Katee Smith
Hey Y'all!
I thought I should jump on the bandwagon and post a sort of introductory blog. :)
You already know about my plans for 09-10, so I’ll just tell you a few basics about myself. I’m Katee (obviously). I’m from Texas (which is why I get to say “y’all”), and graduated high school in 2007. I spent the fall of 2007 at a small school in a small town in Colorado, with the intent of pursuing my BFA (Bachelor of Fine Arts) with an emphasis on Studio Art. Specifically, Photography. The small town ultimately drove me nuts (I’m from Houston… the small town was a bit of a culture shock), so I moved back home. I spent the first half of 2008 being thoroughly unproductive and halfheartedly looking for a job. In August, I finally landed a job. I figured once I saved up some money, I’d go back to school, move out on my own again…
Then Hurricane Ike hit, and everything changed.
In the midst of our 9 day power outtage (much shorter than we thought it would be), I ended up going to an outlet mall. Normally I avoid such places, but the stir-craze makes you do strange things. I had already seen the destruction Ike had caused- the eye of the storm went right over my neighborhood- and now I was seeing the other side of things. People unphased, because they still had spending money. People throwing away hundreds of dollars for clothes, shoes, purses… because they had designer labels. And I was sickened by what I saw. Peoples lives had been destroyed, and no one seemed to care.
Which is what led me to Mission Year.
So here I am!
I can’t wait for August to roll around! :)
About Mission Year
Mission Year is a year long urban ministry program focused on Christian service and discipleship. We take teams of young people, place them in an area of need, and help them to serve people and create community. We are committed to the command of Jesus to “love God and love people,” by placing the needs of our neighbors first and developing committed disciples of Christ with a heart for the poor. Learn more about our first year program…
Katee Smith's Blog
Laugh. / Nov 25, 11:03 AM
I laugh at myself a lot.
I mean this as a general statement- I do clumsy or goofy or dumb things, and I laugh at myself.
I do things I never thought I would, and I laugh at myself.
For instance… I work with kids. I’m not really a “kid” person, so this is a bit of a stretch. The street I live on has “Normal” in its name. This seems to amuse everyone I know. I moved to inner-city Chicago to work at a farm.
None of this seems that weird to me until I consider what my expectations were at the beginning. I expected to maybe work at something along the lines of a shelter… but I somehow ended up doing research for a farm (their current homepage is a blog I wrote, by the way… www.growinghomeinc.org) and tutoring and teaching art at an after school program. This is a far cry from anything I imagined.
The one thing I absolutely did NOT want was an all-girl team. And I ended up with 5 other girls. I love them all now, but I was terrified of them 3 months ago (this is especially amusing if you actually know my teammates).
So as I start to consider options for my life post-Mission Year, it stands to reason that I expect all of my expectations to be defied. I realized recently that I literally could do anything. I’m not particularly tied to any places or people, so I’m free to wander. I feel like I’ve thought of every possibility, but new stuff keeps coming up.
It occurred to me recently (like… within the last year) that I don’t have to do the same thing everyone else does. That was life-changing. So while I’m considering all these options, it occurs to me… not only do we not HAVE to follow the set path, sometimes we’re not SUPPOSED to follow the set path (This may not be as earth-shattering to you as it was to me). No person doing Mission Year right now is following the set path. In fact, Jesus calls us to be counterintuitive (“turn the other cheek,” anyone?). This leads me to no real conclusion- I’m still befuddled about the the future.
Wherever I end up, whatever I end up doing, I will inevitably be laughing at myself.
Comment [1]
Reality. / Oct 27, 09:04 PM
The reality is,
I’m on a team of 6 girls, living in inner-city Chicago.
We can’t walk down the street without getting hit on.
And it gets old. Fast.
I had a particularly fun experience with this (and I haven’t had it nearly as bad as some of my teammates…) the other day. I was walking home from work, and this car stopped in the middle of the street. A guy started yelling in a really threatening way, “come here, girl! come here!”
It was then I realized that I didn’t have my pepper spray on me.
I kept walking and started praying, and he drove off.
Now.
This is not an unusual occurrence.
Other stories:
There’s a guy who hits on Jessica every time she goes to the train station. Which is often. One day, he was eating chicken wings. As she passed by, he said, “Hey baby, want a chicken wing?”
As we were walking home from church one day, a guy leaned out his window and yelled, “hey white girls, you wanna make loooove?”
Again. None of this is unusual.
At first I ignored it. Then it started to make me angry. Now it’s a mixture of anger and sadness for girls and women who’ve either grown up here, or lived here for a long time. The kind of toll that takes on your self esteem must be devastating. One of the schools here has 95 pregnant girls… there are only about 500 students in that school. And I’m starting to understand why- when you’ve grown up in a place where you’ve only ever been treated like an object, you start to believe it.
Evidently, words are powerful.
People. / Oct 13, 10:08 PM
So… Saturday, we did this thing called Pauper’s Right of Passage, or PRoP. Basically, PRoP is a homeless simulation.
At the beginning of the day, we changed into borrowed clothes- things that are actually given away to people who need them. Then we split into pairs and headed downtown. I was paired with one of my teammates (Sarah). We started our day with a nap in the park. After a while, we decided to move to a street corner and try panhandling- but first, we dug through the trash to find a cup (we found a Planter’s cashew can. Quite exciting). Anyway. We chose a street corner and sat down. As expected, most people ignored us. A lot walked as far away from us as the sidewalk would allow, or sped up as they went by. One woman dropped 5 pennies in our cup- all the change she could find in her purse (she spent a LOT of time digging through)- then turned around and asked someone if they had money for us.
We ended up with $1.65… in about 2 hours. We ended up giving it away.
It was an interesting experience.
Probably not something most of you will ever try, but definitely interesting.
It’s dehumanizing, actually.
So I’d like to encourage you to treat people like people, and not just walk past and ignore them.
Expectations. / Oct 5, 10:09 PM
We’ve been here a month.
Well… technically over a month. Whatever.
Time passes really strangely here- I can’t believe it’s already been a month, and yet I feel like I’ve been here forever.
We’ve been at our service sites for a few weeks now (this also seems crazy to me), and therefore Thursday is my favorite day of the week. Allow me to explain.
Tuesday-Thursday afternoons I work at an after school program through the Salvation Army. Tuesdays, I sit in on a drama class (SO much fun), Wednesdays, I help with music theory and whatever else they tell me to do, and Thursdays… there’s Art class. :) Basically the best thing ever.
Coming into Mission Year, I did NOT want to work with kids. Or… I thought I didn’t. But I’ve come to really love the kids I get to work with. They’re so much fun. I even like helping with homework- apparently, my strengths are 7th grade math and 2nd grade reading/spelling. There’s a little girl who probably doesn’t know my name, but runs over and hugs me when she sees me. And it’s things like that that make me remember why I’m here… even when it’s NOTHING like I expected.
But during our first week- during training in Georgia- we were asked to write out our expectations for the year… and then rip them up. I think letting go of our expectations has been a great thing. It’s not always easy, but ultimately it helps us to do the most good, and to truly love God and love people.
Had you told me a year ago that I’d be helping with an art class in inner-city Chicago, I probably would’ve laughed at you. But it’s such a blessing to be able to help kids cultivate creativity.
Lesson learned: God will defy your expectations.
Comment [1]
Chicago. / Sep 15, 03:19 PM
I live in Chicago now.
That’s a really weird statement.
So far, we’ve been through two weeks of orientation. We actually get to start our service sites this week. I’m so excited. I’ll be working at a place called Growing Home- an urban farm. In addition to farming, they need a lot of office help. I’ll also be working at an after-school program at Salvation Army. Originally, I had no interest in working either of those places, but Growing Home is doing some great work in the community. As for Salvation Army… their program is close to my heart. A lot of funding was cut from schools here, so of course art and music were the first things to go. I think this is a terrible tragedy. So I get to go teach music (probably mostly music theory, and some beginning piano), and hopefully help out the art teacher. They’re really excited about having volunteers- they don’t have the funds to stay fully staffed.
Should be a good year!
