My Place and Amy's Place

Hello world! It is summer!

With my roommate gone, the apartment is empty and incredibly quiet (not like she was loud anyway), and Jon is at his home. Well shoot, there went 97% of the people I interacted with.

At first, right as classes were ending, I was like, this is going to be great. I can stay up late reading books and watching movies and not have to get up early and go to class. I can cook real food (more real than throwing some vegetables and cheese onto a tortilla, adding heat, and calling it a quesadilla), read a million great books, hang out downtown Bellingham, go the the park...

And all that was working out fabulously. But then Jon left and I thought, oh my goodness. I'm on my own now. Nobody's here to take care of me or take the bus with me to fun places. Feeling sorry for myself, I tried to keep myself busy. Then I thought, I'm doing this wrong. Normal people are working. At jobs. Real people have jobs. And they talk to people (and drink...mostly drink). I'm not a normal person. Why aren't I normal? Why am I doing this wrong?

I tried to remind myself that finding a part-time job in Bellingham would probably be nearly impossible...and I don't really want a job. I'm happy getting paid here and there from Fair Portia...which is sort of a job.

As I continued to feel sorry for myself, I finally got in touch with this guy running this organization-type-thing which brings college students to a local teen shelter called Amy's Place (google "Amy's Place Bellingham" - I dunno how to put a link into this blog). I got to the shelter at 6:00 pm and stayed until closing at 11:00 pm.

While I was there, I sorted and organized clothes and chatted with some of the people, both volunteers and local homeless and/or battered peopled aged 18 to 25. I was nervous before going there tonight, as I hadn't been there before. Although I want to teach inner-city youth, I was afraid that my first interaction with these people at the shelter wouldn't go well. I thought that I wouldn't be able to converse with them and would be too busy thinking, oh my god. They're homeless and on drugs. I have my own apartment and go to college and have nice shoes. They'll hate me.

Actually, it all went well. Some of the youths talked about being beaten by their parents and others talked about taking drugs, but I surprised myself by not being judgmental. I knew these people were good-hearted, even if they took drugs, and I didn't pity them to the extent where I wasn't comfortable talking to them. It just made me want to help them.

Once again, I found myself wondering if I should be a teacher. I looked around at the building and saw all the wonderful clothes, food, furniture, and friendship Amy's Place has created, and I had a desire to devote my life to this. But my place is in the classroom, and I do believe I can help students to succeed at and say in school. Shelters and schools are both vitally important, and I choose school as my area of focus.

Maybe I'm still not feeling like a normal person who should be working and not living off her grandmother's money, but at least I did something worthwhile today.

--Elie