Reflections on Texas and Getting Perspective

Perspective. That’s it.

After tripping around the country in a 2009-era equivalent to a hippie bus (the 15 passenger van christened ‘Ste-VAN’), that’s one thing an AmeriCorps member can’t deny acquiring. I’ve written to some length about the various adventures, the various sights, and the various people I’ve met over the course of the past few months.

Now, in Texas for the second time during this program, we’ve seen just what a few young people in matching grey and khaki mean for a populace starving for some sort of aid. We spend our days driving between different houses and counties in eastern TX, responding to desperate calls about remaining or reappearing damages. At each house we will do what we can for the home owners. This has included blue-roofing, debris removal, painting, building a playground, and a myriad of odd jobs unforeseen by us during training - how does one turn a plastic sheet, a two-by-four, a length of twisted, a hammer and a few nails into an adequate solution to a taxidermist’s leaking roof? Water 3 has the answer.

With this round coming to an end, and as we begin to bid goodbye to the now-familiar faces that have accompanied us through this project, I’d like to reflect on what reveals to me this round’s significance. There are the same songs that I’ve been singing in each blog I write, preacher’s taking us under their wings and introducing us to free church dinners, hospitable clients who go so far as to prepare us freshly homemade pastries before we arrive, and the friendly faces who recognize the ‘A’ and wave to us as we drive past. We’ve heard over and over the potential of a determined, driven group of youth.

With this, however, comes the realization that since we’ve arrived, our work load has actually grown. For almost every project we’ve completed, we’ve gained another spokesperson going out to the community and claiming our worth. To some, this seems a frustrating conundrum: how can our work ever be finished if, with each success, we acquire another success? To me, this expresses a movement, communities actively going amongst each other to diagnose problems, and suggest solutions.