Never a dull moment at Westminster House.

So, on Friday when I made it to the house, I was informed that I was to take some of the residents to a car racing show at the state fair grounds. I was not really looking forward to the car show but I reminded myself that it was not about me but the residents. The minivan can accommodate a total of seven people including me. All in all, only four people wanted to go to the car show. I inquired if one particular resident would be interested in going because I knew it’s something that he would not normally turn down. It was then that I was informed that the resident was asked to leave Westminster House on Thursday because he was smoking a joint. A resident living at the facility who is on probation actually informed staff that she had to leave because if she were caught being around someone who is doing drugs, she would be in violation of her parole. Needless to say, some of the staff went into panic mode and confronted the resident who was smoking the joint. Evidently, he had asked someone to drop off the joint and he decided to smoke in not in the facility but outside. He acknowledged smoking it and was asked to leave immediately. That’s the reason why he was not joining the others at the car show. See, there really is never a dull moment at Westminster House. After dinner was served, everyone got into the van and off we went to the fairgrounds. Lo and behold no one and I mean no one was there for the car show – there were no cars to be seen. The residents were disappointed and started to get a little antsy. I called the team leader and asked her what I should do. She told me that I could take them to the movies which they were all in agreement. Whoever says God does not exist, has not lived my life! So, instead of going to the car show which I was not looking forward to, I got to watch a movie which I love to do. Three of us watched the movie, “Leatherhead” and it was a pretty humorous and cutesy football movie set in the 1920s. Whenever I go out on activities with the residents, it makes for a short evening since I spend at least an hour and a half with them.

The weather on Saturday was gorgeous – definitely spring weather so most of the residents were out and about. I think at the most we had eight people eat lunch instead of eleven. I feel good whenever I know that the residents are out in the community because the last thing I want for them is to remain in the facility especially when the weather is downright amazing. It was a pretty quiet and non-eventful day at work. I did end up working a half hour later because the regularly scheduled person did not come in and the person who took the shift came in a little later. That was not a problem at all for me. Fr. Tim and I went to the symphony because John had an event at his church that evening. Tim and I had planned on eating at this one restaurant where I had a buy one get one free coupon, but the wait was close to forty five minutes and we would not be able to make the pre-symphony talk if we had put our names down. We ended up walking to a Cajun restaurant just a couple of doors down and managed to snag the last non-smoking table. I’ve not been to this restaurant in years and had myself a very good seafood jambalaya. All in all dinner turned out really well and we were right on time for the pre-symphony talk. The symphony performance itself was very good and the NASA images that accompanied the Holt’s piece after the intermission was impressive to say the least. I kind of wished the images were digital so they would have been really sharp, but that’s just a minor complain on my part. Seeing those images while the orchestra was playing definitely added a different dimension to the performance. All in attendance definitely enjoyed the evening.

On Sunday, I went to a Lutheran church downtown. Kathy Olah is Lutheran and was a pastor’s kid while growing up. She’s been trying to get me to go to this church where she and Joel belong to hear this lady pastor who is a dynamic preacher. I finally did not have anything going on at St. Kate’s so decided that Sunday would be the most opportune time for me to make it there. It is fascinating the similarities between the ELCA branch of the Lutheran church and the Catholic celebration of Mass. Like Joel said, it’s the little nuances here and there but overall it’s extremely similar. They had a little more singing but we all know Catholics don’t sing! I’m glad I went, although Rachel the pastor ended up not celebrating the service which means I’ll be headed back there again just so I can hear her preach.

It was a quiet day at the house with most of the residents out and about with friends and family and that made for a very low key day. Dinner was spaghetti and meat sauce which turned out pretty darn good in my opinion. One of the former residents true to her word made it back to play Scrabble with a couple of us. She’s doing really well and you can tell just from speaking to her. Evidently she’ll be returning at least once a week for an Illness and Management Recovery class offered by Westminster House. I was so happy to hear that she signed up for it because it tell me that she’s doing what she feels she needs to do to not allow herself to deteriorate. Stories like this really show me why I do what I do with the residents. No matter how small of an impact I’m making, I know I’m making an inroad in their lives and there’s no greater feeling than that.

Ah, this Saturday I’ll be cooking my $1,000 Malaysian dinner and I’m really looking forward to it. Conceptually, I know what I’ll be preparing so now it’s more a matter of executing it. At the end of the day, I just want it to be a fun evening for all involved. I’m sure I’ll be writing about it next week.