Today

Last night I came home exhausted and with a headache from hell. After a quick hello and goodbye to Mal (she's gone to Richmond for the weekend), I retreated to the dark hole of my room and went to bed at eight. For a few hours, I drifted in and out of consciousness, vaguely aware of the sounds of my other roommates enjoying their Friday night. The last time I glanced at the clock was at 11. From then until 7:45 AM I remained asleep.

Today was my first morning of training at the Capitol Hill Pregnancy Center. I'll be trained in counseling and basic interactions with the clients that come into the CHPC. For the next five weeks of our Saturday morning training, we'll begin with breakfast and then cover three hours of material.

There are twenty other women besides myself, the biggest volunteer group they've had to train thus far. We crowded into a small room and each sat on padded folding chairs. I felt like a sardine and the binder that they gave me opened up wider than my personal space provided. It was that way for all of us. Thus, there were a lot of "sorry's" and "excuse me's" given and heard throughout the morning as binders and persons collided.

We opened the morning with introductions. There were various ages represented, but most of the women were about my age. Everyone seemed eager and excited to get started. So, after intros, we dove right in to the material. In looking at our agenda, we'll be covering a lot of literature, but we'll also be watching some videos.

After training, I came back to the house and read for a little bit. It was a beautiful and sunny day here in DC. Though Drew and I talked about going to a movie or museum, we ultimately decided so stay in and create our own masterpieces. haha.

Drew has been doing some web work and for the past four hours, I've been working on the painting that I mentioned in a previous posting (January 18). It's harder than I thought and an artistic stretch for me. I usually enjoy painting serene landscapes, with a fence or something here and there. This cityscape is out of my painting comfort zone!