A Day in the Life

A Day in the Life of Bike and Build- Joplin Build Week.
6:50 Wake up call. Mike pokes his head in the girls room and tells us "breakfast!"
Then we have a few minutes to scramble around and get ready. The Abundant Life Church right outside of Joplin has been hosting us all week, and its a great place. They host volunteer groups all the time, and have made us feel so welcome! They have a room full of toiletries for those items that are forgotten (sunscreen, soap, etc). Outdoor shower facilities (really cool- basically a row of spouts separated by tarps) and they feed us every meal!
7:00 Breakfast. Sid is the breakfast chef at Abundant Life, and he goes out of his way everyday to make breakfast a special masterpiece. Today he did custome omelettes, yesterday chocolate chip pancakes with icecream, and before that crepes. We eat more for breakfast than I nor ally eat all day!
Then we finish getting ready, and a little before 8:00 get in the cars and head out to a work site.
At the work sites we do a variety of tasks (quantifiables to come in a later post) including drywalling, flooring, painting etc. The past two days we've been working with Rebuild Joplin's new crew of Americorps site supervisors, who are still doing their training and learning how to lead groups of volunteers.
Around 12:00 we break for lunch, which we packed at the church. They put out a great spread of sandwhich stuff and snacks for us to pack. I've been eating some great PB&J sandwhiches all week in true Bike and Build style! We break for lunch for about how long it takes to eat, rehydrate and take a minute off our feet. Everyone is so committed to the work we are doing here that we dont take long breaks. After eatin we jump right back into our work!
A little bit before 5 we start cleaning up our worksite and finishing as much as we can before we head back to the Abundant Life church.
5:30 is dinner. Its always delicious and we're always ravenous.
Then we hop in the showers. After we're clean we do different thing in the evenings. Monday we played jenga and banagrams, Tuesday we stayed at BJ and Grumpy's house to work late, Wednesday and Thursday we went out with Rebuild Joplin's Anericorps members for some after hours socializing, and tonight we're going to a drive in movie! Eventually we fall in our beds (completely exhausted) and fall right asleep.

Yesterday we did a little sightseeing. We drove by the Extreme Home Makeover houses, and Cunningham Park where the memorial is. The following pictures are from the memorial. Visiting the park was a super emotional moment for me.

Back in JOMO

This week has been amazing so far! Right off the bat I felt like I belonged, and felt at home. I've spent the past few days in Joplin, MO with a group of Bike and Build alumns rebuilding houses that were damaged or destroyed in the tornado last year. We started volunteering right away. Most pf us arrived Saturday, and Sunday we started working with the Americorps St. louis Emergency Response Team who coordinated the original disaster response, and has committed to the long term recovery efforts. They sent us to Wanda's house where we spent the day building a deck and a grape trellis. Then Monday and Tuesday they sent us to work at BJ ad "Grumpy's" house where we planted trees and humg drywall. Intent on finishing the work we had started, we stayed past 8:30 on Tuesday to finish as much ad we possibly could. The go-getter, not-leaving-until-we-finish attitude is something I truly love and sorely miss. It just brings back my love for the enthusiasm of bike an builders, and a little bit of frustration at my Americorps team. BJ and grumpy even fed us dinner because we missed the dinner the church provided.

Today we started working with Rebuild Joplin (Lynea, my former corps member is working for them now) and they sent us to work at Tiffany's house with the task of sanding the drywall in the bathroom, and installing laminate flooring. After we finished those tasks we made our way over to a nearby house where Rebuild Joplin was training a new batch of the Armericorps site supervisors. That house was in the process of being drywalled, so we used the skills we've cultivated over the past couple days to catch them up.

This whole week has felt more like real life to me, than my actual life does. I love hanging out with these people who were strangers 5 days ago, but now are friends; ad having and instant connection. Not only have they all done Bike and Build, but half of them are NCCC alumns as well!

Catherine installing drywall!

Living the dream

Friday night Liz and I got all goofy in our light-up, shimmery metallic, wigged out costumes for the firefly 5k in City Park to benefit the Denver metro Habitat for Humanity. There was almost 2,000 people there! It was a nighttime glow-in-the-dark 5k, and although we were running all sorts of zigzags trying to avoid people it was awesome! We got so many "love your costume" comments.

Saturday I woke up super early for the Rattlesnake triathlon! (And by super early I mean we arrived at 6am). Adam drove me, and made goofy jokes while I freaked out about the swimming, ad lent me his shirt when I was cold early in the morning, and took pictures and cheered! I made it though! I fnished! I didn't drown during the 1500m seim, and while I was the slowest swimmer out there I did it! About 3/4 of the way through my left calf seize up with a massive cramp ad I had to grab a kayak while massaing the knot out. It felt like the worst charlie horse of my life, and its still sore today! Then during the 40k bike ride (just under 25 miles). I took it fairly easy, my legs were still killing! But I did manage to pass a few people. The route was super hilly, and the least scenic bike ride I've done since biking through Kansas. The 10k (6.2 mile) run was great! I did manage to catch up to and pass more people on that leg, and had a strong finish! I was met at the finish line by Michelle and the ALZ Stars crew, where we took pics and I ate a cookie. So the swim took 53:57, the bike took 1:59:57, and the run took 1:02:51. My first transition tool 2:11, and the second, 1:33. 4hours, 23 seconds total.

Then I hopped on a plane to Joplin, MO where I'll be spending a week building houses with Bike & Build aulms.

Almost Tri Time!

The Rattlesnake Triathlon is in 3 Days!!! I’m as ready as I’mever going to get! Last week I met with Deb, a triathlete who volunteered toadvise the ALZ Stars (athletes raising money for the Alzheimer’s Association).She helped me figure out what I needed for the race, and how to set up my transitionarea, and then swam a lap in the Bear Creek Reservoir. After that I feel prettyconfident about the swim portion of the triathlon…however I’m less confidentthat I’ll be able to bike and run after that!

The last two weekends I ran a couple quick 5Ks. At the “IRun Colorado 5K” I ran my best time yet (26:52) and at the “Davita Kidney Rock5K” I didn’t run quite as fast, but I did place 5^th in my age group!Both were really great races and I had a lot of fun! Friday is the Firefly 5K,a after-dark, glowstick 5K I’m going to run with Liz.

Friday I had off from work for network maintenance day soAdam and I went to the zoo! We really wanted to see aardvarks, wallabies andpanthers, but they didn’t have any. Instead we saw Komodo Dragons, tigers and amongoose!

If thinking about training counted, I'd be ready for an Ironman

Its been a while since my last post so let me just run down a quick list of some major highlights.

Flew to CT for Tim & Liz's wedding. It was lovely. Great company/food/venue
Got to catch up with Stephanie, Sara and Catherine while home.
Ran the Sand Creek Half Marathon- proud to report no wrong turns and a time of 2:12:00

This past weekend Katie A came to visit. She took a little vacation from her husband and kids (she gave Steve a week to potty train Logan, haha) and came out here. We spent the weekend eating, relaxing, walking and experiencing Colorado. I made her walk all over the city (Honestly even my legs are sore), and do the Snooze vs. Jelly Brunch test (she picked Snooze too). We went to the Brothers of the Sun Tour where we saw Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney rocking out all night, and went to an open mic night that one of my coworkers hosts called My Teenage Angst, where members of the audience read their old diaries. Out loud. In Public. It was pretty hilarious. Katie said that might have been her favorite part of the trip. We also did the Coors Brewery Tour, and did some sightseeing atop Lookout Mountain.

Today I picked up my fundraising packet for the Rattlesnake Triathlon. I'm doing to do an Olympic distance triathlon to support the Alzheimer's Association. I'm super excited to get to ride my bike and run...provided I don't drown during the first leg of the race. I also hope that there are no fish in the water on race day. I intend to swim with the confidence that all the fast swimmers scared the fish away.

Afterward I was so pumped I biked to Wash park and run a solid 5 miles. I'm pretty sure I look ridiculous when I run listening to the Zombies, Run! App. I would get passed by fast, buff shirtless runner while I'm running along, then BAM! All of a sudden I am passing them as I fly across the gravel like the undead are after my brains. But then when I escape the encroaching horde and settle back into a comfortable pace I get passed again by fast/buff guy :(

Also today I got the details for the Bike and Build Alumni Joplin build trip, and booked my flight. So as I soon as I finish the triathlon, I'm headed to the airport for a week of building, church floors, peanut butter and pasta, and meeting new people who are my kinda crazy!

Katie A and I at the concert!

And now for your regularly scheduled program

Sunday's post was a little heavy on the emotional side. The past week and a half were chock full of awesome so here's a quick rundown. Last week (wednesday?) was the summer solatice ride, a Denver bike ride from City Park to Wash park, cruising though the botanical gardens and ending with burritos. No joke: beautiful short ride through town, free burritos and beer and it supports Bike Denver, the Denver Zoo, the Botanical Gardens and the Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado. I forced myself to go even though Noel was in Chicago and I was alone. Luckily after the race I met up with MG, Ashley, Steve and Brandon; so I actually stayed at the park and hung out for a while instead of heading home early.

Sunday Liz and I ran the Louisville trail half marathon. It was super hot out (its been in the triple digits all week), but we had alot of fun. The route was not very clearly marked and I took two wrong turns and had to back track, but after that Liz and I were able to stay together and finished the race at 2:32:16. After the race and a quick shower I went to DCH where I taught taekwondo to the girls Noel works with. It was pretty awesome and the girls really seemed to enjoy it.

Souls grow back

Warning: This post is chock full of emotions. If you cannot handle them read no further.

I'm having an overwhelming emotional reaction to everything that is happening in my life. Though most of the emotions that I'm feeling are happiness, wholeness, and excited anticipation, sometimes I'm reduced to tears and can barely begin to put my feelings into words.

Thursday I woke up, and for the first time in months I felt genuinely happy and full of positive energy and enthusiasm that those last few months of Americorps beat out of me. The only way I can describe it is to say "I feel like my soul has grown back." I'm ready to go back into the world and experience its beauty, and meet new people, go new places and have an impact on the world. My future was all of a sudden filled with infinite possibilities. I want to bike across the country, and lead trips through the backwoods in nature to teach and share this passion for the world. And I want freedom. I want to be able to give up this materialistic lifestyle that I feel is just holding me back.

There was one thing stopping me. How could I tell Noel that I didn't want to live with her anymore? I know that she had built her life here with the assumption that I'd be here too. But I'd made up my mind. I'd tell her after she got back from her trip to Chicago. After Liz dropped us off, Noel turned to me and said: "My mom asked me to move closer to home. I'm going to move to Chicago." Wow. We were nearly on the same page! She told me her plans, and I told her mine. She wants to leave in a few months, but I intend to stay in Denver for about a year. But now I've been granted the freedom to move on and live my life.

Last night I had Ryan over to pick up his stuff that I'd accumulated. There wasn't much, but I felt bad throwing his things out, and there was some things like a movie we watched together, and the heart necklace I wore everyday while he was in Afghanistan. Things I can't look at without crying, but can't bring myself to dispose of. So now they're his problem to deal with. In conversing with him, his impending marriage became real to me, cutting one more cord that was keeping me here and granting me the gift of freedom.

Then today after the relief and joy of talking with Noel started to ebb, I was filled with an overwhelming sense of loss. Now I can't help but think that I'm losing two of my best friends at the same time. I feel a sense of loss and  fear of being completely alone; with no one to fall back and rely on.

I'm choosing to embrace the positives in these changes. I feel like I can return to the life I love, and that each day is an adventure. I can now look at my current lifestyle with more positivity and enjoy each moment, no longer being stuck in a rut, but moving forward with my life. In the next few months I'll be trying to accomplish my "Life After Americorps" Goals, and creating a plan for the future. More than anything, right now I feel happy. Happier that I've felt in a long time.