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Published: October 6th 2010
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The YAV/DOOR volunteers
At a recent Church Picnic Every Wednesday my housemates and I join a group from our host congregation for sand volleyball. Falling right in the middle of the week, it is a great time to decompress, re-evaluate how things are going and rest on the foundations of friendship and community. I found this space of friends and community especially needed this past week.
About 20 minutes from downtown, the sand volleyball courts are in the middle of blackened asphalt and concrete covered suburbia. There are no beaches around, and the courts lie in between a Y formed by interstates I-10 and I-35. So it was a bit bizarre to me, to play hours of sand volleyball to the hum of sleeping semi-trucks under Shell gas-station lights.
Wednesday was a stressful day. Work with COPS/Metro has been picking up. With a month or so left until the elections, days off are a novelty. Adjusting to a new city, balancing responsibility to my community, the host church, my self and then my job takes delegation, and maturity in not miss-attributing stressors. Yet, I feel lucky to have a lot of responsibility at work, and to be given that freedom.
At the volleyball courts, the sand is buffered by a patio, which leads you to a bar and restaurant. On the patio are wood picnic tables: the kind that are heavy and hurt when you stub your toe. When we got there my housemates ran out to the sand. I wanted to sit down, in quiet and peace just for moment. So I grabbed a beer, and sat down by a member of the church who was also sitting out a game.
It was a time where we were both able to sit and talk, about real things: About challenges at work, with life, relationships. Oddly enough, it seemed to be marked and measured by the amber ale I was drinking. The wet beads fell quick to the pine or oak or maple wood table as I placed the glass down with a thud. With each conversation topic, I felt that bridges were being built and true friendships were being formed. With each sip, feelings of relaxation, comfort and confidence in my being in San Antonio saturated the air.
Events like Wednesday sand volleyball provide a sense of community and forward progressive moments.
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This forward motion has been in many directions. I’ve been meeting with various Presbyterian churches around San Antonio to continue my fundraising efforts and gain connections.
I have been meeting with various directors of campus and university ministry programs to see how they might partner with COPS/Metro in the Get Out the Vote effort.
I have been working 7 days a week getting walk kits ready for walks, organizing GOTV walks, communicating with the other organizers and the lead organizer in how I can improve my work, and what new projects need to be done.
My typical day begins at 830 and ends at 8pm. They are long, hard, good, energizing, exhausting days. They are filled with trivial challenges such as getting lost in a spread out city. The days are ridden with new conversations and ideas. Ideas ranging from community development to explaining how social justice is religiously motivated. My daily life as a YAV is encompassed in the tenuous relationship between believing and acting out my values, faith, and aspirations.
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I am treated as an employee: not a YAV, not a volunteer. And I couldn’t ask for anything else. During my one-on-one’s with the lead organizer, I hear critiques on my work. I am able to bring concerns, disappointments, and questions about my trials with organizing. It is here that I feel the most like an organizer. I use language like “pushing back,” “agitating,” and “it’s about getting votes.” We talk about the most effective ways of getting to know people, and feeling out meetings; about leaving meetings with a solid understanding of who an individual is, but more importantly we talk about leaving a meeting with an understanding of what the next steps are in partnerships.
I read Paulo Freire because I believe his insights into education have much to do with today’s society. It is all related, I think. And through amber ale-coated conversations that melt away waxy layers of stress, to long days on the phone and looking at computer screens of voter data, I am reminded of how systematic social change works: through praxis and theory, through mobilization and organization. And right now, in my daily life and my work life, I am building the theoretical and relational foundations in which social changes occur.
All of the thoughts I’ve written above collectively make up the environment of community development. It must occur through relationships, through a knowledge of a community, through a practical understanding of the community demographics. Most importantly it must happen through conversations that sometimes occur in a sand oasis surrounded by shell station lit up semi-trucks.
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I want to share with you all the other stories of various YAVs. Here are some from around the country and abroad. I'll change the list as I contact more YAVs.
Ben in Kenya: http://bensnipes.blogspot.com/
Jacob in Tucson: http://www.jacobowensintucson.blogspot.com/
Allison in Tucson: http://www.aliway.net/
Kyle in Hollywood: http://wmkyleclifton.blogspot.com/
Meredith in Tucson: http://www.mer-wilkinson.blogspot.com/
Tad in Chicago: http://thopp.blogspot.com/2010/10/anne-rice-and-quitting-christianity.html?spref=fb
Tina in Guatemala: http://tinadeyoe.tumblr.com/
Jenny in Korea: http://jennymcardle.blogspot.com/
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