Getting acquainted

Snow continues to fall off and on. I strapped a pair of YakTrax onto my winter hiking boots and set off for the church this morning.

While there I saw one of the neighbors, Louis, shoveling snow and shaking the snow off his carport. I went out to meet him and get acquainted. I fuond out that he is of Hispanic origin and has now been semi-retired for a few years since his government job was outsourced. He has four children, one of which I met while talking with Louis. He appears to have gone through some similar life transitions as I have -- questioning meaning and purpose, trying to figure out how to move on to the future, etc. He grew up as a Catholic, worked his way around a number of the churches in the area, and now attends the Assembly of God church. From what I could tell, he seemed to be a very spiritual person, taking his walk with God very seriously. Our experiences seem to have quite a bit in common, despite our 15 or so years difference in age.

This evening, the Ministerial Association had sponsored a Domestic Violence (DV) seminar. Petersburg appears to have a well organized group of DV advocates who are on-call 24 hours a day to assist with DV incidents. There were just a handful of us there -- perhaps the snow kept some people away. But I've noticed that there are a handful of ministers that seem to be the most engaged in this town. Whatever the occasion, it's a subset of the same half dozen or so that show up. One of my goals for moving here and being here is to elevate the visibility of the Adventist church to one that is seen as being engaged with the community. So I am making a special effort to find out what these events are and make sure I am there. From all I've been told, Norwegians take a long time to consider someone coming from outside as part of the community. But I figure that if I don't make any effort on my side, the period will be even longer, and perhaps never.

As for the seminar itself, it was helpful -- particularly the list of do's and don'ts when dealing with an incident. Alaska being where it is, and Petersburg being where it is, instances rise during the long winter months. The volunteers and churches are all here to help, but unless we get the word out that we are here and that we care, victims won't know where to turn.

More snow fell while I was in the seminar. The roads had turned white again as the temperature dropped below freezing again. Approaching the apartment's driveway, I thought I was going slow enough and had left enough room to slow down -- I found out just barely. I nearly overshot as I discovered once again that the flaky stuff on top of ice makes for a great skating rink for rubber tires.