More adventure

Well, staffs just finished training and are off to their counties. I have the week off, and am going to visit families that I've worked for in Letcher, Buchanan, and possibly Claiborne counties. Who knows where I'll go!

More pictures later, and more updates later, after I've slept for a good long time.

The Epic Summer Reading List

A few weeks ago I sent out an email asking for a good reading list for the summer. Here is that complete reading list, compiled from several emails (hence the commentary and varying punctuation):

• The Scarlet Letter
• Misery (yes, Stephen King)
• Crime and Punishment
• The Kingdom of the Wicked by Anthony Burgess
• A Thomas Jefferson Education: Teaching a generation of leaders for the twenty-first century. By Oliver Van DeMille
• The 5000 Year Leap
• New Kind of Christian trilogy by Brian McLauren
• Circle Trilogy ( Black, Red, White) by Ted Dekker
• pedagogy of the oppressed, paulo freire
• works of love, soren kierkegaard
• after empire, sharon welch
• the road, cormac mccarthy
• tragic vision and divine compassion, wendy farley
• aftermath: violence and the remaking of the self, susan brison
• god is red: a native view of religion, vine deloria jr.
• the prophet by gibran is my fave book ever, really short
• the life you save may be your own by elie (learn about the modern southern gothic catholics! day, merton, oconnor, percy)
• what is the what, heartbreaking work of staggering genius; both by eggers
• extremely loud and incredibly close by foer
• the secret life of bees (it's book candy! that's what i call novels)
• the glass castle
• my life as a traitor
• absolutely anything by vonnegut (fave, man without a country and slaughterhouse five) or tom robbins (fave, still life with woodpecker)
• if no one speaks of remarkable things by mcgregor
• the long lonliness by day
• slouching towards bethlehem by didion
• deep is the hunger by thurman
• naked in baghdad by garrels
• beyond the sky and earth
• do you know what it means to miss new orleans?
• one dead in attic by rose
• persepolis
• the poison wood bible by kingsolver
• memoirs of a geisha
• snow falling on cedars
• franny and zoey by salinger
• confessions of an economic hit man by perkins
• i am not myself these days
• dharma bums by keroac
• Water for Elephants" by Sara Gruen
• Love in the Time of Cholera--G.G. Marquez
• The World Without Us
• Complications, or Better--both by Atul Gawande
• Firmin
• three cups of tea.
• on the road to kandahar.
• the pillars of the earth.
• empire of the word.
• "The People's History of the United States"
• "The Brothers K" by David James Duncan
• "The Amazing Adventures of Cavalier and Klay," by Michael Chabon
• How to (Not) Talk About God, by Peter Rollins

We'll see what I get to. My other dream project, which is learning how to play the autoharp, may actually come true - I learned the other day that ASP owns an autoharp!! I may not have to buy one!!

Training continues; today is the epic picnic where everyone finds out who their staff is. Yesterday I taught a session on Faith, and led worship this morning. Here's a copy of my presentation:



Or, a link if this somehow doesn't work out:
http://docs.google.com/Presentation?id=dcw4hfxb_42hs2477hg

And now, some pictures:

Staffers are learning about how to lay out and construct porches in this particular session, led by Lynn and Big Dave, a long time ASP volunteers and staffers.

Kevin overlooks the Barn (where the Jonesville center stores building supplies) and a model roof system, built by our liaisons (for training purposes).

The sweet older couple who came and sang for us for our culture night.


Katie "Chaplain" Cole (I'm official because I have a nametag). In the sermon/homily from worship today, I talked about how God is with us throughout this journey of summer staff, using the examples of the story of Isaiah 43 and Dad's kidney transplant. To remind the staff that God is always with us, for the offering we gave out tattoos (a physical reminder that God is with us as we encounter water, fire, butterflies... pirates...).

My tattoo is a butterfly over a heart, over my heart. The best part is that some people keep forgetting that it's not real, and are genuinely surprised when they see me, of all people, with a tattoo.

I'm on the Porch!

After 10 hours of transit and nine months of living in Boston, returning to the Porch yesterday felt like I was merely waking up from a dream. I left Claiborne County yesterday, right?

I'm currently at our training facility in Jonesville, VA, which we affectionately call The Porch. All 130+ of the summer staff are gathered here for a week and a half for training. I will be here until May 31st, attending some training sessions, teaching some sessions, running errands as need be, and (attempt to be) getting to know the rest of the staff!

My mailing address while in Jonesville is:

ASP Lee County VA Center
PO Box 250
Jonesville, VA 24263-0250

After training, I will depart and be serving the centers in Kentucky and Virginia. My centers to visit are: Breathitt County, Clay County, Harlan County, Knott Lotts Creek, Knott Topmost, Knox County, Leslie County, Magoffin County, Martin County, Wolfe County, and Perry County, all of which are in Kentucky. My lone Virginia county is Lee County.

I will have a home base in Knott County, Lotts Creek Center, which means that if anyone wants to send me a letter, you can send it here! The mailing address is:

ASP Knott Center-Lotts Creek
General Delivery
Bulan, KY 41722

Here are some pictures from Training (thus far):

The Porch itself!

Our summer's theme: Putting FAITH Forward. This is ASP's 40th year of service in Appalachia, starting with Tex Evans initial vision in 1969.

Rachel Naumann, Program Manager, welcomes staff to the Porch.


Today was Sim Day, where all the returning staff members acted out scenarios that the new staff are likely to encounter throughout the summer. New staffers also had an opportunity to practice driving 15 passenger vans, assess and address situations onsite, and learn some construction. I had a great time leading a van of first years today, since in years past I have been the returning staffer teaching construction, and before that the nervous first year staffer driving a 15 passenger van for the first time!

Some Sim Day Pictures:
Staffers loosening the "flat tire"

Me and Becky Long, my returner's little sib

Mitch, Allie, and Alex performing the "expansion and contraction" dance, which explains the particular nailing pattern used in installing vinyl siding.


Happy staffers!!

I just can't wait to get on the road again

When you set out on your journey to Ithaca,
pray that the road is long,
full of adventure,
full of knowledge.

- Constantine Peter Cavafy

I'm heading to Johnson City, TN next Wednesday to serve Appalachia Service Project (ASP) as the summer staff Chaplain. This will be my fourth summer with ASP, though my first summer as a support staff. I have served in Buchanan County, VA ('06), Letcher County, KY ('07), and Claiborne County, TN ('08).

I leave for training on the 20th, and will begin my sojourn sometime around the 1st of June. I expect to have cell phone and email access for the entire summer, though sporadically. Aside from fulfilling my actual job expectations, I hope to keep this blog updated regularly, learn to play the autoharp, study Greek (just for you, JKnust!), and tackle my epic summer reading list (which will be fully posted in some future posting).



This summer will be different in that I will be living out of a minivan, driving from center to center every few days or so. (See the above map for the territory that I will be covering.) Therefore, I won't have a permanent address for anyone to send me letters, I won't really be somewhere where that anyone could come visit me, I won't have my own staff, I won't have my own county. HOWEVER, I'll get to drive around Appalachia and see lots of centers, love on lots of staff, meet lots of families and volunteers, see the impact of ASP in its fortieth summer, visit my old families from past summers, get intimately acquainted with atlases and road maps, get lost, and spend a summer seeking grand adventure.

It will be a good time.


NOTE: Map image is from Appalachia Service Project, Inc. website. For more information, please visit http://asphome.org/ourwork_wws.html