My spring break began with a seemingly small, yet somewhat daunting venture: how to fit 16 people and nearly twice as much luggage into a passenger van and a car-like SUV. We squashed duffel bags and suitcases until the hatch closed, stuffed sleeping bags into crevasses, flattened backpacks under seats and between feet until finally our late night game of baggage Tetris ended with resounding high scores. Next came the people tucked between pillows and casting off shoes, who were to call these vehicles home for the next 26 hours.
We were traveling to the deep South for a volunteering opportunity through the University of Massachusetts Anthropology Caucus to the small town of Jonestown, Miss. After days of traveling down the highways, the town sprouted up from the rich soil suddenly. Nestled between miles and miles of abutting cotton and cornfields, her buildings sagged and almost seemed to sway in the southern breeze like stalks of corn. It was as if we had travelled back in time, or had stumbled upon a small third-world country in the middle of the Mississippi Delta. According to the most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the median family income (in 2009 inflation-adjusted dollars) was an estimated 18,333 while the national average was 62,363. Additionally, more than half the town’s population lives under the poverty line.
The 16 of us had come to lend whatever helping hand we could, and our special focus was on the children of the community. They came to us from broken homes and few resources, where getting into trouble was just about the only fun thing to do – a trend that could one day cause major issues with the law. It was their March vacation from school; we held an enrichment camp in the mornings to keep them learning and off the streets. If the estimates of the Census held true, only about 67.6 percent of the kids would graduate from high school, a statistic that we hoped to address in our time there.
In the local Community Development, Resource, and Activity Center we held rotating classes of reading, simple science, music and arts and crafts, all with individualized attention. We wrote haikus, made tie-dyed t-shirts and even held music lessons that consisted of kid’s playing that dreaded fourth grade instrument – the plastic recorder. We talked about food groups and planted flowers around the Center, painted plaster figurines and went on nature walks.
Seeing the kids’ delighted faces every morning made sleeping on the floor of the Center at night (some of us without air mattresses) seem not so bad. Combined with the construction work we were doing in the community, having a quiet place to lay down was wonderful enough. When the children left in the early afternoon, we headed out to two sites to provide free labor for repairs that were needed in the community.
In Addie’s home, an elderly woman, the kitchen floor had a long skinny hole as tall as a second grader that gave way directly to the dirt some three feet below. Standing carefully on the supportive struts of the frame, we pried up the old linoleum and plywood until the cabinets seemed to be floating on air. As we cut and nailed in new floorboards the sounds of James Brown danced from the living room. Over the course of the week we were able to re-tile and finish the floor while the team at the other site was able to replace a collapsing hallway ceiling.
It was not all work though, as we often made our way to towns over the county seat Clarksdale. There we visited Ground Zero Blues Club, a club partially owned by Morgan Freeman, playing the true blues of Mississippi. It was hard not to feel the history and the pain in those crying guitar licks, or the sense of community that hung softly under the colored lights.
It was the same sense that we got when, in the afternoons sitting on the stoop of the Center, every car that passed would wave or strangers walking mildly by on the street would stop to say hello and chat. The friendliness and graciousness of the people of Jonestown towards a group of teenage northerners is something I will never forget. Because the Center had no showers, neighbors happily took us in so we could clean up. Linda, our coordinator and the head of the Community Development, Resource and Activity Center, cooked all of us a fabulous first dinner of barbecue chicken, candied yams, mustard greens, spaghetti and steamed vegetables despite the fact that it probably strained her personal budget. The children didn’t pout or say how bored they were. They were with us every step of the way wanting to learn more and constantly alive with potential.
These are the reasons that I chose to volunteer for spring break instead of relaxing (which, given my schedule, I probably should have). The opportunity to make a difference, even a very small one, is something that I cherish. I may be more tired now than when I left and sick (I must hold a record somewhere for throwing up in three different states on the ride back…) but the fact that I fixed a floor, or helped a child appreciate nature or encouraged them to stay in school and to succeed is something invaluable though intangible. And yet, for all the small contributions I made, I believe Jonestown changed me more than I will ever change it. Jonestown taught me about my privilege and my place in society, and what I can do to make this world better. But most importantly Jonestown taught me to thank a little more sincerely, to give a little more generously, to live life a little freer and above all to love a lot more passionately.
Melissa Mahoney is a Collegian columnist and can be reached at [email protected].
