A Busy Monday...

OK, got here last night! By here I mean a relief work "camp" at the Vineyard Church in Webster, Texas. "Camp" because people camp out here as long as they can, to help however they can, in partnership with the church and a national nonprofit, Mercy Response, that has an office housed here. Great setup! Commercial warehouse-style buildings, trailor showers with hot water parked out back with seven or so RV's belonging to people who've traveled here to help longer term, cafe and kitchen area with sofa lounge and WiFi (yessss!). A Mercy Response coordinator, Diane, gave us an orientation and we have been warmly welcomed by every person here.

Right before we got here we had dinner at a locally-owned (to support the local economy) restaurant called Kelley's, where the most ridiculously large portion sizes ever were discovered. In particular the diner serves baked potatoes the size of some Thanksgiving turkeys, topped with a huge pile of barbeque and enough to feed several people. We marveled at the weight of even the take-out boxes containing the leftovers. Photo coming soon...

We had no idea what we'd really be doing until we got here last night. Turns we're working on a house for 74-year-old Marie Carman, a most amazing lady. She's been through the ringer, she's got energy to spare and joy and humor and strength, she loves Jesus, she's sugar and hot sauce. My first assignment was to spend time with Marie (this ministry is holistic) and, oh my gosh, we really hit it off. She's not one for small talk, and neither am I. She has amazing stories from her life; I can only hope to get into it more with you later. She's always busy, and kept me busy helping her try to feed a tiny abandoned kitten, check on the tomato plants, clean out rooms, and sort out sales papers (to be recycled) from newspapers (to be donated to the animal shelter).

Marie's been living in her house these entire 8 months since the hurricane, on her own, despite having no power, no plumbing, and almost nothing left intact. Luckily somebody got a toilet working some weeks back, but there's still no bath or kitchen anything. That's part of what we're doing. Also we're working on flooring; what's currently there is ancient wood planks that weathered the flood and when I walked into the bathroom today I was looking through the cracks between floor planks at sunlit grass on the ground a few feet below. Good news though, the electricity got turned on today! Marie's face lit up brighter than the bulbs.

After lunch I put down some subflooring, which means I got to use a battery-powered circular saw and pneumatic nail gun, measuring and cutting and working independently and with help from my mum. I heart power tools! Carolyn got to spend a bit of time with Marie in the afternoon, and the others carried on with substantial demolition work in the former/future kitchen. There's much much much to be done hands-on in this house and it seems that each of us will have valuable things to do with every minute of our time here. We've got a flexible game plan and full hearts because God is good like that :)