Week One

I came home last night firmly intending to update my faithful readers as to the state of my life. Then a series of violent thunderstorms came through the 'burg and knocked the power out. As the wind picked up, I half expected to hear tornado sirens and had to remind myself that 1) there are no tornado sirens on the east coast and 2) there aren't tornadoes here. Since I have very little to do with no power after the sun has gone down, I went to bed at nine and only found out this morning that apparently there were "microbursts" -- mini-tornadoes.

Today, however, the weather has held beautifully, and so I can update. I started work on Monday, and the first couple days were a whirlwind of new names and faces as I met all the people from the parish who work in the Parish Center with me. I also met some of the adult people who help out CCM. Some of them I knew; some faces were familiar, though I'd never met them formally; and some were completely new. The list of new acquaintances includes the new pastor, the Monsignor.

With my head still spinning from these introductions, I spent most of Wednesday working on mailings for Freshmen letter-writing. For those who don't know, we try to welcome all our freshmen ahead of time with a hand-written letter and some information about CCM. Plus, every job a college student or recent college grad does needs must incorporate mailings, so this was fulfilling an obligation.

Thursday I headed into Richmond for a meeting of campus ministers. I found, to my delight, that between retreats, service trips, and familial connections I already knew most of them. I felt more at ease during my first meeting among them than I ever did at any of the teacher meetings I attended last year. Best of all, Thursday evening, I came home to dinner with a good friend from college.

Today, the development director (well, I'm not sure what her title is, but that sounds good) came back from vacation, so I have an office buddy now. She, her daughter, and I went on some epic adventures to clear out our office, clean out the Catacombs (CCM social room), and organize the printer room. Our most epic adventure took us into the attic of the Parish Center, where we traversed creaking and bending plywood to store odds and ends that did not belong on the couches in our office.

In conclusion, my office feels much more like my own space after today. I have space, my own peculiar method of organization and plenty of sticky notes. What more do I need in life, other than students?