Flexible

I have been involved wih a local homeless program for 4 years called, The Road Home. They provide shelter, housing and case management for homeless families. My church acts as one of the many host churches, providing overnight shelter to families 4 times a year. Families stay in a church for a week and are then moved to the next host church. Individuals from the congregation provide meals, entertain children in the early evenings and stay overnight with the families during their week. In general families stay in this Shelter portion of the program 8 weeks!

I am on the overnight crew. Sleeping over night at the church 1 evening or sometimes 2, during the week we host. My sleepover occurred on Wed evening.

Always thinking of biking and running - I planned to run to work from our church on Thursday morning and bike home Thursday evening. This allows me to get a longer run in during the week, which usually doesn't happen. Generally I find it very difficult to fit in anything longer than 3 miles in the morning, before work.

But, in order to run to work and bike home, a few things had to happen. I would need to bring work clothes to the office the day before. Since I try to bring my lunch, I packed two lunches on Wed morning. I also had to bring my bike and helmet to work on Wed and leave it there, so hat I could bike home on Thursday. Plans were in place and everything was executed.

We woke up Thursday morning to rain, lots of thunder, lighting and rain. The overnight guests are picked up every morning at 7 by a volunteer and the children are dropped off at their schools, and parents dropped off at work or The Road Home day shelter, where case managers assist with searching for homes and work. (The agency has a 15 passenger van which allows 14 individuals to be part of the shelter program at any one time).

Once the families left I decided to drive to work and get a run in from there. That way, if the weather was bad, I wouldn't be that far from shelter. The heavy rain had stopped by the time I got to work. It was sprinkling at best when I took off. A few sprinkles along with the mild temp's made for a beautiful run.

 

This is a picture of Lake Monona, near the Yahara River entrance to the lake.

 

Here is the bridge I took over the river. Not long after I crossed this bridge it started to POUR. Oh well, I stuck to the sidewalks which allowed for lots of tree cover!

At the end of the day there was another deluge so instead of biking home I put my bike back on the trailer and drove home.

I must remain flexible - plans don't always work out perfectly.

 

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