Monessen Day Five: We're tired now

On our second day of work projects, we were a bit low on energy.  We finished up the apartment we'd started and Butch stopped down to chat with us and to praise us for how amazing the place now looked.  He talked about how he, Jason and Jason (the other maintenance guys at both project sites) were on call 24/7.  He told us about a single mother of three kids, who met a man in China over the internet and left to be with him, leaving behind her furniture, clothing, birth certificates and social security cards.  Oh, and she left her three children behind too.  I have so much respect for these three men who strive to make a difference in this place, who can still look at a disgusting vacant apartment and say "We need to clean it up so that if we wanted a place to live, we would chose here."  How easy it would be to become apathetic, but they aren't.  They care.  They told us how kids like T were pushed out the front door in the morning and told not to come back until it was dark...and we wonder why T has such a chip on his shoulder.

After lunch we started cleaning up another apartment where milk had been left to sour. The smell was incredible.  PK, who was not feeling well, started to feel worse, and I wound up leaving early to take her back to our living quarters.  Sarah and Kelly were right there once we returned, helping me fix PK toast and finding some medication to settle her stomach. 

Friday night was insanely busy with a community cookout.  Lots of kids came, barely any parents and that seemed to be the common theme.  Shalon was there though and as soon as she arrived I heard a "Miss Kim!"  What a cutie.



Shalon and Kirk at the cookout.  I pray for Shalon everyday, that God keeps her safe.

Something else I forgot to mention in yesterday's post.  An odd thing started to happen.  When Paula, Papa Don and I would return each afternoon from the leaders meeting, there wouldn't be any place to sit at our table.  Seems our "loud and weird" kids were attracting a whole bunch of other kids.  Funny how that worked out.

Friday nights at YouthWorks are emotional, especially for first timers, but even for those of us who knew what was coming.  Sarah's lesson that night was about Jesus washing the feet of his disciples and then the YouthWorks leaders washed the church leaders feet.  Then, in turn, we washed our kid's feet and prayed over our kids.  What an honor to be able to pray over these teens who I love so much!  All of our kids have been on YW mission trips before, but not a one was dry-eyed, not even the boys.

Our last night church group time is spent with a ball of yarn.  One person starts it and throws the yarn to the person of their choice, then says what they want to say to or about that person; what makes that person special or unique.  Then that person keeps hold of the yarn thrown to them and throws the ball to the person they choose, etc, and the yarn forms a web of sorts over the table.  At the end, one person is asked to release the strands they hold and we watch as the web begins to fall apart, symbolizing how we are all interwoven and parts of a whole and that we need each other to survive.

After we returned from our church group, we stayed up much too late playing Big Booty with about thirty other people (fun game.  I was hooked).  The kids were now all friends, brought together in a strange place where they had to learn to rely on each other.  The next morning we would pack, clean and depart.