Photos on Snapfish

By now, you should all have received an invitation from Snapfish to view the photos from our week. I've posted about 2/3 of the 975 that we have.

The invitation letter will give you a link that you can follow to see the albums. Or, you can simply click on the link above (the title of this post). You may order prints of any one of these pictures.

If you have not received an invitation, let me know, and i'll fix it.

As an aside, I noticed that when I created my Snapfish account to which I uploaded all of the pictures, I was rewarded with 20 free prints, just for creating the account and uploading some pictures. You do not need a Snapfish account to view the photos, but you may wish to create one and upload some pictures, simply because you'll get 20 free prints when you do so. I don't honestly know if the 20 free ones must be applied to your own uploads, or if you could use them on the shared pictures from workcamp.

Obtaining Copies of the Video

First, I'd like to say thanks for all the kind words you have all given with respect to the video. It was truly our pleasure (I think I safely speak for John here) to make this. I'm quite sure that the effect it hopefully had on you when you saw it, was exactly the same (if not more) for us as we made it. And we lived those feelings every night for the last several weeks.

Whenever you create anything, especially art, you hope that the intended audience/consumer "gets it", or at least gets something out of it that is meaningful to them, because for sure it is meaningful to the creator. For me, this is not so much a creation as an integration of everybody's experiences from that week. John and I had the enviable position of being the priveledged persons entrusted with that integration. God guided us, on your behalf, of that I am certain.

Also, I'd like to again reiterate my personal thanks to John who, whether he admits it or not, did at least as much work as I did. Plus, he was indeed responsible for the Jaws segment, which is the highlight of the whole thing. As well, I have to thank Bill Campbell who is the originator of the whole concept, and from whom I shamelessly stole 2 big parts of this presentation:

• The format/template
• The Google Earth segments

I know we spoke to a lot of you who wish to get copies. We are happy to give out as many copies as we possibly can. Here is the preferred method of obtaining one:

1. Get yourself a blank VHS tape, or DVD (either DVD-R, or DVD+R....NOT R/W) and write your name on it
2. Give this blank media to either me, John Livezey, or Peggy
3. As we are able, we'll copy the movie onto your media and get it back to you. There will probably be some delay, simply due to the processing time. I'll be able to do at most 1 DVD per night. John is probably in about the same boat. I'll apologize up front for that.

Another method is for you to burn your own copy, if you have the ability. For that I will lend out a master copy, or you can get a copy from someone else, from which you can make your own copy.

Here's a disclaimer about DVD's:

DVD burning for the intention of watching on your home theater, is a hit or miss proposition. What I mean is that when I burn a DVD movie on my computer, it may or may not work on my DVD player with my TV. Fundamentally, it has to do with the evolving, and somewhat ambiguous, technical format of the DVD specificaion. There are no guidelines that we can give you as to which type of media to buy to give you a better chance. It's reasonably safe to say that if your DVD player is less than 2 years old, there's a great chance it'll work just fine. If your copy doesn't work, we'll try it again.

Thoughts on Mississippi - Marcia Zeigler

Thoughts on Mississippi

I sat down on Sunday to write some thoughts on our trip but then I read Jessica’s eloquent letter to Mrs. Swearingen and somehow I just couldn’t compete with that so I will now try again.

It has been over two weeks now since we have returned from our mission trip. I guess my best description of how I have felt these past two weeks is unsettled. It has been very hard to fall back into a routine. I also at first experienced the extreme exhaustion as many have mentioned. It made me think of the people affected by Katrina and question how they even manage to get out of bed each day. I know in speaking with Cindy (Mrs. Swearingen’s daughter) that she said she would love to have one day to forget and just relax, but she was so afraid that then she would want another day and another. And there is just too much to do.

I guess a major frustration since returning is trying to make others understand the severity of things in the South. So many say “wow that must have been something” but they don’t truly understand. They are more interested in car repairs, hassles at work, broken nails and everyday life. I guess the same life so many of us led before February 12. But now those things just seem so trivial. Tom is right when he says that although we had an extremely successful week it is just a pinpoint of what needs to be done. It is difficult each day now to think of all the people we met and not constantly wonder what progress they have made, whether others have continued to give them hope. I do feel so fortunate to have shared this experience with four members of my family. I would imagine it could be frustrating to have gone alone and to have to explain to even closest family members.

I spent my entire 4 days at the Swearingen home. Although I thought about moving around to other locations as many of you know I have a real fondness for older adults. Tom told me that Sunday that I was really going to like where we would be on Monday. And then he told me Mrs. Swearingen was deaf. I love to hear the stories that seniors tell. We have a tendency to often make them feel that they don’t matter, when truly they are a wealth of knowledge, history and fascinating tales. I was frustrated to think that I wasn’t going to be able to communicate with Mrs. S. I didn’t realize until later in the week how uncertain and nervous they were with our presence that first day. I watched as Cindy and Mrs. S. tried to move things and be of assistance. Mrs. S. got tangled in some cords and fell on the front walk and I rushed to help her. I began to realize then that it was possible to read so much from her face. She looked so distraught, and angry when Cindy told her that was enough and she was going inside. Of course they appeared again later so I guess Mrs. S. got her way. But as Cindy explained to us at dinner that Thursday her mother seemed to be transformed the week of our visit. As I was painting the shed on Thursday and I came around the corner to see Mrs. S. roller in hand, painting the far side of the shed, it just filled my heart with joy. She looked so happy at that moment and she was so pleased with herself to be helping. At least for an afternoon I felt like some of her struggles didn’t weigh so heavy on her shoulders. That night at dinner I was fortunate enough to sit beside Mrs. S. We had a wonderful evening together without speaking a word. She is a remarkable woman to have raised three children without ever hearing their cries and laughter. I feel so blessed to have met her and to have shared at least a few days of her life with her.

God was with us in so many ways that week in Mississippi. He showed the amazing goodness in the people like Susan, Ed, Joeline and the others who worked day in and day out to make a difference with all those who needed help and to coordinate groups like ours. From Mary who drove us around that first Monday to see the devastation, to those who prepared the wonderful meal for us on Wednesday and finally the cleaning lady who I chatted with on Friday. They all expressed how blessed they are and I realized that my life will never be quite the same since I have met them. We had an amazing group representing us from First Presbyterian of Pottstown. It was an honor to share the week with each and every one of those who went. I hope many of us will get to go back again. We all know there is much to be done.


Marcia Zeigler

Barb Longstreth's Meditation

From the 1st Presbyterian Mission Trip to the Mississippi Gulf Coast
2/13-2/18/06

As a 69 year old woman I had doubts about my ability to be of real help to our mission team in Mississippi, and I went on the trip with those questions in my heart and mind. What could I really DO? Would I get in the way of others? Was I too old to be of use? I didn’t have carpentry, or electrical, or plumbing skills---so I wasn’t sure what my role would be.

Well---I am here to tell all of you senior citizens in our congregation that each of us has a central role to play in the overwhelming disaster that Hurricane Katrina brought to the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Don’t hesitate to go on the next trip because of your age because people of every age and gender are needed to bring hope and help to that region of the country.

Imagine with me a street in Pottstown, the length and breadth of Evans St., where every house has a small FEMA trailer outside of it---families living there because their homes are uninhabitable. Then add all of metropolitan Philadelphia and beyond, and you can get an idea of the scope of the problem. Because of the massive flooding each house must be stripped down to its wood frame, and rebuilt from the inside out.

We were able to be of partial help to several families during the week, and with my limited skills I could help by:

• Removing moldy dry wall and insulation and carrying it to a growing pile outside the house.
• General sweeping and clearing of accumulated trash.
• Installing insulation.
• Spackling newly installed dry wall.
• Helping to paint a shed.
• And most of all listening to the stories of the people we met during the week.

Another major discovery for me was to witness the number of faith communities that are streaming in and out of the Gulf region. On every plane and in every airport, we either saw and spoke with faith groups that were traveling to and from the region, or we spoke with other people who were going to make contacts to bring groups in the near future.

Our own national church, through its Presbyterian Disaster Assistance arm, has established 5 villages, or camps, along the Gulf Coast of Mississippi. Amy and I went to see one of the camps that houses 74 people at a time in portable Quonset type huts. These camps will be dismantled in June, which is the start of the hurricane season. But the Presbyterian church is committed to re-establishing these camps for the number of years it will take to rebuild the region.

In our travels we noticed that there were not many children to be seen---and that view was corroborated by a local person, Fred, who had some astounding statistics to share with us. Biloxi school district: 6000 students before Katrina and 3000 students after. I talked with a young man on the plane coming home, a sophomore at Central Bucks East High School. He took the week off to travel with another Presbyterian group. He showed me pictures on his laptop of an elementary school untouched since Katrina---smelly, moldy, trash everywhere, and a display on the bulletin board in one classroom showing the date Katrina hit, Sept. 29, 2005. The school has been abandoned.

We had a wonderfully diverse group travel to Mississippi, and in our common experience we felt the power of the Holy Spirit at work in our relationships with one another and with the new friends we met along the way.

I am thankful to God for nudging me to respond to His call to this service. We thank you for your prayers and contributions towards this first trip. We will be going again, and hope that others of you will join us in bringing God’s love in action to people in need.

The steady stream of faith based groups is making a real difference person to person and house to house.

Thanks be to God.

Barbara Longstreth

Audio of the Worship Service Meditations

I've created a podcast (ie, downloadable audio file) out of Sunday's meditations. The first version is all 4 meditations in the same file. I'm hoping to split them into 4 different files and make them available separately, but that' s for another day.

You get it one of several ways:

1. You can download the mp3 directly from here.
2. If you know what a podcast RSS feed is, you can point your podcast aggregator here.
3. It's published as a podcast in iTunes. To find it, search the iTunes podcast directory for "First Presbyterian Pottstown", and you will find it right away. That's right, we're on iTunes!

I assume if you know what an RSS feed is, or have used iTunes to download podcasts, then you know all about 2 and 3. If you don't, and would like to learn more about how or what those things are, just send me an email, I'd be happy to learn ya.

Comments from Friend's Volunteer Experience in Biloxi

Wanted to give you some insight into a friend of mine's experience during a volunteer mission in Biloxi. He went down with a group of 14 adults from a Lutheran Church the immediate week after we were there.

The reason I post these comments is to again commend, and give thanks for the leadership and coordination we had for our week. Plus, I think it will give some validation to some decisions we had made as to how to accomplish our mission.

All in all, he said it was good, but he was unsatisfied with the quantity of work they were able to accomplish. He attributed it all to lack of coordination, and poor upfront decision-making. They did roofing and dry wall work.

Here are some of the dissimilar issues with his trip, as compared to our trip:

They all flew, therefore were limited to checkable bags of hand tools, and had no trucks to move supplies around

They had no personal budget that they could use. They were reliant upon either home owners or their "agency" to purchase supplies

They had little up-front coordination of the worksites, the work that would be done, and the tools they would need

Consequently, they had several issues that cut into their productivity. There was a large "tool swap" area to which they had access, but this was certainly not as efficient as having several "sets" of their own tools. Plus, due to lack of coordination, they would frequently get to a new site, have to assess the tools they needed once there, and then drive back to the tool swap area to get the required tools. Without a budget, they had no way of purchasing materials (except through their own personal giving). He said that they frequently waited on supplies, frustrated that they didn't have a) their own truck, and b) a budget for purchasing.

These 3 points should provide validation for the 3 contrasting decisions we made:

Having 3 trucks drive down with tools

Our mission committee provided budget

All the hard work that Tom put in before the trip, and each day we were there

I didn't ask him specifically about the living arrangements or the food situation. I'll try to do so.

March 8 - Workcamp Video Presentation

Just a reminder and info post about the presentation of the Mission Trip Video that will occur during the Lenten School hour on March 8.

Hope y'all can make it.

John and I will have about 35 minutes (give or take) of presentation. Don't know the exact order for the night, but generally, it looks like this:

Intro (you may be contacted about this)

Video

Q&A - This is the congregations chance to grill us on the details, be prepared!

One of the things we'd like to present next Wednesday is the final budget. If you still have outstanding receipts, please get them to Sue Moyer(or Peggy) as soon as possible.

For those that have not seen a Bill Campbell Seekers Production....Basically, it's our pictures and video set to music. Sort of a slideshow on autopilot, and 14 pots of coffee. Once complete, if you're interested, John and I will be able to provide copies of the video (either on DVD or VHS) and I was also planning on providing CD copies of the soundtrack only.

Hopefully redundant disclaimer:

It is important to note that neither the video, nor the soundtrack, are allowed to be sold, nor is money allowed to be collected for charitable purposes in return for delivery of these copies. This is because we are using copyrighted material in the production. They're yours, and they're free for your use.

Also, I've been asked for hints about the upcoming presentation. Well, all I'll say is that you'll see the picture from my previous post. It's in there. If you're sneaky you could accost our wives, who are our first and toughest critics, but I ask that you not do so. If it's terrible, I'd rather you found out on March 8, not before ;-)

Tom's Lessons Learned

The following is from Tom Zeigler on "Lessons Learned" for next time...

This one went extremely well, and we were lucky with accommodations, etc.

A couple things though to consider for next time.

1. Transport less food / snacks / etc. Ask for more cash donations.
2. Consider an equipment trailer. We did OK, but it was tenuous a couple times having to unload trucks to do material runs. And I personally believe we loaded the three vehicles too much for that travel distance.
3. Consider additional onsite vans. Again we did OK, but it was cumbersome a couple times trying to cover different areas, but having to send numbers of people to fill available van space.
4. I think the tools / equipment worked out well. It's good we didn't take anymore than we did. That is really critical, not just from a transportation standpoint but also for on-site management. So we did well there. I think I could have done a better job
at delegating individuals to be responsible for gathering the tools required for the next day's work sites, and assigning vehicles in advance. And I think we could have done a better job of planning material purchases at night for the next day's work.
5. The thing that is very difficult is the time. I'm torn between having one or two individuals making executive decisions and having more people involved. The community time is essential, but honestly I think the majority of the people are exhausted by the end of the day, and really want no part of any planning for the next day. Clearly there needs to be one person taking the brunt of it, but it might he helpful for two or three additional people to work with the lead person, that could assist in #4 above.

Obviously these comments are based upon this particular experience. Depending upon the location, they may not be valid. I think the trigger factors would be:

1. One work site or multiple work sites
2. Requirements for purchasing and / or transporting building materials. Once we figured out MS vs. PA, the Lowe's arrangement was great. And of course we may not be able to set that up everywhere.
3. Availability / extent of cooking facilities. We could sometime be in a place where we are cooking outside. That would mean a dining fly, grills and / or propane stoves, etc.

The other thing we should consider is a "mission team" tool chest, if we believe we want to continue this. I know that we bought some miscellaneous tools to do various jobs and they should be gathered up. I good large lockable FRP tool trunk can be bought at Lowe's for about $50. We could ask the congregation to donate old tools to add to this and / or gradually purchase tools to fill it. Just a thought.

How to post to this blog

There are 3 basic ways to post a new topic to this blog:

1. Use the link above (www.blogger.com), login with your account name and password, then select the "First Presbyterian ..." link. This will show you a list of the recent posts, and there will be a "Create" Button at the top of the list. Click on this and an editor window will appear.

2. If you are logged in to blogger already, and are currently at the www.firstpresbyterianpottstown.blogspot.com page, then you can click on the "Blog This" link at the very top of the page and a quick editor window will appear. Just delete all the info that gets automatically filled in this window pops up. Create your own title, and your own text.

3. If you're a "power blogger", you can use email option. I won't say anymore, because if you are indeed a power blogger, then you already know how it works :).

Also, feel free to comment on other's posts by using the "comments" link at the bottom of each posts. This creates a conversational approach to the blog.

John Macdonald

Pictures Available for All Shortly

As you know, John Livezey and I are collecting everybody's pictures from the week for purposes of the Video presentation on March 8.

There is an added side benefit to this. Since we will have all of them, we will put them online with one of the picture publishing services (shutterfly, etc). We'll probably weed them out a bit, but most will get published. That way, everyone will have access to all the pictures, and will be able to order prints of anything that has been published. It should be quite useful.

John Macdonald

Link to a PDA "Biloxi Blitz" Blog

This links to a blog setup by a large group of Presbyterians that went to Biloxi during the week after Christmas.

Thoughts on the People

My lasting impression of the people is their stories from their experiences so far, and their stories that are yet to unfold. Their stories are at once, both heart wrenching and heart warming. I'm eternally grateful that we were able to become a small part of the stories that are yet to unfold.

To hear Shirley Jones (across the street from the Swearingen house) describe the horrors of the hurricane and the days and weeks immediately proceeding left me with a huge hole in my heart. However, to then witness and hear testimoney of her and her family's perseverance, faith and trust in the Lord, and gratefulness to those that have come to help was one of the most heart warming sensations I have ever felt.

She tells this story about her personal items that she salvaged during the flood (paraphrased, of course):
Shirely and her family (husband and son) also have a cabin on the bayou a couple of miles away from their Forrest Drive home. They began to ride out Katrina at this cabin because this is the place they were worried about flooding. They were hoping to be able to stave off flooding at this cabin, and were totally unconcerned about their Forrest drive home because, "Why would it flood there? It never has in our 50 years of living here."

As the water became too high at the bayou cabin to entertain any chance of keeping the water out, they abandoned and swam (that's right, swam) back to Forrest Drive. Exhausted and spent, they reached their house only to find that it was indeed inundated. Shirley faced a decision with the water still rising, "What do I try to save?". Here's what she saved:

• Family Bible
  
• Her son's honor student awards and credentials

Everything else was less important.

The story goes on and has so many more facets, but I wanted to highlight the things that were important to her in her time of greatest challenge: God, and her family. She answers the "How did you make it through? How do you keep going?" questions with Faith and thankfulness to still be here. It's still tough for them, don't make any mistakes about that.

How does this speak you? I know it speaks to me. Perspective is an often skewed thing. If we simply look first towards the cross, and second towards those we love, won't life become simpler and more meaningful? If those are our priorities (in that order), and we work towards satisfying those priorities every day, won't we go to bed each night and rest peacefully?

Shirley had no flood insurance on her home, and very modest wages for the family. They are working to fix it themselves. Not relying on FEMA (they are reasonably pleased with FEMA, by the way), not relying on the system, not crying "Foul!" and screaming at the government. They are doing it themselves, and as far as I know, have not received any volunteer help (other than friends and family).

The perspective we get from afar via the media, and our own naivety are not necessarily accurate. I have prayed for them every night since Chris and I had the greatest pleasure of meeting them. I ask you to do the same.

One thing I know for sure, I learned something that day, and I'm a better person for having met them.


John Macdonald

The First Pres Pottstown Blog Begins....

This blog is initially intended to publish our Mississippi workteam's reflections on our week of volunteer efforts on the Mississippi coast.