Treading Softly in Timberlands

It's 10:00 Sunday night. I've been packing the last 5 or 6 hours, and I'm finally done. I leave for school tomorrow at 6:05, and stay until 6:00. Then I ride home, finish the tiny last minute things, and move out at 7:30.

I love you. I miss you.
I'm sorry I forgot to post last week. I wasn't going to post this week either, but then I decided I couldn't call myself a blogger if I don't post when I say I would.
Here is the post I started last week.

City Year is...

Weeks 1 and 2 In School...also, I need to figure out what I write about in this blog.

My idea of keeping a blog was that people would be able to read it as their post church activity. You know, not have to wait until midnight to read it. Hmm.

Well, I'm doing great. Also, I'm convinced that I'm the favorite kid because I am the most exciting to talk about. Lol, mostly I'm just homesick.

But that's ok. It's not the debilitating homesickness that I thought I'd go through, it's the 'I haven't been touched in 4 days and I miss the mandatory after family prayer hugs'. It's the 'I discovered amazing friends just before I moved, how fair is that?' and also the 'I miss my dogs!!!' (That's for you, Emily and Wendy).

Truly, I'm happier than I ever have been in my life. The service I'm providing in is amazing. The people I serve with are equally amazing. The students. I care about them so much. It's crazy, I just met them two weeks ago, when school started. But I know already how much potential they have. How much worth.

I posted on Facebook a few days ago this statement : “A student was shocked today when I told him that I moved away from my family right out of high school all the way to California just to volunteer with City Year. He said "It wasn't worth it. You made a dumb choice."

My goodness, how he's wrong.
I think this is worth every bit.”

It got 16 likes. That's 15 more than my average. :)

I have been getting to know these students only two weeks, but I know a lot about them. They are desperate for someone to listen. To know about their lives. To care about them, and not only about their test scores.

Now, I know that the teachers here are amazing. I'll talk about them in a bit. I know the staff here are great, and they care about the whole child, not just the test scores.

But I am in a great position to get to know these kids in a way these teachers don't get to. To the students, teachers live at school. They're not really people, just teachers. That sounded kind of harsh, but really, think about when you were in school. How much did you know about your teacher's not school life?

These kids are fascinated with the fact that I am the youngest person on my team. Probably mostly because I look 5 or 6 years older than I really am. I am not offended. :P

They love that I ride my bike everywhere. They love that I don't know where to go to college next year, which kind of surprised me. Now it kind of makes sense. No, I don't have my whole life figured out, but I'm working on it. I'm excited to share my college application process with these students. I hope it will make their future more real and possible to them.

(I forgot to write about how really truly awesome the teachers are, but it's almost 10:30 and I wanted to be in bed sleeping 1.5 hours ago. So this is where I would put that paragraph, but it's going to have to wait.)

Here's an example of my day:

5:30 Turn off the alarm.

5:39 Turn off the alarm again. Fall out of bed. Get ready to go.

6:00 Remember you're supposed to eat breakfast. Not to be healthy, but because when you try to convince your students to eat breakfast because it's healthy, you can't be a hypocrite.

6:03 Finish whatever pathetic breakfast you scavenged.

6:05, :06, :08 and :09, run back into the house to grab things you forgot.

6:10 actually leave your house, ride bike 1 hour.

7:20 Arrive at school 10 minutes early. YES! (I despise being late)

7:30 First circle begins. Our team meets in circles so we can see everyone, and have a natural order for things. We do first circles in front of the school. It's great because it keeps us accountable for being on time (it's hard to sneak into a circle), the kids see us, we get our announcements, and get to say goodmorning to everyone.

7:45 Leave first circle (after an epic spirit break) and drop our stuff off in the City Year Room. Yes, we're cool enough to get a room. We're spoiled, I know. Go socialize with kids. Try to learn names. Fail miserably. Keep trying.

7:55 Get schedule from PM or TL (have I mentioned that CY likes acronyms just as much as LDS people do? PM=Project Manager, TL=Team Leader, CY=City Year, LDS=Latter-Day Saint (Yes, Mormons)). Go to first class. We're observing for now, but I'm fairly certain we get our permanent teachers soonish.

9:00 go to second class.

10:00 Prep the Pride Store. I am one half of a two person committee getting the store ready. It opens Monday the 17^th. Oh goodness, that's tomorrow. The Pride Store is an integral part of the school wide incentive program. Students earn pride bucks for completing work, being on best behavior, participating in the lesson, etc. They then get to spend their pride bucks at the store on trinkets and school supplies.

11:00 Go to class. I don't remember when lunch is.

Noon: go to student lunch. More socializing, more pathetic attempts to learn names. I'm getting better, but slowly, because now my grace period is over, and the students are telling my their names are wrong just to confuse me. It works.

1:00 My lunch. Eat lunch, sleep discreetly, make calls to my ornery bank...usual stuff. I'm not supposed to work. Sometimes I do anyway.

2:00 school's out. But I missed a period in there somewhere. I know the bell schedule isn't on the hour, but I didn't think it was that off. Whatever. There should be 6 periods and a lunch.

2:05 After school program starts. Students get a snack in the cafeteria, I get a break.

2:30 Students make their way to their classrooms for homework hour. For the next hour, I tutor some kids, get to know others, and the rest, I peel off the ceiling. JK, no one has found their way onto the ceiling. Some got onto the roof though.

3:30 to 6ish I get to play with kids outside, get to know them, keep them off the roof, no big deal.

6:00 Final circle. Announcements, then personal joys, appreciations, and announcements around the circle, every person signaling the end of their speaking by saying Good night to the group.

6:15 End on a Spirit Break.

6:20 Leave school on bike, pedaling much slower on account of being exhausted.

7:20 Get home. Drink three gallons of water, eat a ridiculous amount of not very healthy food, and then sleep for ever/until 5:30 the next morning.

Errrrday.

Love it.

Some of my best moments:

• Real, actual tutoring. We worked on states and their capitals. I'm remembering the game my parents played with me, and wish I had it here, to play with the students.
• Getting a letter from a student. While it's great that these kids trust City Year already, my heart still hurts a little. I will keep the letter forever. I also look forward to receiving a response to the letter I wrote back.
• Going jogging with a group of kids. This is great because one of the kids had not wanted to participate in the mandatory physical activity, but then was super excited to jog with me. Also great because I had enough stamina to keep jogging. This is an accomplishment, probably as a result of riding a bike at least two hours every day.
• Admitting to myself that I will need help. I am not a math student, and it was awkward for me to tutor someone in math. This doesn't seem like a thing that would warrant a mention on a list of good things, but I think the fact that I can admit this, and ask for help (my friend, Heidi, has been an awesome help. She taught me to do long division over a powerpoint via email) makes me confident in my ability to get squishy.
• I said to my group of students in after school one day that if they would tell me, with a straight face, that they were going to graduate high school and college, then I would let them mess about for the rest of homework hour. No one could. Not because they didn't feel confident in their ability to have a glorious future, but because everytime they got close, I would make a funny face, and they would break down into giggles.
• This one is interesting. It is not a best moment for a teammate, but it is for me. I feel somewhat odd including it. There was a particularly rowdy group of boys in homework hour one day, and my teammate was having a hard time dealing with them. They had insulted him, and were being all sorts of disrespectful. My teammate took some time, and while he was gone, I sat a little closer to the boys. They all turned their attentions on me, and started to wear me down with whatever preteen boy shenanigans. Somehow I got them to explain football to me (yah  right) and all of a sudden they were invested in an information sharing conversation? Woah. Surprise, Amy, you actually can deal with things.
• I got a hug and information: humans need 8-10 meaningful touches a day to be mentally and physically healthy. New goal? Probably not. But interesting nonetheless.

Signing off (and mentally preparing myself for another awesome and exhausting week), 

Amy Barton

Corps Member

City Year Sacramento

PS I told Heidi that I was going to be in bed by 9, but more likely 10 because I still had to write this blog. Look who's still writing at 10:09? Me. pooh.

PSS My Relief Society lesson went really well. BTW, kid from my past who said I would go crazy when I moved out of my parents' and never go to church again, I totally just taught Relief Society. Take that.

PSSS To my readers, I love you. But leave a comment to prove you where here. :)

Kay thanks goodnight.

PSSSS I will post pictures sometime this week. Goal.

Someone should explain to me how a postscript works.

It's time for me to throw starfish

I have been trying to write a post like this for a while now. There's just so much about City Year, that trying to write something about it seems overwhelming.

I love it.

I want to start by sharing a story with you.

T H E   S T A R F I S H   S T O R Y     (SHORTENED VERSION)

A young girl was walking along a beach upon which thousands of starfish had been washed up during a terrible storm.  When she came to each starfish, she would pick it up, and throw it back into the ocean.  

People watched her with amusement. 

She had been doing this for some time when a man approached her and said, “Little girl, why are you doing this?  Look at this beach!  You can’t save all these starfish.  You can’t begin to make a difference!” 

The girl seemed crushed, suddenly deflated.  But after a few moments, she bent down, picked up another starfish, and hurled it as far as she could into the ocean.  Then she looked up at the man and replied, 

“Well, I made a difference to that one!” 

The old man looked at the girl inquisitively and thought about what she had done and said.  Inspired, he joined the little girl in throwing starfish back into the sea.  Soon others joined, and all the starfish were saved.

adapted from the star thrower by loren c. eiseley, full version, credit, found here.

I've read several variations of this story throughout my life, and I didn't like them. The versions I read always ended with "well, I made a difference to that one!", but left out the part where the rest of the village helped and saved all the starfish. I thought it was silly, even a waste of time, for one person to spend their time trying to save starfish, the same starfish that would get stuck every season. Surely she couldn't make much of a difference.

Joining City Year, I had moments where I thought: Why am I here? Am I really going to make a difference? And if I do make a difference, will it be big enough to matter?

But I'm here. I will work with kids all year. The 13 corps members will work with students from this school, all year. The 45 corps members in Sacramento will work with students all year. The 2500 corps members across America will work with thousands of students. All Year.

And next year. And the year after that.

We are making a difference. A big one.

And someday, all the starfish students will graduate.



We spent August in training. Long days, full of team building experiences, interesting (but exhausting) lectures, and general getting to know City Year stuff.

The day we first got a uniform part (t-shirts that said City Year on them, and had the Americorps and other national sponsors' logos. ) I put it one in a bathroom stall ( I wouldn't wait until I got home) and danced and sang until someone came in. I quieted down real fast. I wish I could describe the feeling I got. All sorts of pride, excitement, and worry.

Mostly pride. My goodness. I wanted to wear it everywhere. On my bike ride home, I couldn't stop smiling. (That is, until I almost got hit by a car. Well, even then, I was still very much pleased with my life.) There's something about wearing a label that makes that thing more real. At the beginning of August, I was a part of City Year. You could tell because I would tell you. (over and over again because I'm so excited about it) Now, I'm still a part of City Year, but it's easier for you to tell, because every work day from the hours of 6 in the morning to 7 at night, I'm wearing the uniform. My boots, pants, and belt don't have the logo, but the kids have learned that if you're wearing khaki pants, plain belt, and Timberland boots, you're City Year. If that's not enough, I have the logo on the front of my shirt, on my name tag, on my back. It's on my backpack, and my jackets, vest, and other things sport the logo. (the logo is loaded with symbolism. Check it out here.)

I would show you a picture of me in the uniform, but I don't have one, and I'm too tired to play dress up.
Maybe later.

Some time near the beginning of our training, we went on a three day retreat, at Sly Park. Beautiful. We slept in cabins (not tent camping. Thank goodness) and spent our days learning more. More and more and more...

It was there that I was put into my school based team. um. 15 awesome people. All in one team. We can't handle how great it is.

Ok, I know this was random and incomplete, but I'm super tired and want to go to bed. I'll be better next week.