birthday #23

9/10/09
Happy Birthday to me!
I woke up this morning to one of my roommates pounding on the door because she had made me breakfast in bed and a jumble of missed calls and text messages of friends saying Happy Birthday. I am going to lunch with Uncle Shawn (who lives in Washington DC) because he is in Chicago for business, I couldn’t have asked for much better of a birthday present. It’s promising to be a great day.
Since Labor Day it has been a pretty crazy week. All of Amate House got free tickets for the Chicago White Sox game versus the Oakland A’s on Tuesday evening. John Lucas (our executive director) had extra tickets so the guys from work (including Jim Kozy of course) were able to come with as well. Jim took all of us in his 15 passenger van so we didn’t have to worry about CTA or driving, what a great boss! It was a fun evening not because of the game (we were sitting about as far up in the bleachers as you can get and the Sox lost 11 to 3) but because of the company. My housemates lived up to their usual standards of being the best house by doing the most dancing, taking tons of pictures, staying longer than all the other houses, and dancing through the stadium after the game was over.
Tuesday was also the kids at the Teen Center’s first day of school so they had a lot of energy when they got to us. Don’t worry though, they are already sick of teachers, were texting in class, and didn’t want to learn anymore, it was a great first day…Seriously though, we have been slightly struggling with activities for the kids and finding stuff that they all want to do. Some love playing basketball, some like playing cards, pool and volleyball occupy them for awhile, but then there are the kids who say they’re bored but don’t want to do anything we suggest. And 4 hours is a long time to be bored or to just do one or 2 things; we’re working on a weekly schedule that will have stuff that has something for everyone throughout the day or at least sometime during the week. I think we are going to plan a big kickball game for Friday and put up signs today!
Yesterday we were only with the kids for an hour but I got to experience kicking out my first student. He had 2 warnings and still insisted that he didn’t do anything wrong and Linda and I had to call in reinforcements from Jim to get him to finally leave. It was pretty sad, I know that he causes a lot of trouble but I know that he is a good kid at heart. Jim and I were talking and the problem is that he causes us so much trouble at the center and creates so much extra work for us, but the center is exactly where he needs to be so he isn’t causing trouble on the street or at home and to get him on the right track for life. However, Jim had told me on Tuesday that this youth needs to be on a short leash and needs to know who is in charge so if we start out tough hopefully that will be better for all of us later on. Hopefully he is right, I do not like kicking kids out of the center, I want to give them all second chances. You can definitely tell that they are seeing how far they can go with us right now; I am trying hard to be their friend while still being an authority figure and not becoming a pushover.
Hopefully we will have a fun day with the kids today and then it’s tacos for dinner and hanging out for my birthday! Hope everyone has a fabulous day and end of their week. Stay in touch, I would love to hear back from you!
Keep living for the big guy upstairs!
-Meg