bean town beginnings.

Well, orientation’s over, and we’ve begun the process of getting settled in our new home in Boston.

Orientation was a blur of trying to remember everyone’s names, talks about the four values of JVC, and beginning the process of getting to know my four housemates. It was pretty inspiring to meet all of the other people who, like myself, will be spending the next year dedicating themselves to this program on the East coast. Although we came from all different areas of the country, went to a wide variety of universities, and had varied academic interests, we all bonded pretty quickly over our shared desire to serve this coming year. Orientation also included our housemates rewriting and singing a version of Rebecca Black’s song “Friday” at the JVC talent show (appropriately retitled “Boston”... yeah, that happened).

While two of our housemates drove to Boston following orientation, the other three of us (myself included) flew here on Tuesday. We were picked up at the airport by two FJVs (Former Jesuit Volunteers) who drove us to our home for the next year.

Once arriving, we were greeted with a basket of goodies from the ’10-’11 JV Boston Community, a binder about my job about Casserly House, and our landlord, Maria (more about her at a later time – she’s quite the character). The house is full of quirks, partly from the fact that it’s over 100 years old and partly because it’s been lived in by JVs for so long. We were then greeted by two other FJVs who came over with pizza and Sam Adams to begin our year. There’s a wonderful FJV community in the Boston area, and it sounds like we’ve only had a small taste of it so far.

I slept in my bed for the next year for the first time two nights ago. This house doesn’t quite feel like our home yet, but it does certainly feel like a home. I guess that comes with the territory considering that JVs have lived here for around 15 years. After some cleaning, unpacking, and rearranging, this place has begun to feel more like ours.

As part of local orientation, other FJVs have been giving us tours of our neighborhood (Jamaica Plain) and downtown Boston. There’s a potluck dinner at our house tonight, and tomorrow we are all traveling as a group to visit our placements for the first time, which will be another long, but exciting day. And on Monday, I have my first day of work!

After months of planning, I’m finally here. I’m not going to lie: this is pretty surreal. Amazing, exhausting, and (soon to be) really challenging, but also surreal. I can’t believe I just left Missouri a week ago; I can’t believe I just meet my housemates a week ago. It already feels like it’s been much, much longer.

Right now, we don’t have internet at our house (I’m actually at the local library right now), so my posts might be kind of sporadic for the time being, but I will try to keep you all as updated as I can in the coming weeks/months!