"Where You Invest Your Love, You Invest Your Life"

First and foremost, whoever knows good music knows I stole my title from Mumford and Sons. I linked their name to the song with those lyrics. You're welcome.

On to business...

I have been an AmeriCorps VISTA for just over a month now and, if I were to quit tomorrow, I could confidently say this has already been the most wonderful and invaluable experience of my life. And honestly, I've been pleasantly surprised. I knew I would enjoy this job, but I didn't know I would absolutely fall in love with the school and people with whom I come in contact. Unfortunately, I express myself best in lists and bullet points, so I have numbered what I've experienced so far:

1. During orientation, you are warned that many people might not understand your job, appreciate that you are there, or might not initially welcome you as an outsider into their community and/or culture. My experience has been absolutely nothing like that. I have never been more welcomed, supported, or encouraged by a group of people that barely know me in my entire life. A school custodian checks on me daily. This man has to clean bathrooms, wax floors, and pick up trash after nasty high school kids while I sit at my desk and search around on the Internet and yet, HE checks on ME. A man that is originally from a town I'm serving, but now lives in another state, checks on me. He is retired, lives in a completely different area code, and has the means to be going on all kinds of adventures, but he still finds the time to make sure I'm keeping my head above water. A woman in the next town over is a copywriter, among many other things that keep her busy, but she always finds time to provide me really, really good ideas and invites me to nearly every meeting possible so I can meet people to help me along my journey. It never ceases to amaze me how selfless and supportive the people I am meeting are.  

2. Some aspects of a different culture just have to be embraced. I kind of have a funny example for this one. It involves a t-shirt. So, we are selling (attempting to sell) homecoming shirts. With the input of a couple people, a really cool shirt was designed. It was simple, to the point, and looked pretty good. So we thought. Turns out white people are plain. We were using our best marketing strategies to sell these "cool" shirts, but were only getting responses like, "That's too plain"..."Why does it have Mississippi on it?"..."I mean, I would buy this shirt, but if I saw another shirt with claws ripping through the front, I'd buy that one first"..."Black folks like big pictures!" (I swear, I am not making this up). As we told other administrators that we were going to change the front to now display a steroid-induced cougar, nooooo one was surprised. If I could sum up everyone's response into one general statement, it would've been along the lines of something like, "Well, no shit. I could've told you these kids didn't want a shirt that just had the school name across the front." Point is, we now have a really cool design for the front that I think the kids are going to love. Why? Because it fits their culture, not mine. And where I am? I'm in their school and their community, not mine. It was a quick reminder that, just because I don't understand someone else's preferences, it doesn't mean that I should try to change them. I am actually really happy to think that we might now be offering the kids something they actually want and can be excited to wear. I want them to be happy.

3. Turns out that I love collaborating. Wait - I love collaborating with competent and/or passionate people. Throughout my 18 years of school, group assignments were the bane of my existence. I would rather go through rush at Ole Miss than have to depend on another student to efficiently complete an assignment. If you know me at all, you know that rush at Ole Miss is kind of what I imagine hell to be like (sorry, ladies). Anyway - now that I've been placed in a position that requires me to do new jobs in a new community, I have quickly learned to love working with other people. It took me all 24 years and 9 months of my existence to admit that I don't know everything, but since I got over that hurdle (a hurdle the size of Mt. Everest), I now LOVE asking for advice. I love meeting new people, I love hearing their suggestions, I love experiencing their genuine gratefulness. It makes every day of my job exciting and rewarding.

4. I moved to a low-income community on the edge of the MS Delta. I serve kids that may never have as much stuff in their lifetimes as I have already accumulated in 24 years. I work in a town with no established grocery store, no mall, no movie theater, and not a single chain restaurant. There is no park, no functioning baseball fields, no community center. Reading that, you would think this little town in Mississippi had nothing to offer me and that I am probably spending my days showing these people how to live. Nope. I think every one should visit the Delta. It makes you thankful for what you have and it makes you realize how unevenly wealth is distributed in this country. It makes you realize that people of all races don't have equal opportunities and that a lack of education across generations keeps populations in poverty. While it is certainly not the case for everyone, being in this community is a constant reminder that people deserve better and will work for better if someone simply takes the time to show them how.

5. Lastly, going back to the title of this post, I am currently investing my love into these small towns in MS. Sometimes I am afraid my life will be built around them too. What happens in a year when my work here isn't finished? What if I have a lot left that I want to do? What happens when I don't want to leave the school or don't want to have to maintain the relationships I've made over distance? Do I stay? What would I do? The school district doesn't have the money to hire me for anything. I love working here, but this wouldn't be my ideal living location. I'm 8 hours from home and that gets old. It is a good and bad position to be in. It is good that I am happy here, but the time is passing quickly and next August will be here before I know it. That, my friends, is a bummer.

That is a brief, yet organized, summary of my life and where my mind is one month into my job. If you know I'm a VISTA, and clearly you do from this blog, I'm not allowed to be religious. With that said, I'm going to leave you with a quote (some might call it a verse) from a book (huge book, tiny print, lots of stories) that inspires me to be a certain type of woman...

"She opens her arms to the poor and extends her hands to the needy."