Service

The service aspect of this class is one of the most exciting parts for me. My family is a very service orienteted family. We do a lot of service throughout the year and every year, each member of my family receives the Gold level President's Service Award. This award is for 100 + hours of service in the year.
The thing about this project that excites me though, is that I am going to go out of my way to make it challenging for me. Often times the service that I do is in my comfort zone. I get a lot out of everything that I do, but nothing is too mentally draining. For this project I want to do something that stretches my limits.
I have never been very comfortable around mentally and/or physically challenged people. One of my friends in C.A.R. has a brother, Seth, that is mentally challenged and is confined to a wheelchair. My first few years in C.A.R., I stayed away and didn't really talk to him. This summer my friend told me that his brother was his inspiration for everything that he does in life. Most of the things that are a stretch for HIM, he does for his brother. So I went out of my way for the rest of the summer to talk to Seth and get to know him a little bit. At first I didn't know what to say. So I started with the usual "Hey Seth!" He answered me with "Hi Caitlin!" It was stressed on his part, and I could tell it was difficult for him, but he said Hi to me, and he knew my name. This was something that made me light up inside and out. I started talking to him that night, and for almost every other day that we were all together. It was difficult for me to initiate all summer, so I know this is something that I have still not conquered. But I now know that Seth is one of the coolest guys I have ever met, and that just because he isn't just like me doesn't mean that he is a bad person.
Talking to Seth, and pushing myself outside of my comfort zone made me realize that it is so worth it. I am still uncomfortable in those situations so I am thinking about doing SRACLC for my service project. This would be the hardest project, mentally, that I have ever done. Because of the stretch is why I am so excited about the opportunity.

How does service and my story about Seth relate to sociology? Service is more than the fact that it is MANDATORY, it's something to push us out of our comfort zones in our little "bubble" to see the world around us. There is so much more out there than what we surround ourselves with. I believe the story about Seth is a great connection to the "spit" excercise. In the "bubble" that we live in, we sometimes block mentally and physically challenged people out of everything. We are even sometimes trained to not notice them. We are trained to think of them differently just like we are trained to believe that saliva out of the mouth is "spit". When you think about either of those examples, they are all the same. "Spit" is saliva, and mentally and physically challenged people are humans with feelings too. I am excited to push myself to be the person that I want to be: the person comfortable with EVERYONE because they are normal humans too.