LeahAndMark.com

Bits of Our Life from LeahAndMark.com on Vimeo.

Hey. It’s Sunday night which means that it’s about to be a new week. Right? Right. A whole new week of possibility and change and oppportunity - sure it’s not the same feeling that I get from say, road trips, but since I’m all about things being cyclical and change and… general reinvention of myself and everything I do (well, I like to think I am) every week presents a new chance at doing everything better, or at the very least, different. Good or bad, just different. Not the same, but always trying for something else.

With all this free time lately, I kind of wish I had a better camera/camcorder and other electronic junk - ’cause then I’d find some actors who aren’t doing anything, and we’d hack up a script for a 10 minute shoot and knock it out. Oh well. I suppose I’ll just have to stick with everything else.

This picture right here? A Sausage, Egg & Cheese Biscuit sandwich + an order of Spuds from Thumbs Up Diner down the street. It’s SO good - once you get over the part where if you arrive at the wrong time, it’ll be over an hour wait. And yes, it tasteas good as it looks in this picture (and as unhealthy.) But You know, I’m gonna get back to track on that whole running/ working out/ being fit thing this week. Seriously. Because it’s time to be awesome and while it’s less and less about the appearance factor (ummmm) I just, miss that whole feeling of being some sort of efficient organic machine that could run 8 miles easily and looked like I could. So tomorrow.

The 1st photo and this one above were taken during the Yelp Office Hours hangout event at Octane Coffee Bar. It was nice to get out and go to a coffee shop - and not be alone. Since ya know, I’ve been spending far too much time at coffee shops recently and silently hacking away at things without ever interacting with anyone - except over at Breukelen Mojo where Loren and her mom are always up for a bit of conversation. But still. Even though we don’t get out as much lately (trying not to anyways) - it’s good to see folks.

Job? No job? I’m searching. I’m hunting. I don’t know. I can apply to every job website board, and compete against all of the other Finance Business analyst out there - but that’s an uphill battle. So while I’m continuing the search - well… I’m continuing the search.

We stopped by Barnes & Noble the other day and glanced at some books on Belize. It’s a relatively small country but there’s a lot to read up on. Mainly because we’re attempting to do more than simply staying on the beach/tourist areas during our Honeymoon there - and hopefully, we’ll have the money available to take this trip:

Mayan Encounter:

Duration: 17 days (Playa del Carmen to Antigua)

Highlights: Snorkel in Caye Caulker and see curious manatees, Experience traditional life in San Ignacio, Chill-out by the coast at Playa del Carmen, Bargain hard in the markets of Chichicastenango, Enjoy colonial architecture in Antigua

Group Size:
Minimum 1, Maximum 16

Price:
Prices from USD $910 *(plus local payment USD $300)

Basically 17 days traveling the route you see there on the Map. Of course, logistically, it would make more sense to have our honeymoon In Cancun or Guatemala since they’re at either end of that trip you see there. So maybe. We’ll see. This is ALL dependent on many other factors, most of them being the one. Money. Fortunately, there’s still a little bit of time. A little. So we’ll see right? Right. Because remember, tomorrow is a new week and new weeks always present worlds of possibility. Think of how many new weeks there are between here and June. Many. Many weeks of new possibility.

And yet. While we’re on the subject of Trips; Here’s one more that we’re aiming for - this time we probably won’t be able to hit this one until…. at least summer of 2010.

It’s 37 Days and it covers a great deal of India. Oh. It’ll be an awesome trip. Especially for such a large nation. Kind of like our trip earlier this year around China. We arguably covered as much ground as this Indian trip. But I guess that’s enough for now. Oh. There is another trip that last 51 days and is almost exactly the same as this trip shown here, except it starts in Mumbai (Bombay for you people who didn’t get the memo.) However, on this same trip we plan on spending a week in Kathmandu, Nepal. And then hey! If we ever get the chance to get into the Kingdom of Bhutan, we’re totally there. (Do you know anyone who could help us out? (There are a very limited number of travel visas to Bhutan, and they are VERY expensive compared to… nearly everywhere else - but I think if you know people in Bhutan, they can help you get in much cheaper - it cost something like $75 US per day just to be in the country otherwise.)

And that’s that. Here comes Monday.

We’ve recently been getting a relatively high number of visitors that punched in variations of “filing for unemployment in Georgia” - and since they don’t seem to post this information in plainspeak anywhere on their website or printed material - basically once you file, you’ll receive a letter in the next 10 days (I think it’s 10) that tells you how much you will be eligible to receive and for how long, and then within 21! TWENTY-ONE days after that you will actually be ‘Approved’ - at which time you will finally start getting your money.

It took about 3.3 weeks before I finally got some money deposited into my account. However, even with this lag, and before you are actually “approved”, you want to make sure that after you do the “in-center” paperwork and you’re in the system, that you ‘claim’ every sunday through the Georgia Department of Labor Website.  Because when I did finally get the approval - they paid me for those earlier weeks that I had filed. 

So really, it could take up to a month between when you go into the office and get into the system, to when you finally see some money auto deposited in your account - that’s if you do direct deposit instead of having them mail a check to you. Got that? See. They don’t have a simple set of paragraphs like that anywhere on the website outlining the process. They should. Apparently it’s not that hard. 

*Update - You can verify what their formula is for determining how much money you can get from unemployment - but the max is $330 a week, before taxes. Yes. You get taxed on your unemployment checks. You do have the choice of paying the taxes at the end of year rather than per check - so if you REALLY every bit of money right now (and with so little money being given, you probably do), it’s a good choice to select to pay the taxes later - hopefully you’ll get a decent paying job. Again, I know you’re worried about having to pay all that tax money back - but that’s a choice you’ll have to make. I mean… at roughly 25%, you’re losing $82 out of that 330. So then you’re only receiving $248 per week. 

But obviously, we’re all card carrying members of the Upstanding Citizens Brigade here are LeahAndMark.com! Join us! (Okay, there really isn’t such a thing and we don’t know how you could join us even if there was.)

[Photo removed due to Department of Homeland Security Restrictions]

These are pictures we took at the East Atlanta Strut last weekend. This is 2/3 of SuperCute! - Lizerati and Glue&Glitter. They’re in this video just for a second.  These three are MY role models. (’cause you know, deep down I’m a twenty-something crafty-hipster with strong political and social ideologies concerned with making the world a better place.)

This past week has been up and down and then sometimes it was just sidways. Nothing too interesting, just making the rounds and trying to figure what I’m doing in general. Although it has been nice to get out and about and see other people (I think I’ve been spending a bit too much here in the house, or at coffee shops with no one except… me.) Yeah I know. And I will hangout with some of you people who offered to meet up for lunch sometime - but then there’s always that looming budget concern - and most of the time the ‘going out’ or eating out money is reserved for times when Leah and I go out so that we can actually spend some time together outside of the house - ’cause it’s easy to just stay here and go mindless with all the studying we’re both doing. 

And I do go back and forth between feeling like I should be doing more to find a job - and then days when I feel like… hey, we’re not dying for money right now (as in we’re not going to be homeless) - so maybe I should enjoy this a bit more than I have been. But even that’s hard because unlike other people (both good and bad) I’m still of the mindset where no job = bad. Which is not necessarily the case. But if you’ve worked for a long time (at least a decade) it’s weird to not have a job.

But even still. The reason I haven’t accepted just any job posting out there is because I’m attempting to find a job that I actually want and meets the simple requirements that we need. Basically, money, location, and interest. I’m generally interested in most things so that’s not really a problem (I’m open to most industries, and they’d all be interesting since I’ve generally worked in the Real Estate/Homebuilder/Mortgage area for the last 10 years - an obviously that’s part of why I’m out of a job right now.)

It’s Saturday right? Awesome.

********************************

Filing. How. Much. Georgia. Unemployment Post One

Filing. How. Much. Georgia. Unemployment Post Two

Filing. How. Much. Georgia. Unemployment Post Three 

I’m really enjoying my Social Work program, in spite of the supreme busy-ness of life these days.  My classmates are a great bunch of people and I’ve enjoyed getting to know them over the past month.  One of our professors lost his house and everything in it in a fire last weekend.  This particular professor videotaped each of us on our first day of class so that he could watch the video at home and learn all of our names.  He bakes cookies for us EVERY week.  And he always shows us YouTube videos in class (ones that relate to what we’re studying, of course).  Our class feels awful that his house burned down, so Mark came to school on Thursday and filmed us so that we could make our own YouTube video for our teacher to hopefully cheer him up a bit.

So, meet my classmates:

Hike East Atlanta from LeahAndMark.com on Vimeo.

Here’s the truth. I’ve made the shift. Whereas when I was first ‘let go’ back on August 21st, I was worried. WE were worried. There are bills to pay, things to do, things to repair… so yeah, money was and is still a big issue and area of concern. My job search has come up much less than stellar - and while I have been on a few substantial interviews, they’ve either selected no one from the list of candidates (I’m pretty sure that’s the case with the three primary jobs I interviewed for/wanted) - or one of the arguably MORE qualified and unemployed people out there beat me to it! - and as we all know, there are A LOT of Financial and Business Analyst out there that don’t have jobs.

So, while I continue with my online schooling, and weekly application process - with every passing week, Leah and I are both becoming much more accustomed to all of this freedom we have. While the money is always a concern in the back of our heads - we’re realising that we can do so many more things now than we could when we both worked full time 40 hour weeks.

The primary factor being time. Whereas before we had a little more money but no time - now we have even less money but LOTS more flexibility and for me, MUCH MORE Time. Leah still has a great deal of school work, but there is a lot of flexibility in her schedule compared to when she was tied to a desk for 8 hours a day. Although I used to joke about it before, it’s increasingly becoming true that Jobs really do get in the way of my(our) life(lives).

Packing everything into the two days on a weekend is such a… difficult challenge and even then, I hardly think any of us are really happy with that situation/schedule/pattern of living. So. Like our good friend MelissaL said to me thru Twitter back on that day I was let go - losing my job was the best thing that could have happened to me. And while I say that with all of the naive optimism that someone can possess - there is definitely that fear in the back of my head.  And yet, I think we’ve both crossed a certain bridge. Leah with the overwhelming volume of her studies and me with the idea of not having what I once thought was a dream job (any of them.) So now that we’re on this side of the mountain… even though it’s always going to be a degree of struggle… there is much more possibility. Oh yes. We have big plans.

I’m working on something. But until then - the above video is a mashup of our Friday Morning Hike (last Friday) at SweetWater Creek just past Six Flags here in Georgia, and then also our day yesterday at the East Atlanta Strut. We have lots of video of the EAS so I’ll have to make a new one of just trip sometime. Have an awesome, awesome Sunday. Oh. And if you want to meet up during the week - Let me know.

I know, right?  Two posts in two days.  Who do I think I am….Mark?  But I got super lots of sleep last night and I think I’ve really kicked this cold in the booty, so before I jump into all the work I need to do today, I’m taking a moment to explain social work.  Because it has a stigma - that of a frazzled, burnt-out case manager taking people’s kids away or not taking kids away when they really should, and ultimately being ineffective and constantly stressed and not paid well and always under attack.

Social Workers, in reality, are alllllllll over the place - in hospitals and hospices, governments and NGOs, running nonprofit agencies, orchestrating humanitarian aid in the face of natural disasters, advocating for social justice and more effective policies, restructuring the justice system, the school system, fighting global poverty, improving public health, filling in the gaps where private agencies and public services are too overburdened or underfinanced to serve people.

Social Work is not about “helping” people, per se.  It’s more about facilitating a person’s ability to make positive changes in his or her life.  And maybe that sounds like a fancy way to say “helping people,” but the notion of helping is that I have something you don’t have, and in sharing that with you or giving you resources, I have made your life better.  And even with the best of intentions, “helping” still comes across as arrogant.  Everyone has the capacity and power to change their lives.  I can’t give you something you already have.

Social Workers go through training, internships, etc. to learn how to bring that capacity to the surface.  We learn how to listen, how to separate an individual’s truth from the untruths they have learned or come to believe.  And we work with the person, or the organization, or a roomful of politicians, so that they, too, can hear the truths in their own lives and the lives of those around them.

At the community level, Social Workers work with many different groups to forge relationships, working towards a common goal of meeting the needs of those in the community.

And in the process of all of this, we, the Social Workers, are changed.

“…the real question is not how can I help, but how can I serve?  Serving is different from helping…helping is based on inequality.  Serving is different from fixing. Fixing is a form of judgment.  When I fix a person I perceive them as broken.  Fixing and helping may often be the work of the ego, and service the work of the soul.  We can only serve that to which we are profoundly connected, that which we are willing to touch.  We serve life not because it is broken but because it is holy.  When you serve, you see life as whole….in service we are all connected…all suffering is like my suffering and all joy is like my joy. The impulse to serve emerges naturally and inevitably from this way of seeing.”   - Rachel Naomi Remen

Mmm.  The Yokohama Mama veggie burger at The Vortex.  I love its cheesy, teriyaki, pineapple goodness on a Hawaiian bun.

I also love the dried fruit stalls in China.  Pick a fruit, any fruit…I bet you can find it in a colorful heap down a winding hutong in Beijing.

Mellow Mushroom veggie pizza… that’s pretty awesome, too.  We just had some last night.

Okay, enough with the food.  What is going on?  Have I dropped off the face of the earth?  Maybe just a little.  You see, this grad school business is VERY BUSY.  Plus, it is also VERY INTERESTING.  So, while I might not absolutely have to do all the readings and give it all 110%, well…this is what I want to be doing…probably for a good long chunk of my life.  So I’m going all out here.  And that leaves very little time for other stuff.  Like a social life.

I’ll figure out the right balance in another week or so.  But yeah- grad school consumes around 70% of my time these days.  I love it.  But I also have a GRA (research assistantship) and I have a part-time job, and that’s around 28% of my time.  Which only leaves 2% for everything else, if I’m doing the math correctly.

To top it all off, I caught a bit of a cold this weekend, so I needed to devote some time to recuperating, too.  I’ve gotten a lot better about listening to my body and putting my own needs first lately.  It involves a lot of saying no for the time being, but hopefully that, too, will change.  Setting boundaries…that’s what I’m about these days.  I had to step down as the Director of Program Support for StandUp, but fortunately we have another awesome volunteer ready to take over for me.  Whew!

Also, Anna and her doggie Roo stayed with us last week and that was super awesome.  She spoiled us with tons of goodies and I got to talk to baby Ziya and read her a story…I read in my Human Development book that newborns can recognize the voices they heard in utero, so I hope lil Ziya will recognize me once she’s out of Anna’s womb.  This whole child-growing/birthing thing fascinates me.  Really and truly.

I have yammered on enough for the night and I have more reading to do, as always, so off I go…  just wanted to reassure everyone that I am alive and almost-entirely-well!

Oh!  Also, these are muscadines and I had them for the first time ever on Saturday at Lauren and Doug’s dinner party (along with lots’n'lots of other totally delicious food).  They are gooooooood.  You should try some.

Now…I’m really going.  Bye!

Concurrent with the recent bank failures in the financial markets… last night I started to really consider the possibility that I may not find a new job for quite some time. Of course, I’m still searching, and hoping that I do get hired soon - however, since my unemployment has come through and I’ve been approved for 26 weeks of half of my former salary… the realization that Leah and I could both NOT have full time jobs for a few months…. that’s really interesting. Well. It’s more like a challenge.

Mostly because while all this free time is nice, we’re still busy. I still have things to do, and other projects to work on and Leah of course, has Grad school + her own part time job + we both have StandUp every Wednesday night… But the most challenging part is that since our most basic living expenses are sort of covered (as in, we aren’t going to be homeless), now it’s coming up with the additional funds so that we can meet our financial objectives. Because even though we both do not have day jobs, we still have a wedding to finish planning and a honeymoon in Belize to pay for.

I know. We could feasibly adjust our plans but… there’s still a lot of time, and I still have a lot I can do. So while I’ve stopped truly worrying about getting that next job, I’m shifted focus on the other projects.

Still. The idea that BOTH of us aren’t working day jobs and we’re getting by and could feasibly still meet these financial objectives? I’ll have to not think about this too much. Hey. It’s Tuesday. I don’t think AIG will make it to next Monday without filing for bankruptcy. The current market situation and financial failings is impressive and awesome in the worst way.

What’s the count? Even I forget… today is day 26 without a job. Wow. How time flies when… in general.

I have A LOT to do today, and I probably shouldn’t be blogging right now - but then I rationalized it to myself that I wouldn’t have been ultra productive at this time of day anyways and I need to operate on that um, 80/20 pareto principle where ummm, ah nevermind. But still. So. Let’s get things off to a good start this week, because who knows what’s up coming. I MIGHT even get a job. But until then, I just have to keep doing more of what we’re doing these days… which is actually meeting A LOT of people. Just here and there. Coffee shops, parties. Handing out friend-cards like they’re candy - in a good way though. I’ve probably never been so open and friendly in my life.

I have a lot of general plans in my head and we have these travel/tour guide brochures lying around the house. It’s crazy motivation/reminders of… that side of things that we’re still trying for - you know, along with the daily grind of Leah’s grad school, my job search, paying bills, hanging out and drinking coffee - we still want to get out of here for long stretches at a time and circle a country for a month. (India/Nepal is on our short list for next.)

Oh. And I think I’m going to give up meat until I find a job. Man. I hope I find a job soon.

It’s been an interesting past week/weekend. Our friend Anna (of Anna & Chris) has been staying with us since her landlord hired pest control people to spray for bugs and um, mice and other things - which inevitably means that they’re using chemicals that you shouldn’t be breathing - especially if you’re pregnant like Anna is right now.

Sure, sure they’ll say they use ‘green’ or organic poisons and junk like that - but of course we all know there aren’t any kind of ‘national standards’ that truly classify anything as green - so that doesn’t mean it’s green at all (again, whatever that means) - plus the fact that there are still serious chemical compounds in the mixture that this particular company uses - stuff that is definitely not green, not organic and absolutely poisonous to insects, rats, and humans. Nevermind the pest control guys’ arguing with Anna over how it’s safe and she doesn’t need to leave the house… because he read the informational “fact” sheet provided by the pesticide company. Sure.

It’s been fun having Anna over and hanging out.

Yesterday, Leah and I went to a party over at one of her “work” friends. I say “work” because this friend Lauren works for the Georgia… Restorative Justice Project? Program? (The key part is Restorative Justice) - which is actually where Leah is doing her GRA graduate work-study portion. It was fun. Good food, nice people - but more distinctly - it was a new and relatively, different circle of friends.

Several Lawyers, Social Workers (in the broadest sense of the term - which includes much more than simple case managers - ask Leah and she’ll make sure you understand that being a ‘Social Worker’ is not simply confined to being a low level case manager.)

And before you allow the simple term of Lawyer to cloud your impression - these were public defenders and also a nice couple who works with inmates on Georgia’s death row. Not only the inmates themselves, but their families and how to deal with the issues involved with both the prison experience of visiting a family member on death row, and obviously all of the emotional difficulties and challenges inherent with that situation.

Seriously. Awesome conversations. We even found someone with whom we could have a conversation on the current events of the political goings-on in Nepal recently. That was an interesting surprise.

(Here’s the short run-down of relatively recent events in Nepal: For a long time it was a monarchy. Then the prince, who was mentally ill - went REALLY mentally ill and massacred the rest of the Royal Family; King, Queen, and others - all except the King’s brother - who then ascended to the Throne. Then this new King did away with their Parliament - which brought dismay among the people. Enter the Maoists party - who although were not in outright war with the new King - they were akin to a rebellious terrorists group who halfway attempted to work through political channels. Jumping forward, all of a sudden, the King stepped down and the leader of the Maoists party was elected Prime Minister.

Mind you, over the past decade, a few thousand people did die during the struggle/terrorists acts between the Maoists and the new King. The issues now are whether or not the new Prime Minister will keep to his word and work ‘for the people’ as the Maoists claimed to be before they got into power - or if they will bend to the strong wills of their neighbors - China or India. Nepal is in between the two giants, and their problem is compounded by the fact that they’re a land locked nation.

Now YOU TOO can have an indepth and informed conversation on the current state and recent history of the once Mountain Kingdom of Nepal.

 I still haven’t found a new job. I haven’t been on an interview since I was let go from my last one. (I went on four interviews right before I was let go - but none since.) Which reminds me - I have to do my weekly filing for unemployment…. done. It’s pretty simple once you sign up - apparently. I just login - click Yes, No, No and Submit. Hopefully I get that check soon.

Hopefully I get my next great job soon. In the meantime. We’re doing covert ops for the FBI/CIA/NSA - name the government agency and I’m working for them… I’m not quite sure what I’m talking about here. But clearly I have a plan and it cannot be mentioned in print - so if you ever see me in real life, we’ll talk about it sometime.

We had plans to go to a second party last night but the cold that Leah had been keeping back all day long broke the dam and so she rapidly went downhill once we left the first party. Rapidly. So we went home and stayed home.

This morning she’s in bed and finally sleeping (it’s actually almost noon now) - so I’m here, typing away, procrastinating on doing my homework/ assignments/ writing/ cleaning/ everything. But look at that photo up above. That’s the grilled salmon that our new friend Doug grilled up last night. I have video of it… somewhere.

I should get to work on something. Thank you.

Atlanta StandUp for Kids from LeahAndMark.com on Vimeo.

It’s been roughly a year since we started volunteering with Atlanta Standup for Kids. And while I’m just going to cop-out on this entry and repost below something I wrote a long time ago - some of you may still not have read it before. It was written last January however, the photos are new. The video above? Clips taken from the outreach center last Wednesday + our recent volunteer appreciation party at No Mas Cantina, and then photos from the benefit concert earlier this year at Smith’s Olde Bar. We’ve seen lots of volunteers during this past year and some even come back every now and then when it’s right for them - and obviously they’re always welcome. Still. I understand. It’s difficult in so many ways. 

I wrote the portion below earlier this year and although I’ve been at this for a while now, it’s still pretty close to how I feel, and what I experience there every week. In fact, a few months ago I started going only every other week simply because… I’m not quite sure how to describe it - but even though for most of us it’s only once a week - we still need breaks. Like anything done in this realm of social-worky-type things, it’s very easy to feel like you’re not making any progress with any of the youth - and the disillusion is frustrating. Especially when you’re talking about the difficult ones that require counseling/managing/mentoring from someone else who’s much more qualified than I/you are.

But obviously, they’re not seeing those people. They’re not getting that help and counseling from someplace else. Even though they’re arguably difficult or simply - a pain to deal with - we can only do as much as we can and beyond that… beyond that there is usually nothing else available to these kids as far as a redeeming influence, or even what we would consider a good example to learn from. 

More kids have been coming to the center lately, last Wednesday there were 30 youth signed up and at the center. Many of us double or triple-up on kids now. Through it all, Atlanta StandUp for Kids has made considerable progress over the last 6 months let alone over the course of the year since Leah and I started volunteering. Having grown from a small group of dedicated volunteers - they’re significantly more organized and structured - even just during those 5 hours on Wednesday night. Honestly, I don’t know how long I’ll do this - but I also said that a year ago. Either way, I know that if I ever dropped off the face of the planet, if I randomly showed up on a Wednesday night, the other volunteers would show their appreciation and then quickly put me to work. Because there are always more youth.

WE REPEATEDLY FAIL EACH OTHER and I couldn’t care less, I won’t - I refuse. Screw the Homeless with their open hands, begging for a handout while I sit 2 hours in traffic everyday, my life squandered while the meter runs at $4.00 a gallon.

Others fight to eke out an existence, giving up life for less than minimum wage, begging on a corner for employment from bigots because they’re not allowed to be in this country. Seeing them battle for work makes it difficult to care about panhandlers who seem to ‘want’ to live on the street. I do what it takes to not be homeless, why can’t they?

Every Wednesday night, nearly without fail, I find myself surrounded by them; kids, teens, and young adults on the verge of never having a better existence than the one they have right now on the streets. The longer they’re out there without help, without breaking the cycle of their poverty, the less likely it’ll ever change. Most haven’t reached the point of begging on the streets. Full of misplaced pride, they’d rather steal, and even then with this bunch that seems to be a very last resort.

I volunteer at StandUp for Kids and it’s always a battle with myself. After 10 hours of work and commute, spending another 5 hours volunteering isn’t at the top of my list and I don’t want to go. Two hours later, as I stand in the kitchen spooning food and listening to a chorus of melody and syncopated rap rhythms, I see what the other, more caring volunteers see in these kids.

As a group of young black males sit together, rhythmically pounding the table while beat boxing and rapping in circle, it’s easy to witness them open up and forget the dire situation in which they live. They’re relaxed here, and when their defenses lower you can see something in them that very few others will, their potential to be greater than what they’re headed for right now.

StandUp for Kids isn’t a right-away feel-good volunteer project for many of us who spend time there. Sure there are the weekly dinners provided by a church group, or corporation, or even restaurant, but for the rest of us, it’s a crazy commitment that allows us to see actual change and development in these youth. When the restaurant Trois brings food - great food such as excellent breaded teriyaki chicken, it’s a welcomed treat and the kids show their appreciation.

Requiring nearly 24 hours of training and background checks before you’re even allowed to work with the kids, this isn’t for everyone. It probably isn’t for me - and I don’t think about that too much, pushing those thoughts to the back of my head and pulling better reasons up front. Pulling the good reasons, the sort that they throw up on commercials to pull at your heart and get you to give. I grind my teeth at the cheesy thoughts floating around in my block of a head. This ‘doing good’ schtick is eating away at my cynicism, erasing the cold bastard I so often claim to be.

It’s hard. Every now and then I get tired and I want to stop. It’s easy to just stay home and do nothing. No one will call asking me to come and help out. They’ll just go on about their business and I’ll be a memory. On those nights when I’m tired, and on the very rare occasion when I’m somehow roped into giving a ride home to a pregnant teen about to give birth, my disposition isn’t in top form.

But it’s hard not to change attitudes when I arrive at her home and witness 10 people in one room, strewn across the floor, sleeping soundly while the walls creak from the cold outside. They’re conditions worthy of a ’save the children campaign’ and before I can say much of anything, the pregnant teen says thank you and pushes me back into the night, away from seeing anymore than the too much I already have. Hers is a reality completely foreign to me and although we welcome anyone at the center, that doesn’t mean the feeling is or should be reciprocated with her home.

So I go, every Wednesday night and I work with the more committed, more experienced and absolutely more caring volunteers, trying to help these kids from a life they didn’t sign up for, but are clearly living. It’s difficult and progress is rarely noticeable, but there are moments. Glimmers when one person shines and you see that they want something different, and without you, without this group of people, they have much less of a chance out there to be something great, or even something where they don’t have to worry about their next meal.

They don’t need help surviving. They’re already doing that. They need help breaking a cycle of poverty that many of them were born into and don’t know how to escape.