Student Service Stories

Mississippi Reflection, by Alexis Blair '08

While my friends called me repeatedly from each of their various New Year's Eve parties, I was sharpening my bowling skills and watching the Times Square festivities from one of the few rehabilitated entertainment venues in Biloxi-Gulfport, Mississippi. Less than a mile from the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, the lonely bowling alley stood surrounded by empty lots scattered with heaps of rubble and debris, all that remained of numerous homes and buildings which had been decimated by hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

This year, I spent the majority of my winter vacation volunteering with the Project Teamwork Relief Organization sponsored by the Salvation Army. For six days, myself and eighteen other students lived in makeshift dorms inside an abandoned high school football stadium in central Biloxi. We spent our time priming and painting two houses and a church, laying brick walkways, and building wooden ramps for numerous FEMA trailers. During those six days, I learned how to effectively operate a circular saw, screw gun, and pick axe. However, much more important than carpentry skills were the lessons I learned about true service to others.

Throughout my high school career, it has become evident that volunteering has a much greater importance to me than the simple graduation requirement. I have lent my time to several different programs, primarily aiding the elderly and underprivileged youth, but hurricane relief differed entirely from any of my previous endeavors.

By the end of the week, however, I was emotionally conflicted, mainly because painting and laying bricks seemed so insignificant when an entire state remained devastated. However, on New Year's Eve, we attended a Baptist service with the congregation of the church that we had painted. At the end of the service, I shook hand after hand and received heartfelt praise from an endless line of parishioners.

It had not occurred to me that our work had affected so many people in the community, bringing them one step closer to returning to their church. At dinner that evening, our waitress returned with the check, as well as with tears in her eyes. Our work had not even directly benefited her, yet she thanked us over and over for our generosity to her community, which had mainly been overlooked in lieu of New Orleans.

Meeting the people of the small community and seeing their devastation first hand helped me realize how much of a difference I had actually made. I did not end world hunger or achieve world peace; I painted two houses and a church. However, each moment of the trip increased my appreciation for the blessings within my own life and furthered my desire to enact blessings within the lives of others. I want to make a difference, no matter how great or small, because I can.