By Samuel Whitaker, City Year San Antonio 2011-2012 Alum

Let me introduce myself first. My name is Sam Whitaker and I come from Lebanon, New Hampshire. I’m 18 years old, gay and a high school graduate.

When I began the application process for City Year, I didn’t fully understand about the program what I was applying. Don’t get me wrong, I read everything on the site, and had even spoken to a representative at a gap year fair. I just didn’t get what it really means to be a young hero.

In fact, I was not certain I was even getting into the program. I had back-up plans in place, which were nowhere near as productive or fruitful as a year of service. Luckily though, I was admitted and looking back, I took my first step toward becoming an adult.

Maturity is something grown, not magically attained when you turn 18 or 21, or when you buy a house or get a car (+ insurance for you non-New Hampshire folk). I think maturity is like a wacky science project, where you cultivate some sort of spore-puffing fungi in your closet. You need to have the right components or the whole thing falls apart. For instance, you need responsibility. Not because you need to remember to take out the trash or feed the cats, but because a big part of maturity is being responsible for your own actions.

Owning up can be the most difficult thing to do. I will admit I’ve screwed up this year and before City Year, and I’d be a liar if I said I won’t in the future. However, along with learning about being responsible for my actions, I’ve also learned about the importance of honesty. I can’t say how many awkward situations or bitter feelings were avoided by simply being straightforward, admitting what I felt and mistakes made. I can’t blame others for what I did, but I can be honest and show that I am sincere when I say, “I messed up, and I want us to go forward without feeling burnt about this.”

Being honest and open helped me learn more about being on a team. While completing the program, it’s easy to feel surrounded by City Year, and whether that is good or bad isn’t the point. The point is, if you are surrounded by your team members, being honest with them will be so much healthier than hiding your feelings. This is not always easy. I’ve felt uncomfortable or “squishy”. But every single time, I felt more connected to my team and our cause after talking with them. It is the point of the team. City Year is a leadership development program, largely because of the team structure. Everyone is uplifted by their teammates. We all work together to achieve the same goal, which is assisting our students.

With honesty, responsibility, and teamwork, there is one final crucial factor to maturity: patience.

Patience has helped me more throughout life and City Year than anything else. Even when rowdy students, bad news from home, illness and so on, runs you ragged…maintain patience. It is the inner peace you can tap when everything seems to be happening too fast, like kids romping around as if at  Chuck E. Cheese’s rather than third period math, or when your pull-out group decides to run away down hallways, never asking for permission. Patience is also being able to take something, even the most difficult constructive criticism, and still standing tall. I am still mastering this, and I believe that patient people are ultimately  happier people.

I have grown a lot this year. Perhaps I’m a horrible judge of character, or grossly overestimate my actual self-worth, but I think I am nearing maturity. I’m not as mature as I would like to be, but I did move more than 2,000 miles from home to live with six unknown people, help children I’ve never met, and assist in large-scale service projects with which I never thought I’d be involved.

There was so much accomplished this year. I don’t want to gloat, but it’s a damn good thing and I’m proud of the work I’ve done. Even if I’m going to work on my future these next few years, I will still see City Year as a catalyst.

This program did so much for me, has taught me so much, and I’m happy that I took the chance.

By Mary Halbur, corps member serving at Somerset Junior High School

“Do you think we will find dinosaur bones?”

It is a garden, so…unlikely. But why not try?

“Maybe,” I reply. “Let us dig.”

He picks up a trowel and starts in. I am sitting in the sun, watching an overgrown patch of weeds be transformed into a beautiful space, and pulling roots out of the ground with my own trowel. He is an 8 year old boy, here with his sister to volunteer for the day in service to other children.

Together we dig for dinosaur bones, and then bugs, then for roots, and sometimes just for the fun of digging. He tells me about school and his mom and how he likes to learn. We talk about a movie plot, and whether I am really an alien from Jupiter (“Of course I am,” I insist, “so make sure you save those rocks for my lunch.”). We help with other gardening tasks for a little while. I notice he is getting restless and, since we have more than enough volunteers working hard, suggest we wander to the rest of the event and he quickly agrees.

We blast each other with water guns, feed the animals at the petting zoo, and I remind him to wait his turn to ride the pony. I push him on the swings and he chases me around the playground and we pretend there are sharks trying to eat us. We help when it is needed, and play when it is not.

At times another little boy joins us and the three of us run and chase and play and I tell everyone they are my adopted little brothers for the day. Lunch is a little late, so we hang out on the playground while we wait. The boys refuse to go eat unless I come, so I walk with them to get their pizza.

After a while, our friend has to go home with his mom. He is so sad he will not even smile at me, nor will he tell me goodbye. I hug him and tell him goodbye, and watch him walk away, staring at the ground, mad as only a 7 year old boy can be.

Sometimes throughout the day my “brother” and I get separated, as I get called off to do some work-related activity. Somehow, though, he always finds me after a while.

Towards the end of the day, I look up from helping drill a bulletin board and see him standing there. He tells me he “looked all ooooooover” for me, and I apologize for being so hard to find. I feel bad, as he has spent almost a half hour trying to find me. I quickly hug him and promise he can stay with me now. We find a safe place to store his belongings and he joins me as I work.

Being short, he can easily plug in the drill as I move from room to room, and he hands me the screws and makes sure my stool and level come with me to each room. I see him looking wistfully at the drill and ask if he would like to try. What 8 year old would refuse? He jumps up eagerly, eyes shining. I start the screw and then let him finish as I help him hold the drill. We quickly develop a pattern – he hands me supplies as I put in the top screws, and then he does the bottom ones with my help. While we wait for people to bring us more boards, I sit in a chair and he climbs up on my lap, munching on the cookies being passed around.

An eighth grade boy comes in and asks if he can try. I let him do the top, but continue to take the drill back for the bottom ones to help my young boy.

“Miss, I can help him with that, you know. I know what to do.”

“Well…”

I am nervous, not wanting anyone hurt. The internal battle, however, is short, and I soon relinquish the drill and step back to carefully watch. What I see in the next few minutes is so touching I almost cry.

The older boy beckons the younger one over and leans down, asking if he is ready. After receiving the affirmative, he sets the screw up, and I hear his instructions to take the drill and give it a try. Whether he knows it or not, his voice has changed from when he was talking to me and taken on the unmistakable quality of an older brother. Does he have younger siblings? I don’t know. But for this moment in time, he has a little brother, and he is teaching him how to put the screws in. The two work together, moving slowly through the task.

I turn to my fellow corps member to point out this endearing scene and she tells me this older boy was about to be kicked out of the school only a few months ago. I look at her in surprise…this boy?

The one so patiently helping a 2nd grader to learn a new skill? No way.

“I know,” she says, “My teammate has been working a lot with him. He’s changed so much.”

It is in that moment that I realize that what I am seeing is our hope for the future. If we can believe in these kids, they can do anything. They are, truly, our greatest resource, and there is nothing that should ever be considered “too much” anything for them…work, money, time. They are worth every bit and more.

My boy touched my life today. I will probably never see him again, but he had an impact on me that I hope to never forget. Spending time with him today reminded me why I love my job, why I love kids, why I am here, and why I still believe we can change the world. This one little boy brought back the love, joy, passion, idealism, and energy I have been slowly losing these last few months of ups and downs. I don’t know if I’ll still feel this way tomorrow, or next week, or next month. But, at least for today, I was able to remember why exactly life is so beautiful. This was, without a doubt, one of my favorite days in City Year, and will be one of my fondest memories of this year.