PLT's Habitat Spring Break
Early on the morning of Sunday March 9th, 2008, thirteen brothers from the Chi Phi Fraternity, as well as nine others including two advisors, embarked on what would be a memorable, philanthropic adventure to Tallahassee, Florida. The thirteen brothers included seniors Danny Ruffing and Brendan Hamill, juniors Adam Hinshaw, Bill Frake, Garrett Wasp, and Marc Henry, as well as sophomores Andrew Cusick, Alex Tang, Ryan McManus, Ben Downing, Scott Bevan, Diamond Bishop, and Josh Douin.
The trip was for Bucknell’s student-led Habitat for Humanity chapter, and we had signed up to participate in Habitat’s Collegiate Challenge in Tallahassee in conjunction with Florida State University’s student chapter. The red-eyed flight left us pretty exhausted, but we had a great time meeting the FSU Habitat Chapter and having a hearty dinner with them. We were also introduced to our foreman: an intriguing, wise fellow named Bill Stone. Nevertheless, we packed it in pretty early, most of us having gone around 37 hours with about an hour or two of sleep. We all slept in a log cabin reservation about half-hour away from the site. It was quite a nice, relaxing way to spend our evenings with brief jumps into the nearby lake, sand-pit volleyball matches, and even an open campfire with s’mores.
We rose around 6:45 AM on Monday, a procedure that would become common, and made our way to the site. After having some quick breakfast, we got to work. Some of us were on roof duty, nailing shingles, and others were repairing windows or shoveling dirt. Later in the week, many of us helped insulate the house, while others painted and put together the interior structure. We worked all week sans Wednesday, from about 8 AM to 4 PM. The weather was pretty temperate, so all working outdoors on the Habitat houses proved fulfilling in many ways! We got to meet the family of the house that we were building, and we also met a lot of really great people involved in the Habitat process which really reinforced what we were accomplishing with our Spring Breaks.
Wednesday we took a break to go to St. Georges Beach, about an hour away from where we were staying. That was a good time to cut loose with some frisbee, baseball, or just plain old relaxing. We ate dinner in a small, beach town called Apalachicola, Florida. We got to know a lot of our fellow Habitat volunteers pretty well, and shared some good stories. We also became well-acquainted with our FSU Habitat representative, Jason Campbell, and learned that even Floridians need to wear sunscreen, despite what they may say!
Friday rolled around pretty fast, and we were equally ready to go home as we were sad to be leaving. I think we learned a lot on the trip about hard work and determination, as well as just how easy it is to make a great difference in someone’s life. We accumulated around 520 community service hours for our chapter, and I think we all learned and grew a lot from it. There’s really no greater joy than helping people, be them your next-door neighbor or a family across the country. The simple, yet honest and fulfilling “Thank You” which we received on our last day was enough to make us all believe, amidst some of the sad and unfortunate trends that populate our world today, that the work we accomplished on our week away from Bucknell brought true happiness and hope to a small part of Florida. And that’s a comforting thought.