Our mission trip was to Maine Seacoast
Mission in Cherryfield, Maine, in Washington County, one of the most
impoverished counties in all of the United States. The Mission provides spiritual, health, and
youth development programs in coastal and island communities from midcoast to
Downeast Maine.
Through food pantries, emergency
financial assistance, home repairs, in school, out of school and summer youth
leadership and development programs for children in grades 4- 12, the mission
brings support, compassion, and hope to the people of Downeast Maine.
As a seven person team (myself
(spiritual go to person), Joe Foran (technical and construction advisor), Caryl
Gilman (window project manager), Marie Guerin (power saw woman extraordinaire),
Martha Morrison (wielder of hammer and paintbrush and director of site clean
up), Judy Munson (power drill queen), and Tom Wiley (fearless leader and
organizer), as a team, we were located on the Downeast Campus. There is a staff and office building, the
Edge Community Center, and a chapel where we stayed which became our “elegantly
appointed” home away from home for the week.
There is also a trailer on the campus that is being rehabbed for
families to stay when major construction needs to be done on their home. We brought back brochures, which are in the
Vestry. We all hope that you will take a
look at them.
Each one of us kept a journal during
our time away. I hope we can give you a
flavor of our experience by reading excerpts from all of our journals – and by
showing you what the week was like through the visual presentation Joe put together
from the over 500 photos four of us took.
I know the hope of the mission team is that we will ignite a spark in a
lot of you that will burn and glow enough to move you to come back with us when
we return to Maine Seacoast Mission another year. These writings are from our journals…..
Cherryfield
here we come! Tom is especially so
exited to be leading this Mission Trip. He
is like a little kid.
What a send
off from the church we had on Sunday.
Being at the front of the church and hearing everyone sing was so moving
– and then the hugs as we walked down the aisle. After a tear-inducing benediction, we seven
were off on an adventure....
We left
with our hopes (“I am looking forward to growing by leaps and bounds this week
in my spiritual life”) - and with our fears, which we shared in our first
evening’s reflection – would we be able to contribute? Could we physically keep up?
Come as you
are – your responsibility is to be yourself, with all that that means. God knows the good and the bad, the weak and
the strong about me – and loves me just the same – and I’ve done much worse
than be myself.
I realized
the Mary was kind of our example for the trip – when the angel came to her, she
didn’t say more than “how can this be?”
She didn’t ask (as I did):
What will it be like?
Can I really do that?
How will it feel?
She said
“be it done to me as you say.” Wouldn’t
it be great if we could react to all that God throws our way like that?
On Sunday
evening just after we arrived, we went to the Table of Plenty, which is a free
community meal prepared at the Mission each week by a different neighborhood
group. Tonight was hosted by “Freaks and
Geeks” – the young, back to the landers in Cherryfield, and so we enjoyed their
homemade breads, organic produce from their own gardens, and Thai noodles. I ended up eating with a woman who has been
here in the Cherryfield area for 20 years.
She is an artist – does murals and now book illustrations and
binding. She was originally from
Philadelphia, went to several different art schools, Haystack, etc. – a very bright dynamic woman.
It is such
an interesting community here – the activist long haired freaks and geeks, artists,
the people – young and old - who make Washington County one of the poorest in
our nation, lobsterman, fishermen, people who have been here forever and those
who wanted to make Maine their retirement home – and here they found cheap land
and housing, a number of artists. And
yet with such different political persuasions and worldviews to work with,
Maine Seacoast Mission is trying (quite successfully, I would say) to create a
viable working community with a sustainable economy.
Together they
are all creating a warm and helpful spirit in spite of its being a community
with lots of problems.
Joe and
Caryl checked out the job site, and the former has spent the evening drawing
elaborate plans for our rehab – amazing skill, staggering persistence. He’s accompanied at our round table by
solitaire players. The sky darkens,
voices dim, our activity has bedtime overtones.
Preparation for a new day: the
unknown fears admitted, contrasted with the hopes anticipated – getting to know
others better, working on a home to improve safety, convenience, and access.
As I lay
awake last night, (NOTE – as most of us did, it appears from reading these
journals) I wondered about the couple we would meet and share our week
with.
Our home
repair clients are Mary Ann and Kevin Rice.
They moved to their little cottage on five acres when they retired,
fully intending to keep up the property and live the good life Downeast. Ten years later, a heart attack (Kevin) and
less than successful surgery for an arthritic knee (Mary Ann), they are in way
over their heads in a house that is falling down around them and a property
that demands too much. Their house is
part of the 80% of housing stock around here that is poorly made
pre-1970’s. We will be replacing 2 windows
that currently do not open, a new front stoop, and installing a handicap
ramp. Our work means the world to them
and especially to her.
I can go
all rational about this and bemoan their naivety moving so far from any social
net, but frankly, there but for the grace of God….
They are
the loveliest people – they made lunch for us all under a pop-up tent, and we
listened to Mary Ann’s stories of growing up “carnie”, that is, traveling with
the Ringling Bros circus until she was 13 – her mother was a dancer, and her
father a carnival barker who also had a side show act with monkeys. I think they really enjoyed playing host and
hostess and getting to know all of us.
For them
and especially for her, having us here is a real special treat. I value the connection to the people we
repair for.
We are
their neighbors for this week. Being a
neighbor – a good one. Is it easier to
do that with people far away and different and for a short time versus day in
and day out? In some ways, yes. Could I/would I bring the same commitment to
the people I work with? What can I bring
from this week to my daily life?
As we open
our eyes to awake to a new day, I feel a new spiritual day is on the
horizon. The togetherness and teamwork,
which we are experiencing and sharing, is wonderful. We are all God’s creatures and are taught to
help and support each other. The Rice
family will see some changes to their house, but I think the RVCC mission team
will see the most change.
Listen-
ask- learn. Let go and let be. Try, reflect, do better. Perfection is on the job description of the
Lord.
Everyone is
getting along famously – no divas, no generalissimos, just folks interested in
doing right by each other and by our clients, the Rice’s.
We are
learning new skills – Joe is especially patient in teaching us – Marie on the
table saw, me on the power drill. Caryl heading up the window replacement
project, Martha painting and hammering, Judy is the decking queen, Tom is
everywhere needed – in the kitchen doing picky finish work, in the dirt under
the deck - and always with a smile. He
is the one who reminds us to laugh and who gets us going again!
I have been
surprised at my patience. I have learned
that a job well done by all of us is so to be preferred to my typical pickiness
and a job done just by me….
Teasing and
caring for each other and whistling - coming together – our team.
We are
feeling a spirit of closeness growing among us.
Everyone is pitching in and helping – both on the job site and at
meals.
What a
bunch of busy beavers we rare! I am
proud to be part of the team.
How unlike
the 9-5 we normally live in – where everyone has a job, and it fits in a
box. “My box only.” “You have your own box.” Not here in Cherryfield. We are all assuming different roles and they
fit nicely and flow strongly.
We are
working so well together – looking out for each other and no one fainted in the
96 degree heat today!
Hot day
today. We are sweating but at least we
are not sweating the small things.
So many
moments of grace – spelling each other, celebrating one another’s triumphs.
We seven
flow between jobs helping each other in various combinations, a very
comfortable working way. Is the back and
forth with tools and trash, boards and braces, spiritual?
Even though
it’s not in our scope of work, I weeded Mary Ann’s gardens because she so
clearly loves flowers and can’t take care of them herself any more.
I hate the
expression “helping those less fortunate.”
Who am I to judge that Kevin and Maryann are less fortunate because they
needed some work done on their house?
For every
two steps forward there is at least one step back. Things did not fit due to the place being “The
House that Jack Built” – not a right angle in the place!
Who would
have known that we could not even begin to work on the handicap ramp until Joe,
Judy, and Tom undid and then redid the terrible job on the deck it was to be
attached to – some of the supports were attached to nothing and needed to be
replaced. We didn’t know that pouring concrete
would be part of the job we had to do before we could do the job we were
assigned to!
Today I
itched to have the stoop installed at least in a temporary way. With spade and back-breaking late day digging
by one of our crew, we did it.
My thought
was that each of us had had some part in the planning, cutting, measuring,
lugging, screwing that we needed a front and center result.
Did I feel
closer to God here? No – however the
flow of work, humor, reflection, stories, and songs created an atmosphere of
“godliness.”
Each of us
leads a grace at breakfast and dinner. And
so we sang familiar grace songs. We sang
songs with new words. Martha did a
beautiful extemporaneous prayer. And you
know who taught us the Philmont Boy Scout grace. We shared graces from childhood – including
the English translation of a Swedish grace that Judy read.
We head
home tomorrow. I had my doubts about
making this trip but now I hate to think about leaving. It has been a wonderful experience, something
I could never have thought I could enjoy so much. This trip has exceeded my expectations.
Wednesday
afternoon – the Magnificent Seven becomes the Fab Five. Sadly, Judy and Martha are leaving as
planned. They both played key roles in
this group of seven. Plus, I will never
forget the love for our time together, a vision of which Judy left us with –
along with Martha’s short and totally heartfelt prayer. Hugs and tears. Goodbye Dynamite Duo!
Thursday
evening – the mission sponsors a BBQ each week for the volunteers, so we
enjoyed a wonderful meal with a large (30 plus) group from Massachusetts. But the menu was not the usual burgers and
dogs. As a way of saying thanks, the
relative (a lobsterman) of one of the clients whose home had been repaired donated
fifty lobsters and dozens of clams for us to enjoy. Here in the Portland area, we say, oh, what
an expensive treat! However, as someone here
said, Downeast, lobsters off the boat are going for less than a couple of bucks
a pound and are cheaper than hotdogs.
Says something about the economic downturn up there in rural Maine.
Somewhere
hidden in the dirt for nearly 3 days of the traffic of feet and rose bush brush
dragged over it, a nickel sized metal piece revealed itself, picturing the dove
of the Holy Spirit with a few forgotten-to-me words.
I’m not a
big believer in signs (although chickadees remind me of my dad and brown-eyed
susans of my mom) but maybe the 3-in-one was along on the adventure too!
I could
argue that our simple acts are a bandaid on the cancer eating away at their
house, but the windows give them ventilation they have never had before, and
the stoop and ramp allow for her to be something other than a shut-in….
I could
argue that this is all sort of meaningless when objectively measured against
need in even this one small corner of Northern Maine, but better a pitiful
something than nothing at all….
We came
thinking that our job was home repair – build a stoop, put in a couple of
windows. But that is only one of several
levels of our mission. There is more –
there is a social element – getting to know our clients – and their animals –
like Spanky the cat and Maggie the dog. – listening to Kevin and Mary Ann’s
stories. That too is time well-spent but
not exactly in the official scope of work.
But maybe there is another kind of repair that needs to go on as well….And
there are the little things that aren’t in the job spec either but that I think
are important - the things that make a house a home – like weeding and cleaning
up Mary Ann’s gardens. Balancing all
those things can be tricky. But you hope
that the combination somehow will give the Rice’s a pride of place and that
they will begin to take a more committed responsibility in caring for their
home.
I put what
probably had been a pin on the table and never saw it again. Who knows its origin or how long it had been
in that basically beautiful piece of property.
My fingers itch for a dumpster. Does
one get used to living in a jumble? How
is motivation effected by poverty?
What a week
it has been. Lots of laughs. Lots of learning. Lots of letting things go, but the core of it
all was lots of love. A lifetime of
memories.
I came as I
was – and learned a great deal and pushed myself more than I might have and got
more done.
Everyone
will leave this trip with some bumps and bruises, scrapes and cuts, which makes
perfect sense when you think about it.
Life is not perfect even for all those who think it should be. We cannot fix all the things at the house to
the way they should properly be. We
needed to accept the things we could not change (like it says in the Serenity
prayer). When things were not plumb,
square, or level, we had to work within those confines. Personally that was a struggle for me.
We can’t change
the world or even complete all the home repairs that are needed at the Rice’s
home in under a week – realizing that is perhaps “the wisdom to know the
difference” – again, as the Serenity Prayer says.
“Leave
things better than you find them.” We definitely did that. Things are better than when we began. Not just structurally on the house that Jack
built. But spiritually for all.
What did I
learn?
1.
Martha
can straddle a sink (standing on the kitchen counter) to hold boards and more. She
has a real knack for hammering in nails from the bottom up too
2.
Nancy
is a fiend about garden weeding.
3.
Joe
wears red suspenders to hold up his pants
4.
Judy
knows how to use a T square and more
5.
Judy
will dig and dig to get a hold dug for a sonotube.
6.
The
clothes dryer sheets placed inside one’s hat really do seem to keep the bugs
from biting.
7.
I
am surrounded by caring people
8.
You
can wash your underwear by taking a shower outside with your underwear still
on.
I realize
that well beyond the impact on the people we serve is the impact on us. The joy of physical work, the lovely feeling
of a cool shower after a miserably hot day, the delight in simply slowing down
to a more leisurely pace dictated by the work and the heat, seeing ourselves
and the Rice’s through our new unhurried eyes.
What a
week. Ups and downs and highs and lows but, just like life, we can
overcome all if we put our trust not only in the all mighty higher power but in
each other as well.
If when
people come together to be a good neighbor – if that is grace – then we have
all experienced it here. Perhaps we have
glimpsed a bit of the Kingdom. If so,
then why would we not work toward it always?
As I was
leaving I realized how much we live in the fast lane. As I was waiting to
leave, I got behind a vehicle waiting to turn. They not only waited for
one vehicle to pass but another as well. I just watched in amazement.
We in our high paced world would have honked our horn especially after
they let one vehicle out, let alone two. Now being one who ramps up on the rat
race each and every day I know there could have been time for at least two or
three vehicles to cut in those gaps. It
makes me realize that we who have so much always need more. We
really do need to stop and smell the roses. We should also stop to slow down
and help a neighbor. Or even let that other car go by.
From a
hand-written sign outside of the offices of Maine Seacoast Mission: “The best days are when my gratitude is
higher than my expectations.”
Thank you
Cherryfield. Thank you team. And thank you God for your guidance along the
journey.
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