VISTA Corridor Flood Recovery
summer blogger
Blogger
Katie Graham
"As I stood in a church basement, on a cell phone, listening to a friendly stranger tell me he had a dilemma that needed my help, it all seemed to flash before my eyes. I could help people this summer because it was my job; I could care enough to get a few good stories for my roommates and leave it all behind when I returned to school this fall. Or I could help people because, when I applied for AmeriCorps*VISTA on one fine antediluvian spring evening, I decided that this summer I wanted to live for someone other than myself. And at the moment that someone else had a dilemma.
Welcome to my summer."
July 9, 2008
Katie Graham is an AmeriCorps Volunteer in Service to America (VISTA) summer associate assigned to Central Cedar Rapids Weed & Seed/VISTA Corridor Flood Recovery.
Katie's blog will be featured on GazetteOnlinec.com starting July 9, 2008. Katie plans to post Wednesdays, Fridays and Mondays through August 11, 2008.
The original plan for Katie and the other Weed & Seed summer associates was to focus on five neighborhoods, working on neighborhood outreach, event planning and poverty-fighting initiatives.
Then came the floods.
The group quickly refocused on flood recovery efforts.
Katie is the high-energy and adaptable assistant co-director at the East Central Iowa Volunteer Reception Center.
Katie, 21, grew up in Cedar Rapids and is spending what likely will be her last hometown summer as a full-time VISTA summer associate. She is international studies major, minoring in Spanish, at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois.
Katie Graham
"As I stood in a church basement, on a cell phone, listening to a friendly stranger tell me he had a dilemma that needed my help, it all seemed to flash before my eyes. I could help people this summer because it was my job; I could care enough to get a few good stories for my roommates and leave it all behind when I returned to school this fall. Or I could help people because, when I applied for AmeriCorps*VISTA on one fine antediluvian spring evening, I decided that this summer I wanted to live for someone other than myself. And at the moment that someone else had a dilemma.
Welcome to my summer."
July 9, 2008
Katie Graham is an AmeriCorps Volunteer in Service to America (VISTA) summer associate assigned to Central Cedar Rapids Weed & Seed/VISTA Corridor Flood Recovery.
Katie's blog will be featured on GazetteOnlinec.com starting July 9, 2008. Katie plans to post Wednesdays, Fridays and Mondays through August 11, 2008.
The original plan for Katie and the other Weed & Seed summer associates was to focus on five neighborhoods, working on neighborhood outreach, event planning and poverty-fighting initiatives.
Then came the floods.
The group quickly refocused on flood recovery efforts.
Katie is the high-energy and adaptable assistant co-director at the East Central Iowa Volunteer Reception Center.
Katie, 21, grew up in Cedar Rapids and is spending what likely will be her last hometown summer as a full-time VISTA summer associate. She is international studies major, minoring in Spanish, at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois.
Summer of the Floods
This is the story of Katie Graham, an AmeriCorps Volunteers In Service to America (VISTA) summer associate assigned to Central Cedar Rapids Weed & Seed/VISTA Corridor Flood Recovery.
The EndAugust, 11, 2008
It will be ten weeks tomorrow. Ten weeks of attempting to coherently explain the VISTA program to strangers, ten weeks of people getting the CCIA acronym on my badge confused with the CIA, ten weeks on the payroll of the federal government. It all ends tomorrow.
Tomorrow Melissa, Kristen, Jennifer, Alice, Thelma, Angela, and I will be the first VISTAs to complete our term of service. It has been a long ten weeks, a hard ten weeks, an unpredictable ten weeks.
First there was a natural disaster. Then there were job changes, reassigned responsibilities, new coworkers, endless miscommunications, a gun threat, keys locked in vehicles, supply issues, angry homeowners, worksite accidents, and a natural gas explosion. The work was messy, convoluted, and unclear. The office joke became that if your information was older than five minutes it was outdated.
The only thing that did not change after the flood was the needs; even today individuals continue to call in for assistance. Facilitating that assistance is what redeemed the summer. Without making everything perfect, pretty, or poetic, it made it worthwhile.
Tomorrow I will walk away with the knowledge that I did something this summer, albeit with the knowledge that I should have done more. There is too much left to do. Dear readers, if I have managed to command your attention to this point, my final request is that you do not forget. Do not forget about the people whose lives have been irrevocably changed, who so tragically are often the most vulnerable of our society. As a city let us not needlessly reach the point of desperation. Everyday for the last seven weeks you volunteers have demonstrated to me the power of choosing to acknowledge a need, of giving without expectation of thanks, of living life for someone else.
I leave tomorrow humbled by this ten week lesson of how much I have left to learn – about compassion, about gratitude, about sacrifice. May your lives continue to provide me that quiet example of compassionate, sacrificial living. And may you be blessed.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
To read Katie's complete blog, go to http://katiegraham.wordpress.com/.
What are Johnson County VISTA members with VISTA Corridor Flood Recovery doing this summer? Check out this site.
