Tales from the Bx

So I have officially started working at Torch, and I have roommates!! I have had some interesting and exciting adventures in the few weeks before they moved in while I was working at my temporary placement. Since I didn't have my permenant community yet, it was easier for my to visit LI & my other friend Meg who just moved to the city.

I love that Kira & Sarah are so close, and that Ive been able to go out to see them twice now! (and they've each been to see me) One of my visits included going to Amityville Founders Day, as Sarah mentioned before. Now that was an interesting experience... and soo much more fun than I anticipated. There was a beautiful mass where the priest sang the eucharistic prayer (love it when they do that) & they even let me sing in the chior! After mass we were told to go eat downstairs because "thats where the party is." I had no idea what I was getting myself into. There was fantiastic German food, like potato pancake...mmmm. I totally would have had seconds, but the 3 of us were pulled to the dancefloor by Sr. Gina & Sr. Diane who I knew from Preaching in Action. I'm not much of a dancer but they were not taking no as an answer! (The "I" in me tried) Somehow -and I think it was one of the associates doing (susan's?)- we became known as the divas (Get it... D-V-as) for the night. My favorite dance was one of the sisters, who I was told is over 80, did a solo dance to ABBA's Dancing Queen. She even had props such as a kerchief and a rose. Hysterical!! Probably one of my favorite moments of the evening. I also was able to meet Mary & Janet who Kira & Sarah live with. It was nice to be able to put faces with names, but I feel like I may not be allowed to play Skip-bo with them anymore. Something about my amazing streak of beginners luck.

I am definitly happy to be in my permenant ministry now! Even though my temporary placement was not the most exciting atmosphere for me, & the ladies in the office were nice to me, it did confirm my thought that working in an office all day is not my scene. Not enough activity, but Torch is making up for that! Torch is a special education preschool in the Bronx run by St. Dominic's Home. So far Ive been going into each of the classrooms and being just an extra set of hands in order to get a feel for the teachers and the kids. I like getting to know all the kids. I almost have all their names down, which is a feat because some of them are quite creative. Today the teacher was out in the room that I was assigned to help with so I was able to run a couple of the activities, which I definitly enjoyed. Tomorrow the whole school is going apple picking at an orchard up in Rockland County. That should definitly be an interesting experience.

My roommates, Stephanie and Mary Jo, are volunteering for the year through Loretto Volunteers and are working with the Loretto NGO at the UN. They moved in last Sun & Mon, but went on their opening retreat in Loretto Kentucky at the motherhouse there from Friday until Tuesday. We are still getting settled and getting to know one another, but they are very nice. I think we are going to have a good year!

I will try and remember to upload some picks from my random adventures in NYC sometime, but for now I'm off to bed. These kiddies are wearing me out!

~Jen