We were expecting rain to roll in sometime in the afternoon. To avoid the rain affecting our painting, I and another team member woke up early to get the prep work done on the back side of the Wellness Center. We got a little bit of painting done before we had to go to breakfast.
After breakfast, we walked back to the worksite and I was assigned to continue painting on the roof. Luckily since it was in the morning, I was in the shade. I was looking forward to making further progress on the roof since I was the main person who’d been painting in the roof. Even though I was by myself when painting on the roof, the group we had painting different sides of the Wellness Center worked very well together. We were able to split up responsibilities and maximize the efficiency of painting.
After an afternoon of the same thing, we got to spend our evening with the campers for the daily evening activity. As part of the activity, opera singers came to talk about opera. At one point, one of the singers asked for a volunteer to come up and conduct him singing. An older man in a wheelchair was selected. The pure joy on his face and the audience’s applause afterwards brought me to tears. It is experiences like this that make Build America so special.
Creighton DeKalb
Build America 2017