while i’ve got a chance to breathe.

Hello all.  I sent out a mass e-mail about a week ago.  If you didn’t get it or know someone who would want it, just tell me and I’d be happy to add you to the list.  I’ll probably send out another update sometime soon, but for now…

Last night I got to see Modest Mouse and R.E.M. for free!  My host had some free tickets. Patrick and I hauled our butts out to Columbia, MD to get to the show.  We caught the tail end of M.M., but we missed the National who opened.  R.E.M. put on a great show.  ’Twas fun.

Things are slowly starting to gain speed.  My first chance to get to know someone who lives in the neighborhood is happening in a little less than half an hour.  Her name is Phyllis and she lives a block from me.  She’s lived here for twenty years! I’m just excited to get the chance to meet someone who’s been here for such a long time.  Pray that through her I am able to make many connections within the neighborhood and that I would be able to bless her in return somehow.

Please pray for the area surrounding where I live.  Nothing has happened in my neighborhood, and for some reason that has been true in the past, but there have been a lot of homicides, robberies, and muggings in the past three weeks.  In the neighborhood north of mine, 5 people have been killed in the last two weeks.  The neighborhood is on lock down at night by the local DC police and you have to go through a police barricade to get in, and only if you live there at night.  In the NE and SE part of DC, 8 people were shot (fortunately none died… it was in the W. Post) last night alone.  This city is a breeding ground for violence in the summer… it will only get worse as the schools get out and it gets hotter.  Mom or grandpa, don’t worry… If I go out at night now, I don’t go alone and I stay on well-lit streets.  All I can do is pray that God protects me.  The rest is in His hands. Pray for my safety and for the safety of people that live in the surrounding neighborhoods.  

I’m going to be interviewing a lady who works for a CDC (community development corporation) in the neighborhood and I am hoping to get he chance to meet neighborhood residents from the church.  Through that I hope to start building a web of people to gather information from and get to know.  Eventually I want to do some PLA (participatory learning activites) with a group of them… one all-women, one all-men, and another that would be mixed.  I want to try to do a focus group with them also.  So pray that the Lord would open those doors.  

Another opportunity to do research and also just a chance sto be blessed is through a boy named Michael (that’s his self-portrait below.)  Michael lives with his grandmother and comes to the house often.  His father and mother are both out of the picture, so he lacks a good influence and in lots of ways, someone to just love on him.  Joe, Andrew, and Andrea are trying to invest into him.  He usually comes over, eats food, hangs out for a little and leaves.  Last weekend he was over here for about three hours.  Patrick and I taught him some guitar, Patrick and he read a story, and I taught him how to make a letter with burned edges (this excited him greatly, considering every boy is a pyromaniac).  I made him write a letter to his grandma and gave him an envelope and stamp.  He steals sometimes from the house and lies often, so we’re trying to find a balance between grace and tough love, since he lacks an authority figure. 

I need wisdom to know how close to be to Michael since I’ll be leaving in August.  I don’t want him to be too attached and then me just be another broken relationship in his life.  I also want to do some PLA with he and his friends (bribe them with pizza and drinks probably… who could resist that at 11?) to determine how kids see the neighborhood (community mapping), maybe get them to do a matrix or preference ranking with problems in the neighborhood, and then just hang out with them. Pray that the door would open for me to be able to do that.  

 

I’m also hoping to get my neighborhood survey underway in the near future.  I’m meeting with local area commision leaders to do a focus group and talk about the neighborhood, Lord willing, within two weeks.  I still need the approval of the church to carry out the survey and it is essentially imperative that I gain the approval of local residents in some way when I try to carry out the survey.  I’m hoping that door will be opened through Phyllis.  Pray!

That’s all for now.  I’m off to meet Phyllis and later tonight I have practice with Joe’s band.  I get to play at one of their shows and their giving me a thirty minute set, which is super nice of them and will be a good chance to play in front of people. After practice I have to head to a neighborhood group meeting with some people from local churches that live in the neighborhood.

The fam is coming to visit me this weekend and I’m really excited to see all of them.  We should have a good weekend exploring the city and catching up.  In the midst of that I was asked to do the offertory this weekend at Grace.  I’m playing “What A Friend We Have in Jesus” on banjo and singing.  Pray that it remains worship for me and not something that I end up stressing about.  That would be the last thing I want.  I’m glad to play, and I love being able to offer my gifts back to God.

That’s all for now. Much love and know that I miss all of you.