Purge

This weekend was great Team Leader bonding/celebration/goodbye time. We had a big potluck by the pool on Friday night and I really started to feel the relief of this year ending. Saturday we spent at the movies and playing games together. Yesterday we visited Wade's family at a state park east of Jackson and played on his boats and bikes tubing, knee boarding and skiing. Then we headed to Mellow Mushroom for one last time and all agreed on pizza for probably the first time ever. Finally we came home and all piled into the TV room to watch a movie together.

Today everyone is stuck in their rooms cleaning and packing. I am looking for any distraction- have been cleaning for over two hours and it looks worse than when I started- if that is possible.

Four more days until my life in AmeriCorps is over. I can't believe this has been less than a year- it feels like it has been damn near a lifetime.

I'm nervous about moving on.

Good-Bye #1

Most of my CMs board their shuttles to the airport in 15 minutes... Mixed emotions tonight- mostly nostalgic, sad and proud. Soon- very soon- they will be back in their real lives away from the ameribubble.

I am looking forward to knowing them as people and no longer as corps members...

As we go on...

Today is Graduation.

After a week of Yazoo City Disaster relief, the rest of the corps began returning to campus and we started out-processing. Now here we are at the end. Today is graduation and, after much struggle and determination, all of my corps members will be walking. I am so proud to see them cross the stage. I am also having some severe empty nesting feelings. It is strange trying to process this year. These people are my friends in a way, my peers in a way, but also they are not in a way. It's hard to sort out the mixed feelings- relief, anger, stress, sadness, happiness, pride... I haven't been sleeping well all week.

Last night we had the corps member banquet and I got to hand out the Leadership Award to Michelle. She deserved the recognition. Listening to everyone's speeches and reflections finally got me to the mindset that it is coming to an end. Before last night everything felt like a barreling train headed off the track. Now I am beginning to feel things wrapping up. It's difficult to describe all the thoughts and feelings I have been having this week- and I honestly have been so busy I haven't had any time to attempt to process and deal with them.

But regardless, by tomorrow at noon I will be back to being Casey- no longer team leader of river 4. I will have a few days on campus with the other TLs to close campus and start looking towards the next steps in our lives. Mainly we will spend the time celebrating and soaking in the last few moments we have together.

And soon I will be on the road up towards home.

Yazoo City

Hi Everyone

Update: After returning from the red cross shelter, the team has been assigned to disaster relief in Yazoo City MS. If you aren't familiar, Yazoo City had a GREAT deal of damage from the tornado last month.

Jordan's team was already working in Yazoo, so we have had a team to show us around. Due to an extremely complicated chain of events that I just don't have the time to go into right now, Jordan and I are acting as volunteer and case management with LESM. Many disaster response organizations pulled out this week, turning their case work over to LESM (an organization who only came up to set up a volunteer camp, and at this point does not have the resources, personnel,funding or familiarity with the area to work cases or volunteer management). So, naturally, Jordan and I ended up with a stack of 100+ work orders to sift through and organize. To make things even more complicated, all of the organizations that pulled out sent their volunteers our way. On Friday Jordan and I found work for 100 people (most of whom we had no idea were coming to us for work before they arrived)

This weekend we spent Saturday trying to set up a system for LESM to handle this new job, and today I am catching up on some much needed paperwork and job application...

See you all soon (less than a month until i am free) and send me job ops if you hear of them!!!

Lots of Love,

Casey

Flexibility

Well we have been running the ARC shelter all week. We have 33 residents, all of whom to my knowledge are individuals who have been displaced after a HUD apartment complex was condemned (due to damage from the flooding) last Tuesday.

I have been the ARC supervisor in charge of shelter operations from 12am-8am. It has been quite an experience!

My team has been split up into three 8hour shifts for the week and I haven't seen some of my teammates since we got here. I finally got word that we are being released by the ARC tomorrow and closing down the shelter to head back to Jackson and out-process.

I have NO CLUE where we go or what we do from there, but I suppose I will know on Wednesday. Hoping to head to Nashville with flood relief efforts up there.

Here's to one hectic last week of service.

No matter what our deployment, we will return to campus May 18th to begin my team's AmeriCorps out-processing and soon after I will be bracing myself for some pretty emotional good-byes.

Corinth, MS

Yesterday we returned to campus, cleaned our vans, returned our tools, quickly worked on close-out paperwork and were informed at 5:30pm that we are now on our way to Corinth, MS to run a shelter for the influx of individuals and families displaced by the tornadoes and flooding. We leave today at 10am. It has been quite the week.

I am excited to serve on disaster. I feel like this is what I really wanted to do when I first started the program!

I have no idea what the internet/phone situation will be like up in Corinth but I will try to keep you all posted. If not, I love you all and I will see you soon...

Peace,

Casey

Twister

Hello Out There-

First of all, I would like to say that it is soooo nice to hear from you all when I write my blog. Your responses remind me that there's a whole world outside of AmeriCorps still waiting for me.

Update: My team has been pulled from our project in WV (sadly saying good-bye to Lowell this morning) to return to campus to help out in disaster response in Mississippi. As I am sure you all know, there are disasters popping up all over the state: tornadoes, floods and oil spills OH MY! We are currently at a Sleep Inn in Birmingham, Alabama stopping over on our trip to Vicksburg (accidentally passed the 16th street baptist church- which I made my team get out of the van and explore/learn about after a 12 hour van ride- they were not happy with me). When we arrive in Vicksburg we will be briefed on the response efforts. On Thursday we will head to Jackson to work with the Red Cross headquarters in MS to coordinate efforts. We are also on call in case anyone asks for a team for direct response (think house gutting, tree cutting...)

Looking forward to helping!

Also: The Adopt a Katrina Family video is finally done. BIG THANKS to my Papa on all the hard work he did editing and to corps member Peter from Sally's team for writing the score. PLEASE share it with your friends and congregations!

Love you all!

Peace