Today started off really early when we met Ricardo and Mike, two of CASA’s volunteer builders, at a CASA clients home at 7:30 AM. We worked with Ricardo and Mike yesterday when we were in the warehouse cutting the deck boards and 2x4 plywood. Ricardo also has a full-time job and does this work for CASA building wheelchair ramps for those in the Huntsville area in need as a volunteer. Mike was a retired principal in the Huntsville area and just has started volunteering for CASA now that he has more free time. The friendliness of the people we have met is still unbelievable. Not that people are rude in the Midwest, but we’ve yet to run into anyone who seems to have a negative attitude. They are just happy people!
The man for whom we built the ramp was named Kenneth. He was under the age of sixty but confined to a wheelchair. We got a chance to meet Shelia, his fiancé, and she was overcome with emotion when we invited Kenneth out to try the new ramp. You could tell from the trembling in her voice when she thanked us that Kenneth’s disability had affected the rest of the home as well. I realized that the ramp that covered the cement steps to the house meant a new sense of freedom for Kenneth as well as a greater ability for Shelia to help him maintain that freedom.
After lunch we went to the CASA Community Garden. There we met up Sean, another CASA staff member who was responsible for the upkeep of the garden. He explained to us how the garden provides fresh produce to over 500 people in Huntsville community. These are people who are underserved and make deliveries of produce to CASA clients more affordable. The garden included many fruits, vegetables, and fresh spiced found in grocery stores. We helped Sean move around one hundred and seventy handmade tomato cages across the garden closer to where the tomatoes will be planted in the next season. We also filled some gardening troughs with some newly delivered compost. The weather was a sunny seventy degrees, so the manual labor didn’t seem much like work out in the beautiful weather. It was another great day spent with another great group of volunteers and Huntsvillians.
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