And I Have Returned!

Life, my friends, is insane! I love the ride that I am currently on, but it has left little time for my little blog. For that, I am sorry! I see that many new pairs of eyes have stumbled upon my musings. Hopefully they have been enjoyed!

I will be, once again, posting my experiences here. I assure you that I have yet to die!

For now, please accept this piece that I wrote a short while ago from my perch in Guatemala. It extolls the virtues of giving of one's self completely and having the time of your life whilst doing it! Enjoy! (New material is on the way!!)

Have you ever sat alone in your room fantasizing about how your life would be were you the one in charge of it? Did you hope for adventure, a hugely diverse friends group, the need to play hard and live fast and the right to cross borders once denied you? During these fantasies did your heart cry out for freedom, hard, yet meaningful, work and the opportunity to change the world? Do you dream of working your ass off and not getting paid? Well, I’ve got just the thing for you! Volunteering!

The life of a volunteer is harsh. The schedule is insane, the work is exhausting and the breakdowns are always just a moment away. A volunteer’s existence is much like that of a slightly rabid puppy. We bound about, entertaining everyone. Our moods are constantly happy, no matter what surrounds us. Wherever we are, we seem to live on curiosity and risk taking. Sure, we may foam at the mouth a bit, but hey, we’re certainly cute, aren’t we?

A volunteer is a vital cog in so many of the world´s various devices. From those that choose to exploit volunteerism (read “internship”) to the truly great causes of this land, volunteering helps this world go round.

I am currently a volunteer in public relations here at Safe Passage (safepassage.org). Unlike other organizations who ask for thousands of dollars to take advantage of you, Safe Passage asks for only $50. Obviously, one must choose their cause based on a bit more than the cost, but I won’t lie, it certainly helps to have that money in the bank to support this free living, modern hippie lifestyle.

Safe Passage’s goal is to break the cycle of poverty present within the community of the Guatemala City garbage dump. Thousands survive off of that dump. Safe Passage works with the children of those families, ensuring them an education and helping them move on from a future of toiling away in the dump. I can get behind a thing like that. And so I did. In August of 2008 I moved to Guatemala and have been caught up in the rollercoaster life of volunteering ever since. Little did I know that this so called “experience” would be one that would not only change my life forever, but change the way I look at life and at this world of our’s.

For each volunteer here at Safe Passage the experience is different. For each volunteer in general, in fact. Most of us here at Safe Passage are at least 1,000 miles away from home, I am 3,000 miles away. That sort of separation breeds life!

Volunteers are rock stars, that is they live the life of rock stars. Their schedule is the same, sleep encompasses about 4-6 hours of a 24 hour day, maybe less. Work and play make up the remaining hours. To survive working hard one must play hard. Volunteers are pros at separating work from play. During the working hours (here, those hours run from 6AM to 6PM) life is fun, but not inappropriately so. Once we step off of that bus at 6PM, though, the fun begins in earnest. Volunteer parties, nights on the town (in Antigua), love trysts, fast friendships and pure adventure, anything and everything becomes fair game to the life of a volunteer.

One factor rules them all, however and that factor is love. Each and every volunteer at Safe Passage loves their job, loves their kids, loves their team mates and loves their life. They have chosen to become a volunteer and they wear that label with pride. Times get tough, but never tough enough to dampen the spirit of a volunteer. In the end, it is all about the caring, all about the donation of this chunk of our life to the cause that we have chosen to champion. It is all about them, not us.

Yeah, volunteering is good for your resume, it’s good for your psyche and it’s good for your afterlife; but, above all else, it is good for you and the people that you serve. Everyday I feel the affects of what I do for Safe Passage. Every smile, every hug, every tearful visitor who finally gets to witness what we do brings me back to that first moment when I was a tearful visitor wondering if there were any more worthy people on this planet than these volunteers.

Volunteering isn’t a dying art, but it certainly isn’t thriving. Safe Passage is constantly in need of volunteers as are so many other organizations around the world our in your own home town. Will life as a volunteer agree with you? My friend, there is only one way to find out! I pitch Safe Passage because it is what I know, I write this article because I am a freelance journalist trying to support my free living, volunteer self. I gave up a solid career with 3 newspapers and a men’s magazine to come and volunteer and I could not be happier. Give volunteering a try, there’s nothing to be afraid of! 10 months on and I haven’t caught Swine Flu!

For more information on volunteering with Safe Passage, check out their website safepassage.org or email at volunteers@safepassage.org.