Hello family, friends, and others interested in my experiences in Chicago!
As many of you know I have moved to the fantastic city of Chicago to volunteer for a year in community with 12 other housemates in South Chicago, the McKinley Park neighborhood (we are near White Sox field if that helps with location). I am doing a program called Amate House which is a faith-based program that supports volunteers for a year of service in the community. We get room and board paid for and get money for food every month, we receive a $100 stipend once a month and will get the Americorps education award at completion of the program.
My house, South House (SOHO!) has 13 people, 10 women and 3 men, and we are living in a converted convent. We each have our own rooms but share bathrooms, kitchen, living area, food, cars, and lots of other fun stuff. My roommates are the best and we have become extremely close already. It is crazy to think we’ve only been here a month, I am confident that these will be lifelong friends. There are 2 other houses with Amate; North House has 14 people and is up north by Wrigleyville and Uptown, Little Village is west of downtown and has 9 people.
I am working at Blessed Sacrament Teen Center as 1 of 3 staff members. We are an after-school program serving hundreds of high school and junior high students living in the area. Once school starts we will be providing a safe place for 40-60 kids to hang out after school on a daily basis. I work 5 blocks from my house so I get to walk to work (as opposed to the hour+ commute some of my roomies have). Linda is from Amate House as well and is also working at the Teen Center with me. The center is run by Jim Kozy, my boss, who has had to go down to working part-time this year because the center lost most of its funding when the state of Illinois did not give the program its major grant. The center almost did not re-open this year and is really struggling financially. A large part of our job when the kids aren’t around will be writing grant letters and letters to congress people and state workers and trying to get funding from wherever we can. It is going to be a big job with that, programming for the kids, trying to get them to work on school and tutoring, and getting the place organized and running more efficiently.
Because I work in the neighborhood I have really gotten to be a part of the community quickly. I can hardly go for a run or walk around the park without seeing one of my kids or someone else I know through the parish or my boss. Today in fact I went and watched a pick-up football game that a bunch of my boys had gotten together. One of my 8th graders, Ray, asked me to come watch them play and made sure that I was going to come all week. It is a wonderful neighborhood and I am so excited to be here for the year. It is largely Hispanic and the income level is lower but is very family oriented. McKinley Park is a block away from our house and is wonderful, there are always people running, walking, playing basketball, tennis, baseball, football, soccer, having birthday parties, or just hanging out. We have had great weather and it is fun walking everywhere and getting to know the area. It is a fairly safe community but is still a part of South Chicago so we are being careful and not walking alone at night but are perfectly fine during the day. I have also gotten to be good friends with 3 guys from the center. They are about my age and grew up going to the teen center and now are just back volunteering when they have time. One of them used to be a staff member but was laid off this year when we lost our funding.
Our time in Chicago began with 2 weeks of orientation which included lots of community time getting to know our housemates and the other houses, speakers and discussions about the tenants of Amate House, team building at an outdoor learning center, dinner with board members, and a photo scavenger hunt throughout downtown Chicago. Fun stuff we did outside of orientation during the first 2 weeks included, painting our rooms, going to the beach, movies, free happy hour, donut delights, outdoor movies and outdoor summer dances downtown, whiffleball, hotseat, and lots of laughing and getting to know each other.
Our jobs started the 3rd week and my roommates are working in a variety of places including 3 pre-school teachers, HIV/AIDs outreach center, torture center, Uptown Ministry, school librarian, Girls in the Game, a retreat center, and WomanCraft. Some jobs are more stressful than others but everyone has been pretty worn out from these intense and demanding full-time jobs.
I have found a running buddy and we are in training for a 15K race (about 9 ½ miles) in November. Kate was a soccer player at St. Ben’s and is from St. Louis Park and we have tons of mutual friends (we didn’t know each other at all, it took us moving to Chicago to realize how much we had in common and that we should have been friends long before this year!) Being a soccer player she is a faster runner than me but isn’t used to running constantly for long periods of time. We are a perfect pair because she pushes me in speed and I push her to run longer. It has been a lot of fun training with her and getting to know her this year. We helped each other paint our rooms on day 3 and 4 and that was a pretty good bonding experience.
Weekends in Chicago and with my roommates are lots of fun and you’ll have to look at my facebook pictures for all of our adventures. My boss is fantastic and has taken Kate and me boating on the Mississippi River in Iowa, taken us out to dinner and lunch multiple times and came to our house to unclog the drains in our showers. He is an amazing guy and has committed so much of himself to help hundreds, maybe thousands of youth, he is definitely a role model I look up to and respect immensely. He is very caring and fun to be around and a great guy to know and a wonderful boss to work for.
At my house we have dinner together every weeknight (we each cook one night a week) and spend a large amount of time together in the evenings and on the weekends. We have prayer nights and faith sharing. Every Wednesday is community night run by Amate and is 4 hours long and we spend the time doing a variety of self-growth and community building activities. Like I said before, my roommates are great and we have tons of fun together and are learning to live together in a simple community living off a minimal amount and trying to be better stewards of the earth. It has been trying at times but is looking to be a fabulous year full of learning, laughing, and loving.
We just finished up a fun weekend and have labor day off of work so I will have to write more about that later, my housemates are about to start a movie so I am going to go join them.
Sorry this first one was so long, thanks for bearing with me, I will try to update this regularly so the posts are not always so lengthy.
I hope your lives are going well and would love to hear about them, feel free to respond on here, email, call, text, facebook, or snail mail me. I would love to hear from you!
Happy Labor Day, stay safe, God bless,
-Meg
PS food in Chicago is AMAZING!!! Tacos, pizza, sandwiches, donuts, tamales, coffee, tacos, funnel cakes, Gyros, pancakes, and more tacos (I’m not talking Taco Bell style but legit Mexican tacos that are delicious!) we LOVE food at Amate House
As many of you know I have moved to the fantastic city of Chicago to volunteer for a year in community with 12 other housemates in South Chicago, the McKinley Park neighborhood (we are near White Sox field if that helps with location). I am doing a program called Amate House which is a faith-based program that supports volunteers for a year of service in the community. We get room and board paid for and get money for food every month, we receive a $100 stipend once a month and will get the Americorps education award at completion of the program.
My house, South House (SOHO!) has 13 people, 10 women and 3 men, and we are living in a converted convent. We each have our own rooms but share bathrooms, kitchen, living area, food, cars, and lots of other fun stuff. My roommates are the best and we have become extremely close already. It is crazy to think we’ve only been here a month, I am confident that these will be lifelong friends. There are 2 other houses with Amate; North House has 14 people and is up north by Wrigleyville and Uptown, Little Village is west of downtown and has 9 people.
I am working at Blessed Sacrament Teen Center as 1 of 3 staff members. We are an after-school program serving hundreds of high school and junior high students living in the area. Once school starts we will be providing a safe place for 40-60 kids to hang out after school on a daily basis. I work 5 blocks from my house so I get to walk to work (as opposed to the hour+ commute some of my roomies have). Linda is from Amate House as well and is also working at the Teen Center with me. The center is run by Jim Kozy, my boss, who has had to go down to working part-time this year because the center lost most of its funding when the state of Illinois did not give the program its major grant. The center almost did not re-open this year and is really struggling financially. A large part of our job when the kids aren’t around will be writing grant letters and letters to congress people and state workers and trying to get funding from wherever we can. It is going to be a big job with that, programming for the kids, trying to get them to work on school and tutoring, and getting the place organized and running more efficiently.
Because I work in the neighborhood I have really gotten to be a part of the community quickly. I can hardly go for a run or walk around the park without seeing one of my kids or someone else I know through the parish or my boss. Today in fact I went and watched a pick-up football game that a bunch of my boys had gotten together. One of my 8th graders, Ray, asked me to come watch them play and made sure that I was going to come all week. It is a wonderful neighborhood and I am so excited to be here for the year. It is largely Hispanic and the income level is lower but is very family oriented. McKinley Park is a block away from our house and is wonderful, there are always people running, walking, playing basketball, tennis, baseball, football, soccer, having birthday parties, or just hanging out. We have had great weather and it is fun walking everywhere and getting to know the area. It is a fairly safe community but is still a part of South Chicago so we are being careful and not walking alone at night but are perfectly fine during the day. I have also gotten to be good friends with 3 guys from the center. They are about my age and grew up going to the teen center and now are just back volunteering when they have time. One of them used to be a staff member but was laid off this year when we lost our funding.
Our time in Chicago began with 2 weeks of orientation which included lots of community time getting to know our housemates and the other houses, speakers and discussions about the tenants of Amate House, team building at an outdoor learning center, dinner with board members, and a photo scavenger hunt throughout downtown Chicago. Fun stuff we did outside of orientation during the first 2 weeks included, painting our rooms, going to the beach, movies, free happy hour, donut delights, outdoor movies and outdoor summer dances downtown, whiffleball, hotseat, and lots of laughing and getting to know each other.
Our jobs started the 3rd week and my roommates are working in a variety of places including 3 pre-school teachers, HIV/AIDs outreach center, torture center, Uptown Ministry, school librarian, Girls in the Game, a retreat center, and WomanCraft. Some jobs are more stressful than others but everyone has been pretty worn out from these intense and demanding full-time jobs.
I have found a running buddy and we are in training for a 15K race (about 9 ½ miles) in November. Kate was a soccer player at St. Ben’s and is from St. Louis Park and we have tons of mutual friends (we didn’t know each other at all, it took us moving to Chicago to realize how much we had in common and that we should have been friends long before this year!) Being a soccer player she is a faster runner than me but isn’t used to running constantly for long periods of time. We are a perfect pair because she pushes me in speed and I push her to run longer. It has been a lot of fun training with her and getting to know her this year. We helped each other paint our rooms on day 3 and 4 and that was a pretty good bonding experience.
Weekends in Chicago and with my roommates are lots of fun and you’ll have to look at my facebook pictures for all of our adventures. My boss is fantastic and has taken Kate and me boating on the Mississippi River in Iowa, taken us out to dinner and lunch multiple times and came to our house to unclog the drains in our showers. He is an amazing guy and has committed so much of himself to help hundreds, maybe thousands of youth, he is definitely a role model I look up to and respect immensely. He is very caring and fun to be around and a great guy to know and a wonderful boss to work for.
At my house we have dinner together every weeknight (we each cook one night a week) and spend a large amount of time together in the evenings and on the weekends. We have prayer nights and faith sharing. Every Wednesday is community night run by Amate and is 4 hours long and we spend the time doing a variety of self-growth and community building activities. Like I said before, my roommates are great and we have tons of fun together and are learning to live together in a simple community living off a minimal amount and trying to be better stewards of the earth. It has been trying at times but is looking to be a fabulous year full of learning, laughing, and loving.
We just finished up a fun weekend and have labor day off of work so I will have to write more about that later, my housemates are about to start a movie so I am going to go join them.
Sorry this first one was so long, thanks for bearing with me, I will try to update this regularly so the posts are not always so lengthy.
I hope your lives are going well and would love to hear about them, feel free to respond on here, email, call, text, facebook, or snail mail me. I would love to hear from you!
Happy Labor Day, stay safe, God bless,
-Meg
PS food in Chicago is AMAZING!!! Tacos, pizza, sandwiches, donuts, tamales, coffee, tacos, funnel cakes, Gyros, pancakes, and more tacos (I’m not talking Taco Bell style but legit Mexican tacos that are delicious!) we LOVE food at Amate House
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