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Alison K.- This trip was an experience I refuse to forget. There were lots of new people we got to meet, and build relationships with, and lots of amazing people that everyone talked about from the other missions. Everything we did was meaningful. The people that I met were very interesting, and I began realizing these people’s needs. I learned things from the people in my group. I worked at two nursing homes and a Youth Development center. I think I made some lasting impacts. The elderly just want somebody to talk to. And if only we would just let them talk! We would learn so much. The lady I spoke to, at Meadowbrook’s nursing home, Helen, a pianist, I think about 94 years old, was like walking history. Her story was just the story of a ‘typical farm girl’ in South Dakota. And it was fascinating to hear her talk. She told me about everything… and repeated herself, so I’m not thinking I’ll be forgetting about it soon. Somehow, her story kind of reminded me of Anne of Green Gables, or Laura Ingalls Wilder, or an American Girl story. It was just awesome to hear the way things really were back then, directly to the ones who lived in it. I also spoke to Ruth. I didn’t get much time to talk to her, but she was incredible. She had multiple sclerosis, and she was writing these books, one about MS and her sister with MS, and another about domestic violence, due to her years helping in a battered women facility. She was incredibly strong and inspiring, even in the few minutes I got to speak to her.
At the Youth Development Center, I talked to a girl. We didn’t say much, and the screens of the computers were so attracting to me in that crowded, secluded corner… I do believe somebody should’ve been watching these kids more… I saw a little makeover game similar to the ones I’d play at home, and so I walked toward that person on that computer. I learned quite a bit from just watching her there. I sort of detected her fashion sense, by the way she styled the animated, portrait-view, models. She surfed the web, on the appropriate site list, and I learned her name from her sending a random comment to Disney Channel’s site. When she got off the computer, she asked me if I wanted to draw, and set down paper and a pencil in front of my seat. And so we drew for a few minutes. Kristi and her group of little girls, who were playing ‘pretend’, imagined that we were both at an art school that they were visiting. They took pictures of us. I played with the younger girls outside for a minute, then came back in. All these kids wanted were a friend. Someone to talk to, or draw with, or appreciate them, or just to play with them.
On the day of the activity, when we went to the waterpark, I saw my older friend, who was my age, the one who drew, and her eyes just lit up when she saw me. We had hardly said anything, but we were friends already.
What really got to me, however, was the ‘club’ nights, on Tuesday and Wednesday. Tuesday had a very important message. God loves everyone. No matter what they do. No matter who they are. On the very first night that we all arrived here, someone told us to think of everyone as someone that God loves, rather than judging them. The ‘Club’ on Tuesday really reinforced this. They showed us a slideshow of pictures. Of so many different people. And every single one of them, is loved by God. That was extremely powerful in itself.
To be continued….