the way to stop this is to force the girl to dribble with her left hand because she clearly wants to dribble with her right hand every time. I also thought that if I were out on the court playing in this Jr. high game I would pick up on that and would make that happen. It is easy to see that and think of that game plan as a twenty-two year old while watching girls half of that age. But, as quickly as I had those thoughts, I remembered myself at that age. I would have gotten caught up in the game plan and not thought at all about the bigger picture of what was happening. I would have more likely committed stupid turnovers, let the player drive right, and taken mindless shots (which is why I wasn’t ever very good at basketball).

My second humbling experience of the day occurred when half of my community and half of the Vincentian Service Corps community combined forces to participate in a trivia night fundraiser at Marian Middle School. Anyone who knows me knows how much I love trivia and random knowledge. I think this comes from watching Jeopardy! every day after school from about third grade through junior high. Perhaps my most successful after-school extra-curricular activity was Scholastic Bowl in Junior High and High School. I became really excited when I first heard that Saint Louis is trivia-night crazy and that most organizations and schools use big trivia nights as fundraisers. A couple weekends ago I had my first trivia experience in Saint Louis. I felt confident before the trivia night began as I remembered my success during school with trivia. As the rounds came and went, I realized that the questions were more difficult than I imagined. Our team realized this as well, and we were only averaging about six or seven correct answers for every ten questions asked. We ended up finishing respectably in the middle of the pack, but the winning teams knew about nine of the answers in every category. The part of the trivia night that resonates with me most however, was not how many answers I knew, but the instances in which I believed I was right and used my sureness to convince our team that we had the correct answer, when we really didn’t. One of my community members pointed this out to me on a few occasions and, and this reflects a major focus of my year in personal growth.

In my opinion, this year in JVC is as much, if not more about inward growth as external growth. A friend pointed out during a conversation last summer that I have hard time admitting that I don’t know something. This was a humbling experience, and I was almost taken aback. But it is true. I do not like to admit that I do not know something. Instead, I will search for even the smallest tangent (which might not even be related to the subject) to appear somewhat knowledgeable. That conversation has caused me to try to be more aware of this bad habit now, and I believe I am getting better at admitting that I don’t know something if it is true. Taking this self-reflection a step further, I find it even more difficult to admit that I am wrong. This has led me at times to project myself as blindly arrogant, baselessly opinionated/judgmental, and leads to me having not the most approachable demeanor or be the most fun person to talk to and be around. (It’s true, I’ll admit it, and anyone who knows me knows this is true too.) This is downright ugly and I am well aware of this and am working my best to change this during this year.

This year is a good year to exercise this internal growth. Living with five other people with differing thoughts and opinions and ways of going about things causes me many times to admit that my way and ideas are not necessarily the best, that there is more than way to do things. It also provides me with ample opportunity to say that I do not know things a lot of the time (which is true). I have often been quoted this year as saying that failing is the best way to learn. This year has taught me that it is ok when things do not go according to plan, and that I can be wrong. This is something that is difficult for me to admit. But, it is true. I draw things up that are too ambitious and move too quickly without proper time to stop and learn and build up each level. It seems like every week at the Y I have these humbling experiences with the kids. I am lucky to have another staff member who points out that I need to address these small issues before I get to the bigger things that I want to accomplish with the games. This happened last week during my basketball unit. I divided the kids into small groups to do different dribbling and passing activities. After having them dribble down the court with their right hand, and then another trip with their left, I was going to have them alternate. My colleague was quick to say “NO, that’s too hard for them”. I agreed and moved on to have them slide down the court while bounce passing. That did not turn out so well and I left that day frustrated. The next day when discussing it my colleague told me I should put more emphasis on footwork and defensive slides first. Then, once they got the movements down do chest passes first and then bounce passes. This worked better and the day was more of a success.

I guess I now am beginning to approach every day as a learning experience, and see how every plan has so many things that could go right and wrong, and I need to embrace that. I need to take things slower, and realize that growth can occur at plateau levels and not just as constant upward movement. I’m learning this year to focus more on the little things, not get upset when they don’t go right, and build those up to the big picture and the larger achievements.

A Symphony of Brotherhood

“With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.”

Martin Luther King Jr.’s I Have a Dream Speech 8-28-1963

I realize that I’m a week late with a Martin Luther King Jr. Day post, but I’m using that day as an inspiration for this post. While this is a Federal Holiday (for those of you who had the day off, I hope that you enjoyed your three day weekend), I spent my MLK day at the Y. For most of my life, this day has seemed like a normal day (except that we would get school off). This year’s MLK day was slightly different. The first noticeable difference is my environment. Both the Y members and the staff are primarily African American, and on this day the mood seemed more uplifting and actually like a holiday. I spent a portion of my day watching the documentaries that we showed in the lobby: the “I have a Dream Speech” and the other speeches given on that day on the Mall. My boss [who attended a HBCU (Historically Black College and University)] is very much into Dr. King’s work and the significance of MLK Day. He kept commenting about how smart the people sounded during these speeches. I agreed. He also provided an interesting juxtaposition to what we were watching as he kept yelling at the kids coming in to play basketball (who had the day off from school) to “pull your pants up, it’s King Day”. Anyway the above “symphony of brotherhood” quote from Dr. King’s “I have a Dream” Speech has always stood out to me. On one hand the beautiful metaphor appeals to me as a musician, but on a deeper level it appeals to my sense of community; it is recognition of people who come together from all over to devote their time towards a cause that they all share a belief in on one level or another. Dr. King summarizes community with this quote. On this day that calls people to participate in service projects, I could not help but think of this year that I am answering the call to service and the many others that I know who stand with me to do a year of service, and to view the year and community through the lens of Dr. King.

I first immediately thought of the people that comprise my community in Saint Louis. This community is what Dr. King alludes to when speaking about the symphony of brotherhood nearly fifty years ago. My community has many faces and identities: Caucasian, biracial, Filipino-Canadian, we come from all different geographical regions of the United States. We have varying levels of faith, and display an array of spiritual, political, and ideological identities. Regardless of our background and outward identities, we all have one unifying identity as a volunteer, and with this identity we all work together, pray together, struggle together to live simply, to struggle together merely to live day to day with our different personalities, ways of life, thoughts, ideas, and beliefs all under the same roof. But, we all have come together to stand up and work for justice.

I think that community is the most difficult of the four JVC values to both explain to others and to comprehend. Part of that reason is because it is constantly evolving in both outward and inward appearances. My community’s look, feel, emotions, thoughts, ideology, spirituality, and workings constantly change. The closest I can do is to say think about the ways that your families have evolved over the years, and now imagine that lifetime of evolution as a microcosm that only lasts for one year. Community is, in a sense, and accelerated family for one year. It is difficult to truly comprehend a volunteer community unless you have either done something like this or are currently participating in a volunteer community setting.

Luckily, we have some help this year. Moving beyond my immediate community, Saint Louis is a great place to volunteer there are many other volunteers from other programs designed similarly to JVC who live and work here. We see three of these programs on a frequent or semi-regular basis (Vincentian Service Corps, Alumni Service Corps, and the Gateway Vincentian Volunteers). I find it fun spending time with the people that make up these different volunteer groups. I feel comfortable talking to the other volunteers, as it is easy to connect to these other volunteers who are in similar circumstances this year, and each program is focused towards like goals and values as the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. In some ways, this feels similar to the feelings of comfort and familiarity that I experienced when in an art/performing arts social settings in Kenya. (See Art and Cultural Social Circles in Nairobi)

Now let’s expand this volunteer community universe that I know to a regional level.

One of the things that I was most excited about when I became accepted into JVC and even first heard about the program was visiting the Jesuit Volunteers in other cities in the Midwest. Each JV community traditionally hosts a holiday weekend in which it invites all of the JVs from the JVC Midwest (Saint Louis, Nashville, Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, and Cleveland). Saint Louis had to miss the first of these weekends (Harvest Moon/Oktoberfest in Cleveland) but spent Halloween in Nashville and Thanksgiving weekend in Chicago. After going to Nashville I said I would never miss another of these weekends again. These weekends are great to catch up with people, learn about how each community is doing (the good, the bad, the gossip, etc) how people are doing with their jobs, learn about their cities and people are doing living in a city that they more than likely have never been to before. They make for great weekends with fun activities and interesting conversation. Saint Louis’s official weekend is Mardi Gras weekend in which we invite everyone, but two weekends ago some people from Nashville and Chicago came to visit. Weekends such as this one gave me time to catch-up with other JVs and have conversations that are “very JVC”, as they range from nightlife, and tricks to living on a meager budget in the different cities, to the churches in Saint Louis and different mass styles, to the social issues and problems facing the city (and county) of Saint Louis.

Later this week, I am attending a five-day (Re) Orientation in Indiana. It will be the first time that I will have seen everybody in the JVC Midwest program at one time since Orientation almost six months ago. I feel like I have come a long way since then. At the beginning I felt a little intimidated by this year of service, and the people in the program because this year was a complete mystery. I didn’t know anyone, didn’t know what to expect from this year of service, was unfamiliar with Saint Louis, and was nervous about meeting and living with a community of new people for the next year. It seemed as if everyone went to a catholic university and, more specifically, attended one specific university (Santa Clara), and everyone seemed to know everyone or at least was already connected on some level. This drove me to feel shy at the beginning during Summer Orientation. This time around, I suspect will be much different as I feel much more comfortable and like I share a volunteer identity with everyone and have spent a few weekends with many of the volunteers and gotten to know many of them.

Click Here to listen to a beautiful song called Symphony of Brotherhood that I discovered in 2008 and featured many weeks on my college radio show.