How we built the roof, etc.

I thought I would tell you a little more about the construction of the houses. Last Friday we were putting up the roof. Warning: this description would probably make a real construction worker sad.

They had already laid down some boards so that we could work up high. There was a net underneath us, but you could still fall off the edge of the building. Walking around was pretty tough, since space was limited and you had to be careful not to fall. It was mildly terrifying at first, but I got used to it eventually. This huge machine lifted up the triangularish roof pieces and set them near the front of the house. Then we dragged each of them down and nailed them into the boards below us. After we had that done, there was a lot of securing of things to be done. We had to nail down a bunch of metal plates with holes in them to keep things together.

On my house we had an interfaith group volunteering with us. There was this one Mormon boy who was 17. For insurance reasons he had to stay on the ground the whole day. His job ended up being fetching things for the people working on the roof. It was kind of pathetic in a funny way.

I met this guy named Yenum who goes to Principia and had to do a similar project for his school. Near the end of the day he interviewed some of the volunteers and staff who had been around for a long time. They were all so enthusiastic about using their time and their bodies to give back to people. My whole Habitat experience has been pretty awesome and inspiring, and I definitely hope to return and build some time in the future.

Yesterday was my last day and I was at the Restore. Harper called me up into her office to give me a goodie bag of Habitat schwag. Although I feel like I barely did anything for her, she was so grateful to have had me around.