lying on the floor, lying on the floor, I've come undone

It only took about an hour of volunteering, but I have outed myself as a smartass. Remember how no kids showed up the other night? No? Well, no kids showed up the other night. On my first night of volunteering. Off to a great start! While we waited to see if there would be any latecomers, the director, the other volunteers and I sat around and talked. The director asked everyone to go around the circle, say their name, their job, and how long they had been volunteering with Oak Tree. When it was my turn, I said, "my name's Jennie, I work in HR, and I've been doing this for, oh, about an hour now." Then I waited through the uncomfortably long silence until finally everyone started laughing. Thank god. Because in my mind? People laughing at what I say = they like me. Close call.

Last night, there was one more training session, only it really had nothing to do with training and everything to do with sitting around and TALKING about what we'd learned in training blah blah blah. The director also lead us through this relaxation visualization exercise, where we all had to sit around with our eyes closed, breathing deeply and visualizing what she was telling us to do. Basically, it involved walking through a forest, meeting a guide, and traveling back to times when we'd experienced loss. I KNOW. I mean, I guess it was nice to just sit there in the dark and relax but I'm not very good at the whole visualization thing. Like, when she told us to pick a guide, in my head I picked someone and then we were supposed to start walking but instead we started talking and suddenly I was way behind where I was supposed to be. I actually found the whole "journey" sort of silly so instead I made up adventures for my guide and I to go on. Since yesterday was Talk Like a Pirate Day, our adventures involved a lot of swashbuckling. Um, but then when we were done and allowed to open our eyes we had to go around the circle and say what had happened! I thought about maybe bursting into tears and pretending to be too verklempt to share, but luckily I can spew a line of bullshit in my sleep, so I just made most of it up. Oh and also? During the whole relaxation thing, I just kept worrying that I wasn't relaxed enough. Like, I kept thinking, "Are you breathing deeply enough? Does your body feel relaxed? No? You're still sitting up perfectly straight . . . that is not relaxing. Although good posture is important. I'd hate to become a hunchback just because I got too good at relaxing. OK, concentrate. Relax. Relax! I SAID RELAX, DAMMIT! I wonder if I'm relaxed enough. I bet everyone else is way more relaxed than I am. I SUCK at relaxing."

Then finally the training was over. I'm excited to just get into the actual volunteering, mostly because I am much more comfortable with listening to other people talk than I am with talking about myself.

Arrrrrgh, matey!

Sorry, I'm just sad that Talk Like a Pirate Day is over.