Two Weeks in Boone

Well, the first two weeks and two days of my internship at Samaritan’s Purse (SP) have already passed. I am now more than a fourth done with the eight-week program, and I’m sure the rest will pass quickly as well! Just wanted to let any readers out there know how things have gone thus far.

I arrived in Boone, N.C. (the international headquarters of SP) on June 30, a scant five days after landing back in the States from a month in Ireland. To say it was somewhat of an abrupt transition would be stating it mildly. But thankfully I now feel a bit more settled and content J

The next day I showed up for my first day of work in the communications department of SP, as a writing/editing intern. The first week of work dragged a little, even though we had Thursday off for the Fourth of July. Lots of the other communications folks, including my supervisor, were out of town.

I received or found a few things I could work on, but most of the rest of that week I spent time reading articles previously posted on the website. Which was good, because it gave me a chance to become more familiar with the broad variety of work SP does around our country and the world. I did get to write a couple of articles that week, based on interviews one of the other employees had done in Colorado after the wildfire there. I also edited a couple of things for publication.

While I’m here in Boone, I am staying with a lady who works with Operation Christmas Child and her husband. It’s worked out great so far! Actually, they’ve been gone on vacation since last Wednesday, getting home tomorrow. So it will be nice to have them back. I’ve attended their church both Sundays, and I really appreciate the pastor there. I also went with them to their small group last Monday, which was nice to get to meet some people from the area.

On the Fourth of July, the three of us went downtown to watch the parade. But it was raining, as it has been a lot of the time I’ve been here—unusually wet summer for Boone this year! We only caught the tail end of it. Afterward they took me to the Mast General Store to look around. It’s an old-timey place, with big barrels of candy to be purchased by the pound, and a whole variety of neat things upstairs. That evening we ate hotdogs—inside, because it was raining again—and played games with a couple of their friends. We could hear a few fireworks, but didn’t try to go see any because of the rain. July 5^th the SP cafeteria had a pig pickin’, which is evidently a thing in this neck of the woods. They literally had two pigs laid out which they had roasted, and people could just take off the meat they wanted.

There are 10 other interns here this summer, though they all got here at the beginning of June. My first day of work they invited me to join them for a birthday party for one of the gals, so I got to meet most of them that way. Almost all of us took a trip down to Charlotte on the 9^th to tour the Billy Graham Library and the headquarters of the Billy Graham Evangelical Association. Last night, we also all had dinner at the Chief Operating Officer’s house, which was fun. While my host family has been gone, one of the other intern gals has been kind enough to give me a ride to work and such. So it’s been a nice group.

My second week on the job included a better work level. In fact, it was pretty much perfect! I nearly always had things to do, but never felt overwhelmed. So that was nice. I did a whole variety of things….edited various ads, wrote a couple more articles for the web, wrote some donor or volunteer thank you letters, etc. I have five or six various people asking me to do things, so it’s been great. Also got settled into my own corner of a cube! My cube mate is the media relations lady for SP, and she’s been super nice and helpful to me too.

On Saturday (July 13), one of the SP employees invited the interns and several other SP folks over for a hike up one of the many mountains around here and a dinner of “Boston Butt” (think pulled pork). We also had a campfire and made s’mores, thankfully before yet another rainstorm chased us back inside to play a couple rounds of Catch Phrase. It was great to get to know some of the 500 local SP employees in a smaller-group setting!

This week is not a typical one for me. Today and tomorrow I’m going through SP’s orientation sessions with about 30 other new employees, most of whom will soon be moving to one of the organization’s international field offices to work. Then on Thursday I get to go on a work trip! The communications team decided to send me to Joplin as the SP writer reporting on the last home dedication from the rebuild program there after the tornado of May 2011. So I’m excited to go out and see firsthand the results of SP’s work. It will be a grand adventure, I’m sure…including driving for more than an hour by myself for the first time {yikes!}. I’m flying from Charlotte to Kansas City, but there’s driving on both ends of that flight. So prayers for safety appreciated!