Sunday Blog post

 This week felt like a sprint, one thing after another, no real gaps in between.

Earlier in the week I volunteered at Peace House, a soup kitchen on Franklin in South Minneapolis, showed up, did what needed to be done, then moved on to the next thing. I felt a little bit anxious being there, not in a bad way, just aware of everything going on around me, so I ended up writing a story about it afterward to process it.

I kept going to the gym every day, no breaks, just part of the routine at this point.

I made time to sit at the Eagan Library so I could write in between everything else, just plotting myself there for a bit to get words down before heading back out.

Friday started early, dropping my son off at school in the morning, it looked beautiful outside, clear, calm, almost like a perfect morning, and then within an hour the rain started. Later I went to the Eagan YMCA and it got so dark outside it looked like nighttime through the windows. I remember walking through the gym and looking out thinking something was off, like the whole day had shifted.

At some point I picked up a passenger driving for Uber in North Minneapolis, didn’t recognize her at first at all.We worked together at Robbinsdale Farm and Garden (Robbinsdale in one of Minnesota’s most historical towns). We started talking, and I remembered she lived a block away from where I grew up. We weren’t close back then but we knew a lot of the same people, so we just kept going back and forth naming people, remembering things, connecting everything.

We drove through a hailstorm while all this was happening, and I had to pull off the exit ramp from the highway to be safe and we just kept talking about childhood and people we hadn’t thought about in years. She mentioned how Facebook feels like a ghost town now, which felt true.

She was going to her mom’s house, same house, still there on Girard, just a block from where I used to live. I dropped her off and almost immediately got another passenger a few blocks away, took that ride all the way back to West St. Paul where I live(such a coincidence!) . Right after that I got on the phone with my younger brother, he knew the girl from the neighborhood too, and we started connecting even more dots, naming more people from back then, building out the web of who knew who in that neighborhood.

It rained on and off all day, at least five different times, starting in the morning and continuing through everything. After that last ride the weather cleared up almost immediately but I was so wiped out,I picked my son up from school and went to bed.

On Saturday afternoon, I went to the Luminary Arts Center to see Arena Dances, the space is right next to the Minnesota Opera and Acme Comedy, everything kind of clustered together, easy to move between spots, different kinds of energy all in the same area. The event itself was loud, fast, a lot going on.

Then I went to a spontaneous theater event at the Central Library in Minneapolis where we wrote monologues for writers and then watched actors perform them right there, write it, hand it off, see it acted out immediately. I got lucky with timing because I was already downtown, drove over and found parking about two minutes away. Parking downtown can be like a needle in a haystack with metered spots, but this time I got in and out easily and kept the energy going.

Rideshare client and ptsd

I had a rideshare. Liner who told me about her daughter who had been in the military overseas during the war. She said there was an incident where two of her daughter’s comrades jumped out of a plane and their parachutes never opened, and after that her daughter really changed. She said it led to a lot of PTSD and a sadness that kind of stayed with her.

And I told her, yeah, I understand that more than people think. I went back to something I said earlier about my father, how I would describe him as “angrier than shit,” like he was carrying that military weight in him all the time and it would just come out in different ways. And she said, “yeah, that military experience, it affects the whole family,” not just the person who went through it.

I also told her about another passenger I had picked up before who said she actually received benefits because of PTSD from both of her parents being in the military, so it really runs through families in a way people don’t always talk about.

Then she shifted back to her daughter and told me she’s actually doing well now—living in Washington, running her own hair salons, and even getting ready to have her business advertised on a billboard. And I said, “that must be a proud moment for you.” And she was like, “yeah, it is, but I wish she was here. I don’t like the idea of my grandkids growing up without seeing their grandma.”

They had gone through about 10 years where they didn’t talk, mostly because her daughter had trouble opening up emotionally, but she said they’re on good terms now and she’s really happy about that.

And I told her, yeah, that’s really what matters, just being able to talk again and have that connection in the present.

I think moments like that are why I like these rides. People end up sharing parts of their lives they probably don’t say out loud that often, and for a short time, you’re just there listening. Sometimes that’s enough.

 

The First Thing I Said Was “I’m Really Anxious”: My First Day Volunteering at Peace House

Walking into Peace House in South Minneapolis, I thought I needed a role. Instead, I learned what it means to simply show up.

---

When I first arrived in South Minneapolis, I couldn’t even find parking. My GPS kept looping me around, making it seem like the building was a mile away when really it was right there the whole time, and by the time I finally parked, I was already overwhelmed. Outside, there were people digging through a trash can, trash scattered across the ground, and I remember thinking, what am I walking into?

When I stepped inside, the first thing I said to the volunteer was, “I’m really anxious right now.” I didn’t even try to hide it. I needed something—someone—to attach my mind to, just to steady my racing heart.

At first, I didn’t understand what I was supposed to do there. I had come thinking I might learn how to cut hair, but there was no one there to teach me, and I kept wondering what I was even doing there, what volunteers actually do in a place like this. One of the women told me, “If you’re not doing something like hair, you’re here to listen. To be a presence. To be a kind of friendship.” But the room didn’t feel still enough for that. People were constantly coming in and out, grabbing food, talking, leaving again, like dozens within the hour, and it felt chaotic in a way that made it hard to imagine sitting down and really knowing anyone.

She showed me around anyway. There was a wall of volunteer photos, and she mentioned, “Sometimes people just take their pictures down.” Then she brought me to a back room with shelves of hygiene items and clothing, and told me, “If something’s missing, I’ll go to the thrift store with my daughter and pick it up.” Shoes, small essentials, things that might not seem like much but clearly mattered. That stayed with me because she was already volunteering her time and still finding ways to give more. There was also a place where people could charge their phones, and that detail hit me in a very practical way—of course, if you’re less housed, where do you charge your phone, where do you keep anything steady for even a few hours?

We sat down and she offered me food, and I said yes, mostly because I needed something to focus on besides how anxious I still felt. Later she told me, “You did a really good job regulating yourself by the time we sat down,” which surprised me because it didn’t feel like I had done anything intentional, just that sitting helped.

We started talking about her past as a substitute teacher, and she said none of this made her anxious compared to what she had seen before, like students throwing chairs or situations that felt unpredictable in a different way. I told her, “I had a small student jump on me once and beg me not to call her mom that day.” Another volunteer nearby laughed and said, “Yeah, you’ll be lucky if you see me for the next eleven days after this,” and we all laughed, and it felt like a moment where I could actually exhale.

At some point, I could tell she thought I’d be capable of doing this kind of volunteer work. Maybe she says that to everyone, because it’s obvious they need people, but it still made me pause and think about whether this was something I could actually do.

I started thinking about why I felt drawn to this space at all. My own mother was less housed for a long time, and even saying that out loud felt complicated, like something I wasn’t sure how to place. But I’m starting to understand that it shapes the way I see places like this—not because I share the same circumstances, but because something in me recognizes it, or feels close to it in a way I can’t fully explain.

Later, I sat with a woman who had bright purple hair, curled carefully, and she told me, “I did it myself.” We talked for a few minutes about hair, about how important it is to feel put together, to feel confident as a woman, and it was such a small, light conversation, but it felt real in a way that didn’t ask anything from either of us.

Before I left, the volunteer explained more about what people could offer there. She said, “You’d be surprised—people can give as much as a nail cut. Or help identify wounds and point someone toward a free clinic. A lot of people who are less housed don’t know where to go, how to get insurance, or what resources are even available. Sometimes they just need someone to advocate for them.” That stayed with me too, the idea that something as simple as knowledge—something I might take for granted—could actually be a form of care.

I also couldn’t stop thinking about the food. Something as simple as a tortilla, some lettuce, and refried beans. It didn’t feel like enough, not for a grown person trying to get through a day, and it made me think about how there are still gaps, not just in presence but in resources, in funding, in what people are able to give.

I don’t know yet if I’ll volunteer there again. But I do know that places like Peace House matter. They matter because they offer something steady in the middle of instability, a place to sit, to eat, to charge a phone, to be seen, even briefly. And I think there are more ways to contribute than most people realize. Not everyone knows how to cut hair—I don’t—but maybe someone can trim nails, or recognize an infection, or share information about a clinic, or help someone understand how to get insurance. Those are not small things. If anything, this experience made me realize that giving back doesn’t always look like a big, obvious act. Sometimes it looks like noticing what you already know and offering it to someone who needs it. And maybe the city doesn’t just need more places like this, maybe it needs more people willing to see that they already have something to give.

Sunday blog post

 This week I was able to take my son to the indoor park on Saturday. I also went to the library, where I spent about two hours reading my comedy work. Tomorrow, the library has an audio production, and since there are no cubicles available, I will go in and use the space to study. I also want to plan how to catch up with some old friends this week.

In Improv, some of our scenes were based on “meet cute” moments from When Harry Met Sally. We were at Paradox and talked about how we got to know each other from the start. Later, we were given a national product to sell. For example, I was given a product called an emotional regulation jacket that acts like a hug. (This is somewhat of a real project in production right now, designed to help people who are vision-impaired understand when someone is nearby.) These were very enjoyable scenes.

Later, we were split into groups and given an occupation and a quirk. I gave someone the occupation of taxidermist and someone else the occupation of ventriloquist. It was interesting to see how these two characters interacted. At one point, the ventriloquist visited the taxidermist to help with a deceased puppet. They were initially scared( because that was the quirk they were )given because they didn’t realize it was a puppet, and the taxidermist didn’t want to perform on people

Overall an enjoyable week..

Sunday Blog Post

 This week has been all over the place. My former company was acquired by a new one because of financial issues. We’re all trying to make head of the new company. The aftermath included orientation sessions, online trainings, and the final class improv show.

Wednesday night was the improv final at Northeast Middle School. We did a short-form game where my partner and I ran a scene, then repeated it in a different genre. A candle turned into a sci-fi scene where I became a robot. 

I threw myself on the floor to exaggerate a scene of quiet quitting, and there was a roar of laughter. At the end, my partner “unscrewed” my hardware so I wouldn’t repeat myself, and I declared that I was human again.

Saturday I went to a gathering for my friend’s mom, whose husband had died recently. It was part of the Hmong community to show up. About a hundred people came over the course of the day. There was food laid out. We ate, talked, and commiserated. My son played on the playground at the church where it was held. The elders packed me up three bag fulls of shrimp, chicken and watermelon, so I was as gen Z states: "stacked.":)

Afterward, I took my son and his friend to an indoor park (highly necessary as its still in the 40's in Minnesota). While they played, I jumped into a Zoom improv event.

In addition, there was a death in my building recently. It’s been sitting quietly in the background. Not loud, not overwhelming, just there.

The Hmong gathering was the highlight of my week. It really helped to be around supportive friends in the heat of a job transition. I felt a little lighter.