I had my first shift with Project Angel Heart this weekend. On Saturday, I went to the site and spent a few hours in the afternoon driving around federal delivering the ready-made meals to clients. It certainly was an experience and really made me thankful for what we have. Even living at school in small dorms rooms, we have more than the clients I visited. We have so much to be thankful for: our health, our friends, our homes, our families, our friends, our safe neighborhoods, easy acess to healthy food, and the list continues. Even in Denver, many families live without these simple luxuries. It reminded me how thankful I am for the life I have and the opportunities I have for the future.
It also brought to light our discussion in class about how diseases can't be stereotyped. All the clients who answered the door looked relatively healthy. If I were to see them on the street, I wouldn't know that they had a life-threatening illness. Illness or disease doesn't define a person. Instead, it is their character and actions that will leave a legacy.
I'm curious how other's first experiences were? What did you do? Learn? And what did it make you realize about your own life? How does it confirm or deny what we've been discussing about disease metaphor in class?
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Like Laurel, I also drove to Project Angel Heart for the first time on Saturday to pile bag after bag of food into the car trunk for the weekend shift of food delivery. After a brief training with Russ, we set off—map in hand—for Federal and 38th Ave.
Even as a Denver native, I still wasn’t familiar with this particular area of Arvada. I suppose that’s rather telling in and of itself… don’t we all, to some extent, try to avoid those melancholy areas of town that force us to acknowledge the poverty and brokenness that we pretend does not exist? Though some of the clients lived in quirky, colorful, charming homes, many were just as Laurel described. A specific nursing home complex comes to mind—as we stepped inside, we were overcome by the stale smell of the dark entryway and the bare, yellowing walls; no one was in sight except one frail, elderly lady who sat, staring out the small window. For some of Project Angel Heart’s clients, this is their reality.
During my first shift with Project Angel Heart, I had the opportunity to breathe life into the statistics we heard on the first day of class. We were told that approximately 90% of Project Angel Heart’s clients live in poverty… and I was able to experience this reality first-hand. Now I am even more awed by the power of Project Angel Heart’s mission--they provide sustenance to those who are most vulnerable. In Susan Sontag’s essays, she notes the alleged medical equation: cancer = death. Considering the astronomical cost of health care and basic living expenses, isn’t it a miracle that cancer does not necessarily mean death to impoverished patients?
Thank you, Laurel and Alyssa, for posting your initial reflections on your first shift at Project Angel Heart. It sounds like you both have begun to make some interesting connections between our reading and our community work. I'm struck by the way that both of you read this experience in ways that challenge or revise some of the assumptions that you started the course with.
I wonder is this larger theme might prove productive for other folks in the course who have yet had a chance to work at Project Angel Heart? How has even our reading opened up new insight for you with regard to illness in our culture?
If you have been able to complete a shift, your reflection on this experience, as Laurel asks about, would also be interesting to read.
I recently read an article by Thea Singer titled "Why We Don't Care About Darfur". Singer cited Dr. Paul Slovic in naming a phenomenon called psychic numbing as the culprit. Psychic numbing, most succintly, is a psychological mechanism that prevents us from exploding from grief. The brain is simply not configured to process a huge statistic as are associated with life-threatening illness, e.g. over a million HIV/AIDS fatalities. Psychic numbing is a protective mechanism, based on the concept of entitativity, in which a person gets a coherent picture of whatever they are looking at. Individual faces and identities create more empathy than huge, unrelatable statistics.
I have chosen to take this article, and read it as such: "Why We Don't Care About Cancer/HIV/AIDS/Homelessness/Global Warming/Malnutrition/Overpopulation/(Insert Universal Problem Here)".
The concept of psychic numbing, according to Slovic, represents "a fundamental deficiency in our humanity." However, he makes a point of saying that this does not make us heartless -- it makes us human. However, what also makes us human is the capacity to realize and come to terms with this deficiency, and hopefully achieve a drastic change of perspective, and hopefully, a drastic change of heart. Joseph Stalin said, "A single death is a tragedy; a million deaths is a statistic." This truth is not unavoidable. But it is within our individual power to be aware of this truth, and use it to our personal advantage.
Work with Project Angel Heart at times can feel like a grand staging of mass production. I spent a lot of time feeling like I was going through the motions. But this is all a part of the detachment we suffer from psychic numbing. On the way back to school, we talked in the car about the individual soups we had poured, joking about how "I made sure that lid was on" or "I put that lid on extra special just for you." It is almost this perspective that makes the work worthwhile. To be aware of the one person whose life is bettered as a result of our work is, in a sense, more touching than thinking about a million meals to a million people.
At the risk of sounding repetitive, I would like to elaborate on Lauren’s post. This section she wrote is what caught my attention:
"To be aware of the one person whose life is bettered as a result of our work is, in a sense, more touching than thinking about a million meals to a million people."
This phrase is brilliant in the truth is conveys. In a world where 56 million people die per year how can we as people possibly acknowledge such tragedy while still maintaining the conviction that our own efforts can make a difference?
As an individual, a person must focus on the impact she makes and she must taking meaning from those actions. To compare oneself to the entirety of an issue or process can only result in disillusionment. Take for example, the production of a play: no one person can bring a play to life but with many people each completing a single role, a work of art can emerge.
I think that the idea of helping others should be approached with this same mindset. Regardless of how futile a gesture may seem when compared to the world’s problems, a person can simply focus on how that gesture is received: a smile or a thank you are the responses that truly give meaning to community service.
Because I would certainly like to facilitate this mindset, I am looking forward to working with Project Angel Heart. I would particularly like to be one of those people who get to drop off food so I can meet the people who benefit from this service.
Like Laurel, I too was struck by the appearances of the clients we delivered to this past Saturday. What resonated with me, however, was not the healthy appearance of the clients, but rather their overall cheeriness. I'm not sure why--I never expected the clients to be proverbial poster boys for their given illness (or indeed anything of the sort)--but something in their confidence moves me. They were living as if illness were not a part of it; they refused to allow their their day-to-day activities--from the brief glimpse into them that I saw--to be at all affected by their condition.
It made me realize that when I pondered what it would be like to live with a terminal illness I never really saw beyond the initial reaction to the news that one has such an infirmity. One has to eventually move on and accept the facts, and continue to live his or her life to its full capacity. If a man makes up his mind that he is going to be happy, then he is going to be happy regardless of what he has or doesn't have, and the same is true if he decides to be sad. I saw an overwhelming amount of courage and optimism in the clients of Project Angel Heart. It gave me hope--not because I am comparing circumstances, but because such unbounded auspicious vitality in any living thing must inevitably touch even the most cynical among us. I look forward to delivering again.
While what Laurel, Alyssa, Frazer, and Travis have said is true, the thing the caught me most off guard was not so much the state of the clients, but how much I felt like an alien in my own city. I grew up here-I am a native as you can get. I snowboard, I love the outdoors, I know where the best places to eat are. Further, working construction this summer I learned the city pretty well, having drive around from job site to job site. And this took me to just about every area you can go-from Evergreen to Aurora, Lone Tree to Fort Collins. But the entire time I did this I went not as some rich white kid who had everything. I went as a dirty construction worker who was going through the daily grind just like everyone else.
But now, being back in school and transforming back into that rich white college kid that I am supposed to be, I feel like an intruder in areas where prior I had felt right at home. Frazer and I stuck out. The forms Project Angel Heart has you sign before your shift say to try to be inconspicuous. Frazer summed it up perfectly: "Inconspicuous. Pretty inconspicuous when two white guys in a blue Audi are driving around dropping off packages."
In the end, though, whether you belong there fades into the background. All this alien feeling does is distract you from what you are doing: helping others.
HBO had a short running series exploring the struggles of people infected with HIV/AIDS. Each episode focused on a different region of the world, ie Brazil, Thailand, India, Russia, etc. Inherently these countries treat the AIDS patients differently, but the interesting aspect of these people are how they respond to their current state. For example there was a young woman in Thailand and she responded to the disease by first living in an AIDS shelter and then moving into her parents' house, which was a huge step as her parents had to accept the fact that she had AIDS. Similarly in Russia, a couple, who had contracted HIV via intravenous drug use sought to change people's mind about AIDS and try to dismiss the social stigma surrounding AIDS. A very powerful image that has stuck with me since seeing that episode is the male character challenging someone in the street to shake his hand, knowing that he was an AIDS patient.
These people that are inflicted with AIDS are treated so differently around the world, but they all seem to be seeking the same thing... acceptance. I believe that is why Sontag was so against the military metaphor; because it alienates and emphasizes the difference between people.
I look forward to working with Project Angel Heart for this reason: treating the clients with chronic disease as I would treat any other person. No one wants to be stigmatized or seen differently and it truly is a struggle that needs to be approached as a culture.
I am so confused. Going into this volunteer work, I thought that I would have this life-changing moment the second that I stepped into the home base of Project Angel Heart. I thought that this epiphany would come about, and I would suddenly be...I don't know exactly what I expected.
However, I did the same thing that everyone else did. I showed up, I cared, I delivered, I wished good wishes, but somehow I didn't have this experience.
Everyone spoke about their surprise towards the people and the places. I felt no surprise. I had delivered meals for a program much similar to Project Angel Heart, and so I knew what to expect. I knew that most would give a quick hello and goodbye, some would say thank you, and a few wouldn't say anything at all.
And I was perfectly fine with this. I understood.
Some of the class talked about the poverty that was evident due to the location of the neighborhood and the state that it was in. However, I had once again experienced this. I was used to seeing shabby houses, fences held together by some yarn, and windows that were covered by trashbags or duct tape.
These were the areas that needed Project Angel Heart. And I understood this.
But I do want to reflect on some thoughts that Ryan originally posted. When I originally volunteered for TLC (similar to Project Angel Heart), I wasn't so different from the people to whom I was delivering meals. I lived in the same town, traveled along the same streets, attended the same public schools.
In a sense, I felt like I was helping a neighbor or a friend that I hadn't quite met yet. But now, I realize that I am a stranger. If I see them as someone who is needy, how do they see me?
This thought exists in the back of my mind. When hand over a package, or when I smile at them, what do they see? Do they think that I'm a private school girl who is trying to maker herself feel better, or do they understand that I truly want to help regardless of my political, social, or economic background?
How can I convince them that my intentions are good if they won't even acknowledge that I am there? I don't want instant gratification nor do I want some type of award. I just want the people of Project Angel Heart to understand that I am there to help.
As I explained in class, Tanner and I got the "veteran" shift. Tuesday morning, 8am, the learned and experienced gather to prepare the Project's meals. Everyone knew what needed to be done, who would do what, when things should be completed… Tanner and I basically had to chase the head chef around the kitchen in order to get any assignments at all. But that was good to see, I'm glad that they had more help than they needed and that all the regulars had their specialized places and purposes. After all, I was a mere tourist; those volunteers dedicate serious time and emotion to a mission that I was only visiting. Everyone has their OWN cause, and it was truly a blessing to witness so many people in their element.
Oh boy, I'm getting excited to try this delivery business. I want to feel lost, alien, in awe, human and moved by the adventure. My first visit to Project Angel Heart was at eight on tuesday morning (so so so early), and instead of feeling anything foreign, I was quite at home. I helped to prepare an entrée of spagetti with various sauces, peas and carrots. I scooped peas into 300-ish trays and actually enjoyed the rhythm and conversation it allowed. I bonded with the other volunteers, especially a psychedelically minded sophomore at CSM, and had a great time leaving the rest of the world behind in the cheery atmosphere. The grim reality of the service that these volunteers provide does not sober their mood, rather it seemed to make them delighted. The joy that the volunteers felt at being able to serve others was much more moving than the thought of who we were helping.
I do not ignore or evade the ghettos and sketchy parts of my hometown, of which there are many, and have delivered meals for other non-profits many times; thus the severe conditions of the recipients will likely not shock me. But the joy of the workers was a surprise. Maybe I already am in awe. Maybe it was just really early in the morning.
I have volunteered at several organizations with mission statements similar to that of Project Angel Heart. I have also seen poverty and been around it for my whole life. Hence, there were no surprises when working my shifts. I knew from experience what it would be like working with others for a good cause, just as I guessed that we wouldn't have much interaction with the clients themselves. The dirty work of food preparation and the light-hearted bickering of territorial volunteers are realities of such types of work.
That being said, the ability and opportunity to volunteer always strike me as such a blessing. After my two shifts, I feel grateful once again for all that I have, in the way of food, financial resources, health, family, and so much more. Along the way I was also able to have some fun. I truly enjoyed getting lost in a big city and even dripping peach cobbler and soup all over myself, especially as it was accompanied by good conversation. And the fact that it was in the name of helping others is what makes the experience all the more worthwhile.
Having volunteered in this way before, the work itself did not teach me anything new or lead me to any deep realizations. However, the experience of helping others never gets old; it continually shows me how important the dedication of an individual or group can be in the life of someone who is suffering. I am thankful for the opportunity to continue to be of service alongside Project Angel Heart.
I haven't yet volunteered at Project Angel Heart but reading everyone's experiences so far have made me very excited to dive in next week. I was surprised at Laurel's comments that the patients under Project Angel Heart's care don't give off the impression of being sick. The picture of a terminally ill patient has been burned into our minds via various forms of media that we can easily lose touch with reality. What a great opportunity for us all to stay true in our human connections.
With my first shift at Project Angel Heart coming up this Tuesday, I am finding the postings of my classmates reassuring and stimulating. That is, on the most practical level, I am becoming excited about what has largely been described as an intellectually stimulating (and I’m tempted to say even emotionally broadening, based on some descriptions) and only minimally intimidating experience. Far more intriguing, however, is a ‘bigger picture” idea or connecting theme that seems to be developing.
Through our reading assignments and discussions so far, the most startling realization for me has been that we have certain specific ways of thinking about illness, both as individuals and as members of a society. A simple idea, perhaps, but it had not occurred to me prior to my involvement in this class. I see this theme emerging in a lot of our postings as well. Having first been made aware of our own thoughts regarding illness (and the contestable nature of these thoughts/assumptions), our ideas appear to be undergoing change through involvement in Project Angel Heart. This is a fascinating process of growth, and I look forward to being part of it.
i realize that this post is incredibly late, but having just recently completed my first shift working at Project Angel Heart a few days ago, i felt that now i could really respond to laurel's questions with a bit more insight.
i showed up at Project Angel Heart on friday morning at 8 am. and i'll be honest, i was pretty apprehensive about what the day would entail. and then, i scooped up turkey tetrazini into trays for two hours. there was nothing glamorous about it, nothing to make me feel that all too prevalent holier-than-thou feeling that so often occurs with volunteer work. and maybe this is just the cynic in me, but i really started to wonder why people really do volunteer work. is it really to help other people? or is it because it makes the volunteer feel better about him/herself? i mean, i hope that there really are those among us that volunteer simply to make the world a better place and to help those who really need it, but really - how many of us are those people? maybe that's why we don't have earth-shattering, defining moments while we're doing our volunteer work. maybe we're just looking at the motives behind the work incorrectly.
jees. the cynic is raging tonight.
I've just finished reading all of your comments to Laurel's post, and again (I hope I don't come off too much like a Pollyanna) I'm humbled and moved by your clarity of thought, your reflectiveness, and the engagement you are all bringing to this endeavor.
A few more specific responses: Ryan, I laughed out loud when I read your comment. This past Saturday, I had a similiar feeling with regard to my inconspicuousness. I brought my six year old son and his friend from school along with me, and as we were delivering meals to clients in a large apartment housing unit, my son had to use the bathroom. Now being the six year old he is, he proceeded to be all loud and obnoxious about it, and I thought, how am I supposed to be respectful and inconspicuous when he's doing this? And yet, each time a client opened the door, they seemed genuinely pleased by being greeted by the boys. As loud and crazy as they were, the clients seemed to enjoy a moment of childish energy.
And to Cortney: I think your cyncicsm is certainly appropriate. You're right, dishing out turkey tetrazini is decidedly not glamorous, nor is much volunteer work. It can feel like you're not really helping do anything really important, like impacting larger social change or getting at root causes of a problem. But doing such work together, in common with other interested people, is actually something that goes beyond feeling good about oneself (although I don't doubt some people view "charity work" in this regard)--it gets at the heart of civic democracy. We'll be reading more about this later on in the quarter, but for now, think about how coming together to pursue joint interests relates to our rights as citizens in a democracy.
Here's a comment from Sarai Glass:
I had my first experience with Project Angel Heart last night, preparing food. As soon as I walked in I was welcomed with smiles and in general, a very warm atmosphere. One of the first things I noticed, aside from a very nice, clean kitchen area, was upbeat music. I felt like the music was so appropriate to the atmosphere I was already feeling. Everyone was inviting, but, you could tell they weren't there to socialize, rather, they were very serious about the work they were doing. Anyone can prepare a meal, but the people I met were not just anyone's. They were so cheerful and full of joy, but determined to do serious work. All I ended up doing was cutting up potatoes, cutting up turkey, and ladeling soup. But in actuality, I was preparing a meal that would go on to nourish another human being with a life threatening disease. All I could think about when I was preparing the meal was that I hoped if I had a life threatening illness that someone like Project Angel Heart would be a part of my life. What a blessing it must be. To say the least, I am very excited to do deliveries.
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