Slightly Scary Sharp Things

Break Time \o/

Saturday number four came up two weekends ago and Corrina and I headed back out to the Tule Ponds for our final required service. It was pretty fun with just the two of us, though we were disappointed that Zoë and Auriana didn't come. I was hoping to be able to do something other than pull out weeds from a hill this week, since for the past two weeks it felt like we weren't really doing much for the place. Like I said in the last post, it felt like Brandon was just putting us on the hill because he had nothing else for us to do. I wanted to actually be doing something the establishment needed work in.

Boredom+Camera

This week we had two main jobs; one was to cut back some tall plants and the other was to trim some hedges. The lady (Brandon's mom, since Brandon and his beard weren't there) gave us an angle hand weeder (look at how resourceful I am, Googling things to find out their names--we just called them "cutters") and showed us how to cut through the stalk of a plant. She left us with four other kids to clear out a hill. It was pretty fun and simple work, though I was irrationally scared of cutting off my own leg. The cutters cut so simply through the plant stalks that I got a little bit freaked out to be using them so close to my own body until I realized how weak the plants actually were.

We probably took a little too much time on our break since the supervisor lady was busy in the back of the park with another group of kids, but with the other four boys we finished our work early and really had nothing else to do. When we finally got back to work, the lady took us to the outside fence, where we had to get rid of a few more leaves around the perimeter. Then the four boys went back on the other side of the fence. Corrina and I stayed outside and worked on clipping the stray branches off the top of the hedge that covered the fence. Myself being a little on the vertically challenged side, Corrina dd all of the cutting and I did all of the stray branch collecting. After we finished trimming the hedge, the supervisor told us we were done and free to go, so we thanked her and walked back to my place after a morning well spent.

Of the four times we've gone to the Tule Ponds, I've enjoyed them all. While it might sometimes feel that we're not doing much for the establishment, other times it really feels like we're helping out the community. It's good exercise as well, and it's nice to be able to hang out and talk to my friends and others while doing good work. I plan to go back to the Tule Ponds for work even though I've met the requirements for this project. I might even keep going after I finish my 40 hours, since I like the place so much.