Because I feared we might be short a student to partner last night, I went with the Monday group. \u00a0I have been fascinated with the idea of being “non-intrusive.” \u00a0Really, the best things happen when the project is fully in the ownership of all the listeners and tellers involved. \u00a0We ended up having just the right number, and I stayed to talk to the guard who was very chatty.<\/p>\n
First–it is so interesting to me how no one ever seems to know how or why things happen, like all the brand new furniture in the library! \u00a0Fur beanbag chairs?? Little cafe tables and chairs?? \u00a0It is SO much better for us and our storytelling project now, but I have no idea how it happened. \u00a0And neither did the guard.<\/p>\n
The guard told me that one of the unity advocates (actually, that is what they are called now, not “guards) has started a boyscout troop in the facility. \u00a0I wonder what they will allow those guys to do? \u00a0Apparently they will work on badges and build stuff., though I didn’t hear of any plans to go camping. \u00a0He is excited to work with his guys on building a bridge out of popsicle sticks. \u00a0He was an engineering major in college.The thing is, he wants them to make each popsicle stick a point in their lives that got them to where they are and moves them forward, or one thing they have learned, and the water underneath is going to be painted on a board and in it they will write all the bad parts of their life that they have overcome. Interesting in so many ways.<\/p>\n
The most touching thing he told me was that the guys on his unit are obssesed with our program! \u00a0It is their favorite thing, and they bug him all day “are you going to take us down to see the volunteers? \u00a0They are coming, right?” \u00a0I tried to ask him what they liked about it. \u00a0some of it is getting to see people who aren’t incarcerated. \u00a0And it is interesting to them–they are bored. Other guys who are not in the program are envious that those guys get to spend time with attractive college students! \u00a0\u00a0They are all talking about college now, he said! \u00a0They are really intrigued, and are starting to see that as a possibility for themselves.<\/p>\n
At the end of the night, the residents were asking me if we were going to do this again, for another 6 weeks. \u00a0I am so disappointed that I don’t have a spring class to offer them, but my job just doesn’t have enough space in it for me to teach again in spring. \u00a0I just think of those residents over there, full of potential, bright, lonely and bored, and I wish so much that I could do more.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Because I feared we might be short a student to partner last night, I went with the Monday group. \u00a0I have been fascinated with the idea of being “non-intrusive.” \u00a0Really, the best things happen when the project is fully in the ownership of all the listeners and tellers involved. \u00a0We …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2991,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[44426,44423],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1199","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-experiential-reflections","category-fall-2016","column","twocol"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7RVTr-jl","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2991"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1199"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1199\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/storytelling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}