jayunsplanet

This past spring I decided to accompany a group of VJC students to New Orleans, Louisiana to spend our spring break week helping in the community devastated by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. While most college students are spending this time at sunny beaches or just relaxing and taking it easy, we spent a week doing labor and getting dirty. I will admit, I wasn’t really looking forward to the work or the fact that I wouldn’t be able to sleep in everyday and then go get paid at work. On the other hand, I was excited to go on a road trip to a place I had never been and be able to help people all while hanging out with my friends.

Our mission was to work with Campus Crusade for Christ who was stationed in NOLA since soon after Katrina hit in 2005. College groups come down and CCC organizes where they will work for the week. They also hold nightly meetings with the groups and sponsor fellowship. Our group from VJC was split up for the workdays. My group basically did 3 different jobs. We worked with a group/staffing organization called Acorn. We also worked with a group of volunteers called “Common Ground”. They were stationed right in the heart of the Lower 9th Ward – in fact right in front of where a levy was breeched by a barge which flooded the 9th Ward and the area that received much of the media coverage.

With Common Ground we worked at the Louisiana Nature Center. This center had a huge forest that was complete devastated by the nasty waters that got dumped all over NOLA during Hurricane Katrina. An invasive species of plants called “Chinese tallow” had overtaken the forest (and much of the Southern Gulf Coastal plains.) As long as these plants were allowed to grow, nothing else would grow in the forest area. So they needed to remove these species. They look like wooden bamboo sticks. We also were able to plant some trees for future growth. We also went down to the Lower 9th Ward and worked on a community garden at the Common Ground house that sits right in front of where a barge breeched a levy. This was a great group bonding we had because the entire VJC group eventually got together to work on this.

With Acorn we worked on an older woman’s house that was gutted as a result of Hurricane damage. The entire VJC group worked together to strip door frame and window moldings and scrap off any junk. We then primered everything door frame and window frame. We also cleaned out the junk from underneath her house. It was a pretty relaxed 2 days. We could have done more, but there was no direction so we just all hung out.

My group spent some time at a place where old Christmas trees are dumped – to resuse AFTER Christmas! New Orleans residents move their Christmas trees from their living rooms after Christmas to their front porches and leave them there until Mardi Gras. Mari Gras had just ended by the time we got there. So, that brings us to the Christmas tree dump. To the New Orleans naturalists, these trees are a godsend. We stacked the trees into piles throughout the area. Later on, the US Coast Guard will come in with helicopters and pick up the bundle of trees and deposit them into sections of the Mississippi River and other watersheds to rebuild the coastline that was extremely damaged by Hurricane Katrina.

Admittedly, I feel as though we didn’t accomplish enough to warrant a trip like this. I feel that the organization(s) we worked with simply weren’t organized enough to provide us with valuable working experience to help others. There is a TON of work to be done down in New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, but at this point, it’s more necessary to have skilled laborers. The months after Katrina, New Orleans saw thousands of volunteers coming down from across the country to help out. At that point in time, volunteers were needed to do the dirty work of clearing out homes – anyone could do that. Now, it’s time to rebuild, and you need construction workers who are skilled and licensed to do such work. On the other hand, we were thanked tremendously by numerous people while we were down there. They saw the effort we made and they appreciated any and all help no matter how small we thought it was. One woman even paid for our entire group’s dinner one night!

I am somewhat of a picky eater. Let’s just get that out of the way. Generally, a safe dish for me would involve chicken. I absolutely despise cheese. I will not eat anything with melted cheese in it. I can tolerate cheese on tacos and the occasional pizza slice though.

With that said, here I dine on chicken tenders, French fries, a hot mini-loaf of bread w/ honey butter, and a Dr. Pepper. This is my weekly meal from Outback Steakhouse. It is off the children’s menu and only costs $5. It totally fills me up and is a much better value than going somewhere like McDonalds.

I learned that honey butter was available upon request at Outback. It’s an insider knowledge… but the taste is amazing. It tastes so much better than regular butter. The Outback bread is also amazing. I am a chicken tender connoisseur. I have had chicken tenders from everywhere under the sun.

Outback makes my favorite chicken tenders. They are plump and meaty but also have a great amount of batter. Batter is important. Chicken tenders need some health amounts of batter.

The fries are not really my favorite, but they go with the tenders and bread nicely. I generally like crispier fries and Outback fries are usually a little soggy. The sogginess might be due to the carryout container. I recall the fries being crispy when you eat in the restaurant. However, I digress.

There is a proper way to eat this meal. To get the full sensation of all these delectable items you must take a bite of all of them in the same mouthful AND wash it down with the drink of your choice. It is an amazing experience.

Couple this meal with a great television show, and I’ve just had the greatest hour of my week.

I am not really into the arts. I don’t like that modern abstract art where you have to interpret meanings and all that junk. I generally like art that is a picture or painting of nature, architecture, or people. Honestly, a piece of “art” that always intrigues me is right here in my house. It’s not your typical Van Gough painting, it may not even be that great of a painting to an artist, but I love it. It’s painted on the wall at the bottom of my steps to my basement. It’s a snowy winter scene with a covered bridge as the focal point. I love it for the winter scene, the nature, and the architecture. It symbolizes my one of my ultimate locations and times.

I dream of living down in the south in the country and having a covered bridge like this at the end of the driveway to my house which sits on acres of land. People have different desires and places they want to live in their lives. I want to move down south and live the country lifestyle but still be connected to the city.

I walk by this painting numerous times through the day and never really look at it in depth and really think about it. This is getting me to think of the painting and realizing how much it describes my ideal location. I wonder if walking by this painting had some kind of subconscious effect on me. Is the painting part of the reason why I am so intrigued by scenes like this? If someone told me that was true, I would actually believe it. Seeing an image every single day has to have some kind of effect on you whether you realize it or not.

Driving home from a friend’s house Friday evening, the time is 12am. I have a choice. 695 or back roads?

I love the back roads. I haven’t taken a drive like this in awhile. Gas is expensive, but my newly repaired car is getting good mileage. What the heck? Go for it. I turn onto Dulaney Valley Rd – constantly scanning the shoulder for critters or deer that want to meet up with the side of my car. Lights on high lighting up the otherwise pitch black landscape. The twinkle in dark horizon catches my eye. Slow down. Tail up in the air. The fox darts back into the bush. That was close. Keep going. I round the bend, and spot a low-lying fog coming up off the water of the lower Loch Raven Reservoir. It’s both creepy and beautiful. As I continue around the bend I’m trying to focus on the road but I want to look at this fog – half expecting something to pop up out of the water – hoping for some odd reason. Not wanting to have car drive off the side of the cliff into this beautiful scenery, I pull of into the gravel lot overlooking the man made dam with a perfect view over top the foggy water scene.

It’s so relaxing and peaceful; there is a car down below ion the side of the road. As I Drove by, I did notice two occupants. I do not care to know anymore about their situation or business. Once parked with my windows half way down and the moon roof opened I caught the whiff of a burning fire. What perfect weather to cozy up to the fireplace or bonfire. 58 degrees on the temperature readout. A melody of upbeat yet calming alternative rock playing in the background – I remember my notebook is in my bag in the trunk. I reach through the trunk bypass and grab the book and start writing.

It feels a little weird sitting here on the side of the road writing in a notebook about this beautiful scenery – but I kind of like it. A car drives by, the first one so far, it snaps me out of this weird relaxing mood, I check the clock – 12:30am. It’s time to head off on my way. I start the engine, pull out, check my rearview for one last glimpse of the water, and head home – relaxed and renewed.

The picture I found to use is me sitting at my Lego table setup in the basement of my house. The picture is dated November 1998. I had a neat setup with 2 tables in an L shape. One table had all my good Lego pieces spread out. The other table is where I built my creations. I had drawers under the table full of pieces.

I used to spend hours after dinner building everything from cars to buildings to skate parks to mini cities. This was the earliest I can trace back to my hands on creativeness.

I have evolved from Lego’s to small wood models to shelves to bike ramps to now working on my car. I love being hands on and making or modifying things.

For a while I designed building floor plans on graph paper and then that evolved into using a computer program to design the same things in even less time. (I still liked the hand drawn method though.) I have binders full of layouts.

I always wanted to be an architect… but in middle school, I realized that I had no mathematical skills whatsoever.

IN high school, I picked up computers and fell in love with that. I taught myself everything I knew through hands on experience of breaking and trying things. This stems from my childhood of playing with toys and taking them apart sometimes never putting them back together. However, I considered it worth the expense. My parents were a little upset but they soon realized it brought me joy and could turn into something good. Turns out it did benefit me, because in my career I have to take apart electronics all day long and build computers.

What I am trying to get at and show is my mischievous “tinkering” and creative childhood formed who I am today and benefited me in the things I do now.

This picture brings back memories of my childhood and really helped me to realize how much of an effect growing up and doing these things have on me today. It’s neat to look back on time and see how things changed and what made you.