June 17th- First day and having fun

By Jody
When trying to think back on what I remembered most about this day, I find myself bombarded with memories. On the most personal level, I remember the warm fuzzy I felt in my heart watching my kids and their new friend Matt play Skip-Bo at the kitchen table after a quick breakfast and again as soon as we cleared the dinner dishes. Laughter and good times being had.

On a spiritual level I remember the inner calmness I felt at 6:30 this morning as I walked out of the Head Start building and turned the corner to view the sun's rays shining through the clouds and illuminating the Glacier National Park mountains.

It is only day two, but our small group has already bonded into a family. We discovered during our morning work sessions that we could all agree on four major goals for our week- to serve, to learn, to have fun, and to meet new people. After defining what makes a great team, we then went over the rules, policies, and daily procedures for our week in Montana and then marched off to check out the community center and pool!

After Matt showed us all that he is an ace at cannonballs off of the diving board we all enjoyed nice hot showers. (Kelsey had warned us that they might be cold- so we were thrilled!)

After lunch we climbed aboard the Global Volunteers' van with Linda driving and Joe as our tour director. My family thought we were going on about an hour drive through the reservation, so imagine our surprise as we headed into the Glacier National Park area! Our "short" tour actually turned into an adventurous five hour tour through the plains of the Blackfeet Reservation, along the road to Many Glacier, up the Going to The Sun Road, and back through the winding hills along the St. Mary River/Lake area. Joe filled out minds with facts about the landscape, the animals, the Blackfeet's history, the Park hotels, the recent wild fires and floods. The adults absorbed all the information while the kids fell in and out of sleep.

We had the pleasure of meeting Candy who has prepared our delicious dinners of lasagna and chicken and vegetables. We have not lacked for food thus far... In fact, I am guessing that although we have 6 "children" in our work group of 13, we are eating more like 13 adults.

Tomorrow we will move into the community and finally begin accomplishing our goals for the week. Having fun, that we have already done in spades! Now we can learn, serve and continue meeting new people!