Building Homes, Not Houses

For the first two days of IASB, 7 and 8 March, about half of all IASB participants worked in Habitat For Humanity projects in Worcester and Sturbridge. Habitat for Humanity, an US organization long associated with former President Jimmy Carter, builds and renovates affordable housing for families in need, relying much on faith-inspired volunteers.Thus, it is only fitting that we have a great coverage of the project! Here's the story:

“You know, I really feel bad about all those holes I have put in my wall over the years,” I said to my friend as we drove back from our work site with Habitat for Humanity (HFH). To me, house walls have always seemed like one of life’s boring constants: I accidently punch a hole in my wall over Christmas break and when I come back for Spring break, it has magically replaced itself. Today, working for Habitat for Humanity, I have learned that this is not the case. In fact, walls are actually fascinating structures that require a great deal of time and recourses to construct.  In a perfect world, I would be able to give a full account of every step that goes into creating a wall, from laying the foundations of a house to hanging up your Rebecca Black poster. Unfortunately, I am familiar with only those steps that I have personally participated in with HFH, so I will stick to that.

Yesterday, the first day of Clark Alternative Spring Break, a group of around 12 college kids, including myself, took a van from Clark Campus to an undisclosed location in Worcester for our first project for HFH. When we arrived my first thought was that the beams that made the foundations of the house that we were to construct looked intimidating. My instincts proved correct. For six hours I found myself climbing up and down 13-foot ladders trying to operate a staple gun and a hammer and nails. This task was not made any easier by the strong winds that day or the muddy ground; both of which made the ladders prone to sliding. Fortunately, what our group lacked in talent we made up for in enthusiasm. Between cheering each other on and laughing at each other’s jokes, the day flew by and neither the wind nor the mud dampened our spirits. I cannot say how exactly it came about but by the time we were done, where before naked foundations had stood, there were now the beginnings of a wall.

The second day proved to be an even more sinister challenge: math. In the past I scoffed at my freshman year geometry teacher when she would tell me that I would need geometry in every day life. But today I ate my words when we were tasked with installing dry wall. This entailed taking huge 8-foot by 4-foot slabs of drywall and drilling them into the beams of a house so they covered the insulator. Unfortunately, not every section of wall is the same size as the sheet of drywall we started out with: things such as pipes, windows, and doorframes could not be covered by the wall.  So, armed with measuring tape, t -squares and exacto knives, we cut the sheets so that they were shaped so they fit with the section of wall. This process was painstaking and time consuming: the wall had to be cut just right. If your calculations were incorrect and the cuts were off by just an inch, the pipe or outlet you needed a hole for was covered and you would have to throw that sheet away and start over. 

The moral of this story is that a wall, or any part of a house isn’t just something you get for free. As I have learned, houses are hard to build and because of that they are too expensive for many to afford. So next time you feel the urge to kick the drywall, play baseball in front of the delicate window, or bang on the door when your brother is taking too long in the bathroom, remember that someone worked hard to make your house and that someone less fortunate would love to have it. Appreciate what you have.

-Joe-

Pictures by our awesome photographer Unurbat

And then there is a house, where there wasn't!