Day 1~Hard at work with Habitat

~Saint Mary's Disaster Relief Ministry Team report by Judy Walden Scarafile

We began our first full day in Louisiana bright and early. We met at 6:30 in the lobby of the Slidell Holiday Inn and then all 14 of us piled into the 15-passanger van. It was a quick drive to the First Baptist Church in Slidell where the Habitat trailer was located. Lindsay Grove, the Americore Volunteer Coordinator for East St Tammany Habitat for Humanity greeted the new crop of volunteers. There were about 40 people from all parts of the USA, but this time, mostly from the East and Midwest. Our group from St Mary’s was by far the largest.

We gathered outside, literally in a circle for what is called “Morning Circle”. This was a welcome and a time for reflection. We also had a 15-minute safety talk. It seems just like common senses, but in fact is probably where the most of minor injuries occur…not paying strict attention to the rules of “Safety First”.

Cathy Wood from Habitat read a meaningful reflection and shared her experience as a Katrina survivor in Slidell and how incredibly grateful residents are for the outpouring of help they have received from volunteers. With that warm welcome, we received our assignment for the day.

The St Mary’s team would be driving to the Lincoln Park area of Slidell to work on two houses, side -by -side on Lincoln Rd. We arrived on site to find one house with walls up and waiting for a roof and the other was rough framed.

Ernie, Peter and Michael were quickly assigned to work on a shed in the back “yard” which had a hand written sign over the doorway, “Love Shack”. They worked all day on the shed, doing siding, creating scaffolding and ultimately putting on the roof. It was the first finished project on the property and was a source of pride. Certainly the song “Love Shack” would hold a new meaning for all of us when we would next hear it on an oldies station.

The rest of the 11 of us began the long project of nailing. Everything needed to be nailed, it seemed, so with hammers selected from the tool trailer, we began. We hammered nails into plywood sides to reinforce the walls, hammered steel braces between the plates and joists to reinforce the roof. Hammer, hammer, hammer. All 11 people hammering all day long. I knew there would be some sore muscles and wrists on Day 2 but this was worth it. We could see our progress and that was really meaningful.

At 2:30 we started the clean up process to put all the tools away and pick up any scraps. Suzanne swept the rooms in the house as thought she lived here and she teased people to “take off their muddy shoes” before coming into the house.

Back into the van with lots of stories to share we drove the 5-minute ride back to the Holiday Inn, our home base. Fourteen hot showers awaited us and we could not wait …..for the showers or Day 2 on our job site.