I would have never found the place. Tucked way back down a winding dirt road, hidden under the loblolly pines, doubt I could have seen it from the air, unless that new piece of roof caught the sun. I was barely out of the truck when a few friendly dogs came wagging up. They were followed by an arm full of little sparkly-eyed pigtailed festooned chatter boxes ... aka second graders, all girls, cousins. As I later found, Mrs. C's great granddaughters ... and they giggle when she asks them "which one are you?" When they weren't staring at me and asking questions, they spent their day racing one another up and down the road, then back to me bragging about how fast they could run. All the heat in that house comes from an open fire place ... or the gas stove in the kitchen. I'm going to try to describe this little place ... it was poor, but very sweet also ... it didn't feel desperate like I'm afraid the impression left by my description will. Out front was a truckload of uncut wood, two foot sections of trees. A couple of the guys on our team split the whole pile for her, and those little girls stacked it neatly on the porch. I was really surprised by the quanity of wood she had piled up around her place ... I've never seen anything like it ... all kinds of wood, all the way from sections I couldn't wrap my arms around, down to twigs and broken furniture and eventually the rotted out 2X4s that we pulled out from under the ten layers of linoleum which made up her kitchen floor ... the flimsy plywood subfloor was totally splintered through at both entrances to the room.
She had a roll of brand new linoleum out on her backporch waiting for someone to come stretch it out and cut it ... that was what she was hoping for ... a new layer of linoleum in the kitchen ... she called it a "rug".
Back up ... We arrived ... a convoy of three vehicles, in a cloud of early morning dust. I wasn't wearing a watch, but the sun wasn't over the pines yet ... that kind of early. Once we turned off the paved road I saw started seeing trailers ... mobile homes, tucked in here and there. Probably two miles down the road was Mrs. C's place, an old four room shack with a bathroom added on back. A screen porch stretched across the front, and there was also had a back porch as deep as the bathroom addition. Attached to one side was a dirt floored cinder block two car carport which housed a rusted out pickup that seemed to be used for storage, and a brand new washer and an old dryer was out there also. I'm working on cleaning and organizing my garage and was struck by how very dirty a dirt floor is. There were several trailers clustered within the two acres or so that seemed to make up family land. At least two daughters and a son lived in those trailers ... I met them ... and a grandson, father to two of the little girls, lived in the one closest to her home, but I never saw him. So, we pulled off the road, stopped our trucks, and were met by the curiosity of first the dogs then the little girls.
Our group was made up of four college guys, a man about my age who runs a wood yard, and me. The older man said several times during the day that he came up in a place just like this one ... 'cept no bathroom, and the running water came from a hose hooked up to a neighbour's line. I know him fairly well, and two of the four boys, brothers, I've known for pretty much their whole lives ... the other two guys I've seen around ... we all attend church together. I got my first look at the equipment box as we collected in Mrs.C's front yard. I was there specifically to finish sheet rock, but there was no mud in the supply box.
So, up the stairs to meet Mrs.C on her front porch, then inside the house to a room with two double beds, two recliners, a chest of drawers with a TV glowing on top, and the fireplace, open and also glowing. We trailed through the front room into the next room which was pitch dark and just big enough to hold only another double bed and the door way to the kitchen. She lead us through the house to the kitchen and stepped into the bathroom with our team leader to show him where nail holes were causing the roof to leak into her only closet. I stood in the kitchen assessing what I could do with what looked like the sorriest sheet rock work I've ever seen. The sheet rock on the walls had been papered and later painted over, but are now rippled where weather from a hole in the tin roof had left the room exposed. The wall Sheetrock needs to be replaced, but I don't think it's on anyone's to do list. The installation of two new sheets of tin on the roof and one 4'x8' piece of sheet rock attached to the ceiling was the summer project. There were gaps between the ceiling board and the walls ... almost two inch gaps in some places. Pretty soon an Urban Ministries runner showed up with a gallon of wall mud. She also told us that there was a sheet of plywood on the front porch which was intended to be used to repair the floor. We had a bag of nails and a hammer in the project box, but no saw, and the house wasn't wired to accept a three prong plug. I started applying net tape and wall mud along the edges of the sheet that had been hung by the last team. There were places which I couldn't reach because the floor under wasn't strong enough to support the wobbly chair I was standing on. One guy left to acquire a saw and an adapter. One guy went up on the roof with a caulk gun while another guy stood in the closet directing him to the leaks. Two of the guys started splitting fire wood. And the old guy started figuring out how to go about repairing the floor. They wound up shutting off her water and hauling the whole sink cabinet out in to the yard ... the counter top wasn't attached ... it was laid with the sink still in place on the back porch. Behind the sink cabinet there was no sheetrock ... Just exposed two by fours and no insulation. Pulling the floor deck out was pretty easy ... it was mushy wood, rusty nails and powdery dry rot. We didn't have any lumber to work with at all ... cept for some scrapes she had leaning against a tree which were too good for the wood pile. The old guy MacGuyvered a workable plan. While the men removed the damaged floor (and layers of linoleum) I scavenged for useable CMU block pieces left over from the carport addition ... I hammered the mortar off the edges and prayed that the work inside would go well. I can't even describe the mess. Our team leader kept on saying something like safe and weatherproof ... that was the mission plan. They wanted me to tell Mrs.C that laying her new rug was not going to be a possibility for that day. "Tell her I will come back out here during the week, next weekend at the latest, and do it" one of the college guys said, and a couple of others said they'd come back with him. I sat on her front porch with her and explained what was going on to her. I told her I knew she had her heart set on a new floor and honestly, I don't think she understood why just tacking down a new roll of linoleum wasn't all that was needed. I said it would look real pretty until she fell through it and then we might never find her. "Well, beggars can't be chosers" was her philosophical reply. I very gently told her that I didn't want her breaking a leg stepping through that floor. She was disappointed, but so sweet about the whole thing. The truth is ... The back of her house is falling off. I asked her what color she wants her kitchen painted and she said white would be real nice. I smoothed out the wall mud as good as I could. There was no sandpaper and it looks pretty rough streaking down the walls where I closed the crack between wall and ceiling. I don't really know if paint is on anyone's to do list either.
By the end of the day her roof didn't leak, and almost the entire kitchen floor deck had been replaced, and a gallon of wall mud was in place plugging the gap that you could see tin roof through ... and fire wood was split and stacked.
Earlier I said I met her son. He didn't offer to help. He was a well dressed man with a phone in his ear. I also met two of her daughters ... They sat outside their trailers at picnic tables with I guess their husbands ... watching those adorable little girls play and listening to football games. My guys sent me out to ask around for electrical tape once, and later in the day I was looking for a water hose to wash dried mud off my hands ... Mrs. C's water was still off. Not once did anyone offer to help. That really surprised me. The women, I understand why they didn't help ... it's the men who really surprised me. They didn't even get up to turn on the water hose, just barked orders at the grandkids ... and one man gave me a couple of his business cards. He has a paint and pressure washing business.
I came home tired and dirt dirty. My back and neck hurt a bit from balancing on a chair and working with my hands overhead ... up and down more then I'm used to. I was so thankful to walk into my clean house at the end of the day... the floor is strong every single where I step. I filled up the bathtub with hot water, epsom salts and eucalyptus spearmint scented bubble bath and slid under the water remembering that it was a very old black lady who first told me that Epsom salt will drawn the pain right out of you. Mrs. C had a box of salts sitting on the edge of her bath tub. I laid there with my eyes shut thinking about that place ... no more then ten miles from my home ... cept for that box car that I saw people living in when I was a little kid, it's the hardest living conditions I've ever seen with my own eyes. I was thinking about the book, Happiness Hypothesis ... she seemed happy. I sat with her a couple of times during the day, and she was very easy to be with. Her ways are gentle ... she seems to be content. I am troubled to see so many able bodied men living on her land but not offering to help. I just don't get it at all. My husband has given me an article to look at ... "Toxic Charity" is a book written my Dr. Robert Lupton who is the founder of FCS Urban Ministries. I may look at the book. His premise is "well intended services , one way giving, actually harms the dignity of the recipients". He observes that these feel good mission minded experiences are actually counterproductive, and contends that chronic poverty issues deserve a development strategy. This article, in Saturday's Birmingham paper says American's spend as much as $5 billion annually on mission trips and the actual amount of good accomplished is very minimal. I haven't looked at his data, but I suspect we can be more effective.
I don't feel particularly good about my make a difference day. I said I would do it because I sensed that the guy heading it up for my church was having trouble recruiting volunteers. I did it for him. I was happy to help an old lady. She absolutely can not do that for herself and she probably can't afford to pay someone to do that for her. She's probably happiest in her own home ... I think I will be when I'm that old. I don't know what the real difference made was. I'd say all things considered it was a good use of my time, but the real good may have been stuff that I can not see or understand. Maybe it was something for those children. Maybe it was something for me ... I look at all the places where my ceiling meets the walls and I am glad. My floors have never felt so good. I'm grateful. I'm glad that we can work. I'm glad we do. I can't imagine my boys letting people come in and do for me while they sit around. I can't imagine my girls doing that either. There's another thing here that is the truth ... Mrs. C truly believed that another layer of linoleum would fix her problem. The back of her house was falling off and a cosmetic fix was all she really wanted. It's childlike. I really did not sense an entitlement dynamic with her at all.
Well ... I'm going to be thinking about it.
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