A pretty mundane week really.

It was a pretty mundane week and believe you me, I’m perfectly fine with that. I went to the High School Musical which is a Disney sensation for the past year and got to see for myself what the whole hoopla was about. The musical definitely catered to kids and I mean kids – not even teenagers. I went on opening night and the amount of kids all decked out in High School Musical clothing was really cute and adorable. The musical itself was OK – not something I would see again. I actually had more fun watching two kids sitting in front of me. They were at the most five years old and by the last three songs, they were standing up, dancing, waving their hand and swirling without a care in the world. Needless to say the kids had a blast and I was indeed reminded of the innocence of a child.

On Thursday, I was invited to be on a panel to talk about immigration issues to the Greater Des Moines Leadership Institute group. What might you ask is the Greater Des Moines Leadership Institute? Well, it’s people who are groomed to be leaders in the greater DM area in the near future. Many of them hold high level positions in company and government. I recognized a number of them and overall it was a good discussion. I was invited by my lawyer who was the main speaker and she said she could not think of a better person to sit on the panel. There was an Iraqi lady whose husband worked for the UN back in Iraq and when the war broke out, they had to leave the country. They spent a number of years in Jordan and made it to Iowa just a couple of months ago. Hearing her story was just gut wrenching. A part of me did not feel like speaking on the panel because I wanted to hear more of her experience. When it came time for me to speak, I basically shared with the group my trial and tribulations in getting my green card over the years from a student visa to a work visa then finally a green card. It was interesting to hear what they thought of my immigration process. A number of them asked some pretty good questions and I did my best to answer their questions.

I got paid on Friday to watch a movie with the residents at the theater. The activity director is being investigated for verbal abuse and the Department of Inspection and Appeals are in the midst of their investigation which pretty much means we still do not have an activity director. On the activity calendar, the plan was for the residents to go to the movies. They all got to choose what movie they wanted to see. Most of them joined me in watching the movie “21” which was pretty good. One watched an action movie and two others watched a comedy. The thought that went through my head was the fact that I was indeed being paid to watch a movie. How weird is that? Oh, the things that comes with the job!

Sunday was the last time I was going to see three residents who will be moving out by the middle of the week. It’s really a bittersweet experience really because I’m happy that they will be moving out which shows that they are able to live independently and that has always been the goal, yet at the same time, I’ve gotten to know all three of them pretty well and one of them has been a regular Scrabble player. She by far has made the most positive change from a quiet and private person dealing with major depression to someone is definitely more outgoing and social. I’m very happy for her. She did comment that she’ll be back every Sunday to play Scrabble with us because it’s her goal to beat me in the game! How cute of her. I’ll definitely miss her the most. All good things must come to an end I guess.

Saturday was a very nice day. It was a very quiet day at the facility and after I left, I basically plopped myself down in my apartment and had a dvd watching extravaganza. It was fun. I had borrowed a number of movies from the library and have been waiting to find the time to watch them. The time came on Saturday. Let me just say that it was an extremely nice and relaxing evening for me. There was no agenda and I just got to chill in my apartment. It’s nice to be able to do that once in awhile.

Over and out for this week. The only thing going on this coming week is the DM Symphony performance on Saturday. It’s pretty amazing how my weeks differ from one to the next.