It's Fun to Stay at the YMCA

How would you like to have a slumber party with 5 to 9 of your classmates or co-workers? Your bed: a foot away from your supervisor's, who drools and rambles in her sleep? (that's me) Sharing 1 or 2 bathrooms and walking a mile to shower at the YMCA? Then spending the whole day at work and meals with those same people, who BTW, you just met 7 months ago? Every night for 8 weeks?

Sounds like an NCCC rite of passage to me! During our first 2 rounds, Maple 4 had it pretty easy housing-wise. It's true that in Cincinnati, people shared rooms with up to 3 other people, we had 1 bathroom without a shower, and there were mice–mice with gall. But on the flip side, we lived in a beautiful 176-year-old farm house, and had roosters, cows, horses and other farm buddies to hang out with. In Vinton, we slept on campus. And since our roommates were away on projects with their teams, each person had a bedroom and bathroom to his or herself. SPOILED! 'Tis not the case now, friends.

Currently our humble abode is one room in the YMCA-run Lake Superior Village Youth and Family Center. We snooze on 1-inch thick floor mats with sleeping bags, which we have to move into a separate room in the morning because our home is also one of our work sites. And all of the what-ifs listed above apply as well. But, you know, it's actually not that bad. In fact, I consider it a badge of honor to have this type of AmeriPad. The lack of privacy can be frustrating at times, but it's a character-building experience; and in the end we only have to live like this for a short time. In exchange for the cramped quarters, we travel the country and get paid to help people, so it's a fair deal.

Here's a couple photos of our set-up. This one shows the mattress pads that Gaby, Hillary and I sleep on. Mine is the one next to the foosball table.

This one shows where Drew and I store our our personal belongings in the community center's computer lab. His stuff is on the left under the desk. Mine is on the right. As you can see, I basically live out of the red AmeriCorps bag assigned to me at the beginning of the year. Above the desk are team items such as a huge box of donated noodles and a bag filled with games like Banannagrams and Jenga that we never play, except for one time when we didn't have power.