As the last week of BJM came around, the usual feelings of the end of the semester came around– some relief at being so close to finishing and some stress at having to deal with finals. My last afternoon at BJM (of the semester, of course) was like every other, an hour of peace and laughter. There’s somethings in life that are uncertain and others that are pretty constant, like my afternoons at BJM. Even though I havent been volunteering at BJM since 2010, the upcoming end of the decade reminds me of how every season has a chapter that begins and eventually ends. And as this one came to an end, I was comforted by the little familiar and joyful things about my BJM afternoons–chatting and receiving a warm hug from Ms. Stacy, laughing with and learning from Mrs. Sarah, and of course, the new experience that the kids take us on in the craft room. Every visit has familiar things, things that happen regularly and new, exciting things one can always depend on. BJM is a place of comfort and joy for a lot of children, and every visit is a reminder of why. I’m extremely thankful for the familiarity of this chapter, but I’m also amazed by the new adventures that it held, and am excited to see what the next chapter holds. So, here’s to the end of a decade (perhaps not literallyy, but poetically) at Beverly J. Martin Elementary’s wonderful A+ Program.

Visit on December 5 3-4PM

This visit at BJM I had to help a few third graders with getting their math homework done. It was very simple multiplication but the 2 of the three students were having an easy time doing it. However, one of the students, Jayce, was having a tough time trying to figure out the problems. He was having trouble with the worksheet, and I could tell he was feeling pressured by those who knew how to do the problems. He was comparing himself to others, which would hurt his ability to do the work. I slowly made sure he stopped worrying about others and he eventually was able to finish the worksheet.

This situation is very applicable to college life, where we often look into how we compare to others, and what rank we are amongst our peers. We forget to value our own selves and allow our opinions of ourselves to be consumed by the thoughts of others. We must stop comparing ourselves to others as it only leads us to doubt ourselves and ruin our own confidence. Although I come to help students, I often learn many lessons from these young children that apply to my own life.

Unfortunately, I was unaware that the Tuesday visit to the animal shelter conflicted with my Tuesday bus ride home for Thanksgiving break. Due to this conflict, I ended up hopping in the car with the other group and going a week later.

One of the cats who’s been in the shelter since I started volunteering is named Queenie. On her door are a set of rules to follow to ensure that she doesn’t get angry with you. In fact, when I started in September, she was a staff only cat, but recently became open to the public. Vic, perhaps because the strict rules make this cat more enticing, always seems to want to play with her. I think he’s insane. This cat is crazy I can see it in her eyes.

One of the rules is that picking Queenie up is strictly off-limits. Despite this, Queenie remains very much a lap cat; if you so much as kneel in her presence, there’s a good chance she’ll hop onto your knees and lay down, trapping you in your awkward position for as long as she wants.

What was special about this visit is that it was the first one that I got to drive to. Julia and I are both drivers, but she is much better than I am about reserving the car, so she usually drives. This time around, however, she had a prelim and asked if I could drop her off close to where she was taking it once we were done. She must be crazy for still doing service on the day she has a prelim…

The Halloween decorations were gone, but the animal shelter had some sort of Harry Potter theme going on for the week. A lot of the adoption prices were cut and each of the cats were assigned a house.

The cat wing is composed of a single hallway that branches into 5 doors. The door directly at the end of the hallway is a cat room, but the other four doors lead to smaller “common areas”, each of which have more doors that lead to cat rooms. Within each of the common areas, the cats that live in that branch take turns having their doors open so they can roam the space. Recently, the back right common area has been closed off to everyone but staff (volunteers not included). I’m curious as to why, but there’s a large sheet of cardboard blocking the glass.

This was the first week that I went with my proper group. Due to a prelim on the first Tuesday that my group went, I had to reschedule and go with the other group last time. This means that is has been three weeks since my last visit to the animal shelter.

Unsurprisingly, since the last time I had been, Half-Stache was adopted. Considering how friendly of a cat he was, this was expected. Although I’m disappointed that I won’t be able to see him anymore, I am glad that he has found a home.

Interestingly, some of the cats had Halloween themed decorations in their rooms. One set of cats had a spooky box they could hide in, which they had taken an extreme liking too. The majority of the time I was in their room, they were on, in, or around the box.

During our last time at BJM, Hannah and I wanted to do a fun activity with the students that they could later take home. We decided to have them make snowflakes and get them to decorate them. We provided them with an example snowflake and already cut out snowflakes. This was a fun but messy activity as using glitter can always be. However, the joy of the children and the teachers overcame anything else. I loved the different ways they were able to decorate the snowflakes and expanding on using certain decorations for things I wouldn’t have excepted to use them for. For instance, the pipe cleaners we had used in our example us a string to hang up the snowflakes, but some of the students stuck it on their snowflakes giving them an extra sparkle.

The BJM after school program has made me realize how creative our minds are as children. From playing pretend to dressing up and holding a suspense of disbelief, these are things I feel that I’ve let go as I have gotten older. During this week’s service, I got to experience it again as I joined some children in making things with play-doh. There were some cookie cutters they used with the play-doh to pretend to have baked cookies. Then they went around having me “taste” all their assortment of desserts. This made me reminisce of times I would use items around my house when playing I substitute for other things.

At BJM elementary school’s after school program, the students are given the options to do different activities. One of them is a dance class, but usually only do the older children partake in this activity.  The art room is next to where the dance class takes place, so there would be times where the younger children will be intrigued by the dance class. It was a great sight to see this children show off their dance moves and feel comfortable enough to join the older children. Some were a bit more timid, but after much encouragement from the teachers and me these children felt okay with joining. Sometimes a little push is necessary to help children see their potential.

During my third visit to BJM elementary school, I noticed the sense of community in the neighborhood. Ms. Sarah, who is a teacher that helps out in the Art Room, has been living in Ithaca for many years and has been part of these children’s lives even before they were born. Since she moved to Ithaca, she has always worked with children, so she has interacted with many of the parents when they were children and some are even her godchildren. Ms. Sarah exemplifies loyalty to these people’s families and does her best to get to know the parents of children she has not met before. It is great to see that she was able to make a home away from her home and contribute to its development.

As I walked over into the math and science room on my last day of volunteering, I sat down with some of the students who were playing connect four. As we started playing they all told me that I was playing it wrong and had lost. I was so surprised as I knew no other way to play connect four. They showed me all of the versions of the game they had come up with and exactly how to play. Given that connect four is a classic game, I was beyond surprised to see all of the variations and rules they had created. I was so glad to see them having a good time and creating the rules as they went on and laughing at the things they were not sure about.

Sometimes it is so easy to assume and think that certain things can only be done a certain way; however, so many of the rules and norms we blindly follow are far from concrete and are not permanent in any sense. Often when we find the courage to act beyond these rules we end up not only being our truest selves but also the happiest. We are told so often to think outside of the box or to be creative to stand out amongst our peers; however, we often try to accomplish this within the constraint of everyday rules and norms we simply are not taught to think beyond. Watching the children play and laugh as they redefined their own rules was nothing short of admirable and caused me to reflect on so many of the things I do simply because I have been taught to.

With my newfound cat caring confidence, all their tails were mine. I went around playing with each cat, but to show not only my confidence but also dominance, I light pet and grabbed every tail insight. Some liked the tail grabs while others thought it was an initiation to play fight; however, for me, the tail grab was my declaration of confidence. I had finally gotten used to my Tuesday home at the SPCA.

Someone left Queenie’s door open and she got out into the hall and…started slamming her body into her door to get back in. I’ve never seen someone so violently want to go back into their room, but that’s Queenie. The issue presented itself when I realized it was only me and Queenie in that small, small hallway. For three weeks I had honed my cat scratch dodging skills, formed, somewhat, telepathic connections with most cats, and had my dignity shattered by Queenie. Thus, I knew what I had to do. I opened her door and she scrambled in. Now, I believe that stepping in the vicinity of a screaming cat is brave enough, but I also turned my back and opened the door. At this point forward, I fear nothing

Queenie and I had met eyes a couple of times through a glass door, and, with each interaction, I said to myself, “never going in there.” That was a complete lie. This week I found myself trapped under Queenie sleeping on my lap. This would be a cute scene if Queenie wasn’t labeled the Queen of the SPCA on her door. I went in as a testament to myself to see how far and how comfortable I could get with the cats 3 weeks in; this was a mistake. Queenie had conquered not only my lap but also my pride. Being forced to sit for two hours because you thought Queenie would end your life in one swipe of the paw, was not the best way to go out. My legs have never recovered, but at least I went in.

Due to the incident last week, I only use string toys with Fiona. As I swung the toys, our eyes met and I felt that, at that moment, we truly understood each other; Fiona only wants to be played with not pet. Such a revelation made me think that I could honestly form connections and understand the temperaments of other cats. I would like to note that at the beginning of this post, I mentioned how I only play with Fiona using string toys, I would like to edit such a statement to say; I used string toys with most cats because I had slight trust issues.

I love cats, I really do, but I have never handled them before, so volunteering with cats was a whole new experience. Yes, I had received training and yes, I went to orientation; however, the first week was still filled with excitement and a sprinkle of fear. It especially did not help when Fiona walked into my lap to rest, but then turned and bit me as fast as he came into my lap. Such a betrayal would often deter others, but, from then on, I felt as if I needed to conqueror the cats and play as much as I can with them.

The first day interacting with the cats was extremely enjoyable. At first, there were so many cats that I didn’t know who to visit with and for how long. Given that there are three or so volunteers that go at a time, we were able to split the cats pretty evenly, ensuring that everyone was able to interact.

I spent the majority of my time with a cat names “Half-Stache”. According to the sheet on his door, he had been found in the woods and was taken to the animal shelter. The fact that he was in the same wing as I was meant that he already been given vaccination and treated medically. At first, I wondered into his room and sat on the floor. He seemed apprehensive of me, so I got on my phone and chilled on the ground.

After a couple of minutes, he seemed to take an interest in what I thought was my phone. He wondered over and started headbutting my hand, at which point I realized that he was more interested in my hand than the screen. Whenever I held my hand out, he would rush over and headbutt it, which I would reward by petting him. I found this extremely entertaining.

It is always refreshing to come into BJM and be greeted by students from the last semesters.

Unfortunately, I had accidentally called one of the students by the name of another student, which they thought was hilarious and kept rambling on about how I “don’t know” any of them. It took quite a bit of time for them to settle down, especially since they were no longer getting any homework done cause this mistake was apparently very funny.

A group of students in the homework area were discussing the uncertainty of their attendance to the school dance. What I found the most interesting was that this group of boys, who I knew from last semester, had told me about their plan to wear matching suspenders and sun glasses to the Valentine’s Day dance. What had changed in the last few months? They group of boys were still friends with each other, as were a lot of the other students.

I felt that these boys has reached the “too cool for school” phase, and were no longer excited to participate in school activities along with the rest of their classmates.