Today's pick comes to us from Delilah, though I don't think it's this Delilah, but I could be wrong. That made me wonder about something. So I write songs and such, many of which I write about girls and the crazy things they do. I always wondered what it would be like for a girl to hear a song on the radio that came from someone they date/dated and they knew was about them. Like if some of my songs got on the radio, I bet the girls who they were written about would know, and I wonder what the reaction would be. I guess it depends on the mood of the song huh? I mean if it's a nice love song, I would imagine they would be pretty pumped, unless that love is long gone, then they are left dreaming about old days. And if it's a screw you song, well I can't imagine anyone would dig on that. Anyway, sorry for that tangent, but ladies, comment on this post to let me know your thoughts on this matter. And Kat, (the subject of our song from the first suggestion) if you read this I really want to know what you think of your song.
So Delilah's suggestion was to work in a soup kitchen. Holy community service! I have actually gotten quite a few emails about doing this, which I think is awesome. Let's scratch each other's backs people. The soup kitchen I chose was actually the place where Christina works called POTS (Part of the Solution) in the North Bronx, near Fordham University. Quick side note, they used to have another center called People Advancing New Solutions (PANS). Cute play on words. POTS AND PANS. So POTS does a lot of awesome work, everything from legal services to clothing drives to food pantries to daily lunch and dinner for anyone who needs it. Today I worked down in the kitchen with Diz, Oliver, and Oliver's son Patrick (good name, sir). Quick activity: think of two super fun people you would love to work with for a day. Got them pictured? Okay, Diz and Oliver are cooler than that. Really.
I had to be in there pretty early, so it was a coffee morning for sure. Diz and Oliver have been
working at POTS for a long time. I'm not sure the exact length of Oliver's tenure, but Diz has been at POTS 10 years. I was in 7th grade when she started, wearing my awesome purple track suit that Mom got for me on sale at Marshall's, when Diz started. No wonder I got made fun of. Yikes. Oliver and his son were on food prep getting the day's meal of baked turkey and rice ready to go. Diz was making sure everything was set up for when the clients arrive. Our
first task of the day was to put on the plastic apron. Check. Then it was prep time. My job was sorting the donated breads for lunch into individual dessert portions. They get all their goods donated to them from various stores because the expiration date came up, even though the product is still good. How much food gets thrown out because of this? I will find out in a future blog post I promise.
Then it was punch time (the drink, not the action), and getting ready for the start of the barrage of people coming in. POTS serves about 500 meals a day, everyday, all year
long, to anyone who needs it. Impressive. My job was the dish washing station. Easy breezy, until the dishwasher broke just as EVERYONE finished their meal and the next wave of people came in. People yelling "I need cups! I need plates!" and all I can say is "The dishwasher won't stop!" Not good for my first day at this. No worries, Oliver came over and gave it the magic love and it was fixed.
Everything was going smoothly until I decided hey, I need to document this experience. So unknowing Patrick pulls out his camera and takes a picture of the room while people are eating......this was a no-no. Diz came running over and said "You better stop doing that or people are gonna start a fight in here. They don't like their pictures taken." And I knew it immediately, as I got about 30 death stares from the people in the room. "Why is the white boy taking my photo?" My bad. One of the guys came up to me as he dropped off his dirty dishes and...forcibly...asked what I was going to do with that photo. All I could muster to say was "Nothing, I'll delete it I promise", and a response of "Yea, that would probably be best for you". Insert picture of tail between my legs here.
After the room cleared of my mistake, it was all down hill from there, and tons of fun. I got into a pretty good rhythm of cleaning, stacking, and moving the dishes. I think I could get a job as a busboy now. I'm moving up the world people. Watch out.
On a side note, I was contacted by a lady who makes documentaries, and she wants to include me in her next documentary. Sweet! The only thing is it's for Brazilian television, but that means I will have a strong following down in the land of Ronaldo. More info on this to come I promise, because we are meeting tomorrow to talk about it. The big thing I need right now is just spreading the word on the blog, so that will be great. Thanks Delilah. Keep the suggestions coming friends. Get ready for the rest of the week's entries, as I promise they will be pretty interesting.
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