They didn't cover this in training...

This past week has been a HUGE growing week. I have learned so much about myself and really what to expect the rest of the summer and just some lessons about people.

The group that came in was from Milford, Ohio. I wasn't supposed to be a host this week but since some of there people didn't come, my director told me that I was co-hosting five minutes after they got here. So not much time to prepare. There were eight kids in all: one boy, seven girls, with ages ranging from eighth grade to a senior in high school. The leaders were all volunteers and they had daytime jobs. The main youth pastor wasn't able to make it since his wife's father had just passed away. So it was an interesting beginning to the week.

The first day, after we take them to dinner, we take the group on a prayer tour of the city. Joseph, my co-host, and I are in different mini-vans. Due to drivers not listening to instructions, we end up taking the group an hour out of the way before even starting the tour. Again, an interesting start to the trip. We get back pretty late and after debriefing, it is evident that this group is timid in praying and talking about anything.

The days go on and I let myself not get totally involved with the group because it feels like I shouldn't be here anyway.

And then Friday comes.

This is the groups of kids with two kids from the neighborhood, outside of Will Feed, which was our anchor site for the week. It's a place where kids can come to hang out and essentially stay out of trouble. They get two meals for free and our volunteers just go to hang out with them.

It's about 4:15 when we leave Will Feed on Friday. And it is also when a huge thunderstorm decides to accompany us back home. We were on our way to get to a 5:30 reservation at Siam, our Thai food restaurant (one of my favorites).

The 90/94 is the highway that we take from the south side to get to the far north side of the city, because that's where our housing is. However, the traffic is comparable to the 91 during rush hour; there's a lot. I encourage Joseph that we get to the 55 and take Lake Shore Drive but he thinks that we'll get there too fast and we have time to kill. So we take the 90/94 and we are creeping along. Joseph then calls me and says ok, let's get off and take surface streets up. So we get off and get to Halsted which turns into a one lane and we are going slower then if we had stayed on 90/94.

So I tell Joseph, let's cross downtown on Jackson to get to Lake Shore Drive, he concedes and we start getting over. Then a wonderful impatient taxi drivers cuts in between the two mini vans and hits Joseph's van. All I could think was, they did not go over this in training!

The impact was only from 6 inches away so no one was hurt and there was only minor damage but since the leaders rented the vans they knew they needed to file a report. So we tell the taxi driver who agrees, but then drives off after saying he'll pull over. Not really surprised at this.

We end up pulling to the corner of Monroe and Wacker, right in the middle of financial district.


Here we are at the corner. The kids have to pee but we have to wait for the cops and Joseph is convinced that it will take two hours for the cops to show up. And we are definitely not making our reservation.

It all works out in the end. But it was definitely a bonding experience. I learned that you have to learn to speak the groups language. This group was highly sarcastic, and I tried to not be sarcastic this whole week so that I could maintain some professionalism and because I didn't want to become too attached to a group. But as soon as this happened, I just let my guard down and became appropriately sarcastic with them. We bonded immediately. I'm going to miss this group. They gave me some headaches this past week but all in all it was a good time.