For those of you not from this area, let me inform you that we had one heck of a storm system roll through yesterday.   Rain like I have not seen in ages, and in Olean, MPH winds that took down trees, knocked out power and likely did some additional damage that we are not yet aware of (Bob's Woods).  While it was a nasty evening, the day turned out to be a highly productive one for BR.  We began working with Rebuilding Together's Olean Chapter, painting a smaller house in the area, however, given the massive number of volunteers that showed up, the job went quickly and we were soon able to move locations and return to work on Carter's house, which we had started the weekend prior.    We spent quite a bit of time at Carter's and accomplished much with the help of two volunteers that showed up from the Rebuilding Together job.  Additionally, two other BR recruits appeared in the afternoon to help power wash, scrape, re-putty windows and prime...

On Sunday (today) we traveled to Buffalo to continue work on the Justin & Sal house, part of the Make-A-Wish foundations efforts to make their existing home more accessible.  As I mentioned before, the house needs A LOT of work, but I was amazed today to find the progress that has been made during the past 7 days.   The sub floors are in, the walls have more paint, a sliding door (which will eventually lead to a deck) has been installed in Justin's room and there are plans to have the electricity on tomorrow and the new furnace installed Wednesday.   AMAZING stuff happening all over.  BR has been focused on getting the stairwell from hell dry-walled, and today moved one step closer to having the job completed.  Our head engineer, Jim, did some design-on-the-fly and had us reframe a lower, flat ceiling below the existing slanted, uneven, and less stable structure.  It turned out better than I could have imagined and I hate myself for doubting him, if only briefly (lol)...   The walls going up the stairs are also now drywalled, which is an accomplishment given what we had to work with.  Today's crew consisted of myself, Jim, Jen, Scott, Rick, Rob and Laurie from Cricket.  While there are no new pics, I can assure you that things are progressing rapidly on all fronts.  Stay tuned and contact Jim via www.bonaresponds.org to sign up to help.

-Nate

As most of you are aware, there is ALWAYS something going on with BonaResponds.  Whether its mowing trails, collecting items for Haiti, packing items for Haiti, fund raising, etc. it is very rare that they are not busy.  You'll note in a recent post that we started work on a local house in Olean, scraping and painting the exterior for a WW II vet.  Despite best intentions to continue work at "Carter's", BR was called for help in completing a house in Buffalo for a father and his medically fragile son.  You can see more about the family we're helping here.  Carter's WILL get done, but for the immediate future, Justin's needs have to take priority.  The family is on a deadline and the project is much more involved than any one group can handle. Certainly BR would love to have enough volunteers to work on both projects simultaneously, but unfortunately that's not an option while school is out.

Thanks to Cricket Communications who is footing the bill to get the job done, to Make-A-Wish for helping to spearhead the project, and to the many other volunteers who have contributed their time and resources to a truly great project.

Pictures from today's work day are available via the Flickr link to the right.

-Nate

A friend of mine was complaining that I hadn't been posting frequently enough on here, so I told HIM to write something..  I couldn't be more please with the result...  Thanks Brian!!!

When one is mowing a walking path on a 95 degree day there is little to do but to sweat and think. While mowing in Bob's Woods, I would have various thoughts like; "how long would it take for nature to reclaim the path if no one mowed it?", "will this path be here a 100 years from now?" and "who walks on this path?". The last question leads to more thoughts such as "if volunteers do not mow the path then who would?" and also " I have been on similar paths other places and WHO took care of them?". The "WHO?" is most critical, particularly in a time of budget constraints and cutbacks. The "WHO?" are volunteers that have given 15 minutes, 15 hours or whatever amount of time out of their lives to make the existence of others a little better without the expectation of recognition or compensation other than the feeling of self accomplishment and the thought of  "I did that".
 

Even though I have not volunteered with BR as extensively as I would have liked, my experiences with the group have been humbling. Volunteering itself is a very humbling and equalizing experience where one is not defined by their name, degree, title, profession or any of the other criteria in which society places "value". In the instance of volunteering, the "value" is in the action itself, making someone's life just a little bit or often to the recipent themselves, a WHOLE lot better. I speak of being humbled because as most people of my generation we focus on important issues like :  "I want a new car", "I want a vacation" or "I want my student loans paid off".  Compared to some of the issues faced by people that BR has helped, my "wants" and "needs" are pretty insensitive considering there are people in our community (not to mention the world) with leaking roofs, no food and other struggles with day to day living that is often taken for granted by myself (and hopefully by others also so I don't sound like such a jerk).
 

Nate asked me to write a "little something" when I was complaining that he has not blogged lately, so I have to stop and summarize my thoughts before they wander too far off track. In summary, if  I.. you... whoever... does not volunteer... then who will?  Volunteer, because in the words of the angelic Martha Stewart "It's a good thing"...

**You can follow Brian on Twitter @BubbaCarey

So...  since the Botanical Gardens, BR has kept busy with some smaller projects a bit closer to home.    Last Saturday a group of 6 (Jim, Jen, Emily, Bill H, Patti, and myself) finished up some work at the Olean Family Literacy Center that was started back during our last local service weekend.   The rooms had been drywalled during that event and required some sanding, minor touch ups and paint.   We completed two small rooms and the hallway.  Of not from this work day was the fact that once again, the police showed up, as we set off the alarm when entering the building.   They were nice enough though, and gave us the number for the maintenance man that was supposed to have disarmed the system prior to our arrival.  Also of note, Bill H. and his wife Patti are from Texas, where they met the BR group during their visit/work in Bridge City and Pass Christian, TX (I know, I already said Texas, but it seemed odd to leave the city without the state).

Today (July 3rd) Jim, Jen and myself traveled to Salamanca (Jim rode his bike (see below)) to finish up a paint job for "Rose" that was started some time last year.   Rose and her friend were very welcoming and extremely appreciative.  We fixed what needed fixed, painted what hadn't been painted yet, and mowed the yard.   Rose provided me with supervision as I painted and told me stories from her past.  Very cool, very nice lady...  I hope we get to work there again.   Of note today, the neighbor lady told us she almost called the police while we were waiting for Rose to answer the door (starting to see a trend?)... 

I think this weekend will also include mowing trails and removing some fallen trees over at Bob's Woods, and maybe some additional clean up at storage if time permits.  

Also, here is an excerpt from http://blakewtd.wordpress.com  Blake is the director of a documentary by 4 students call Walk The Dream (www.walkthedream.com).  We ran into them while we were in Millbury, OH cleaning up after the tornado.

"In the past month we’ve gone through two massive cities (Cleveland and and Chicago) and seen three major storms. The beginning of severe weather started in Huron, OH in the middle of the night. We hadn’t been able to find a place to stay, however a local McDonalds allowed us to park our bus in their parking lot to sleep in. It’s an interesting experience to say I’ve had, sleeping in a McDonald’s parking lot. But when trying to shower and get clean in their bathroom it’s hard to not feel homeless. During the evening a storm passed through which was enjoyable as I sleep very well when it rains. The pitter patter of rain on the roof is soothing to me. However the huge siren going off in the middle of the night wasn’t so pleasant. Holly tried to worry us all by saying it was a tornado warning. But I (being from Rochester, NY were we don’t have such a thing) insisted it couldn’t be. Hah, was I wrong. I didn’t know it until the next morning but a horrible level 4 tornado had touched down about 50 miles away from us. It’s probably better I didn’t know that evening or I wouldn’t have gotten back to sleep so easily.

After finding out the tornado had touched down so close to us we decided it would be well worth the time and extra miles to go to Millbury, Ohio and help out cleaning up from the destruction. I have never experienced a natural disaster (aside from an ice storm that knocked out everyones power in Rochester for a week once). The site of what a tornado can do is life changing. While walking into town we started to notice street signs bent in half, some tree branches down, then a completely naked tree. The school was one of the first things we came across. Half of it was untouched and looked as it was suppose to for the graduation ceremonies that were suppose to be held the day after the tornado had touched down. The other half was spread across a field. Insulation clung to a chain link fence, school buses lay in a row missing windows, doors, and hoods. There were remnants of the school for blocks. Bull dozers pushed heaps of school items together to crush them and put them in the dump. The school was condemned. It is now to be knocked down and rebuilt, at an estimated cost of 50 million dollars.

That was only the beginning of our experiences there. However there is a video you can reference on our facebook page about our visit so you can see a little of what we saw. Much like our trip in general the number of volunteers that came out and helped clean up really reminds you of how kind American’s are. It felt great to be the one to lend a hand after how many people have helped us out. "

-Nate