Week Five: Scholarship Reference Letter for a Former Katimavik Volunteer.

10 o’clock at night. Wednesday the 30^th.

I get a Facebook message from an old Katimavik volunteer. She explains that she is in the process of applying for the Terry Fox Humanitarian Award Program Scholarship. “Awesome! Good for you,” I think. “The deadline is Friday,” she continues, “so I would need it to be sent Xpresspost by tomorrow morning…” It was evident to me that she was in full panic mode. She gives her most sincere apologies for springing this on me on the very last minute and offers to repay me for the cost of the shipping. “Why not?” I think, “Seems like she could really benefit from this scholarship.” So I put my personal work load aside and start writing away. Next thing I know, it was 1 o’clock in the morning and my eyes were getting a tad weary. I had to finish it that night since I had to go in work the next morning for 9am. “Good thing I work close to a Post Office,” I thought. So I continue writing and fine tuning and at 2am, I was done. I decide to email it to myself so I could review it one last time at work with a refreshed mind and pair of eyes before sending it off. 12:30pm the next day, the Xpresspost letter was in the mailbox. I receive a message on Friday saying that she had received it. The deed was done!    

Instagram: geneseguin. #k4kproject

This is the second endorsement that I gave out to my good ol’ former Katimavikers. I received a phone call about three weeks ago from an employer wanting to do a reference check for another one of my volunteers. Not too long after, I received a message from her saying that she got the job for which she had applied. Now here’s to hoping that everything will work out for this little bird too.

Glad to see that Competency 8 is being fulfilled! 

(Katimavik peeps will get this...)

Thoughts on the project so far

I've been feeling pretty good about where the project has been heading lately and the surprising amount of attention that it's been getting! 

• A francophone radio show, Vaguefm, from the Penetanguishene area has talked about it on air last Wednesday (which yes, has made my mom pretty proud); 
• The kind folks from Pay It Forward Saint John, who are the people that have inspired me to do this project in the first place, have been tweeting away about it and have distributed it by email in their large networks; 
• The traffic on the blog has been increasing exponentially, attracting people from the US, Germany, France, the UK, Argentina, Nigeria and Singapore; 
• Lastly, I’ve been getting some random amazing feedback from acquaintances and from people that I have never met before. 

All of this to me translates to potentially having had a small impact in some people’s lives and I’m hoping that it has encouraged them to do a couple of random acts of kindness themselves.   

G.

Week Four: Wool Socks for a Homeless Person.

As I was coming back from work the other day in -25^oC weather, I noticed a homeless and also sockless man walking in front of me. I felt so bad for him and his lack of socks - so much that I was contemplating of taking off my own feet warming gear and handing it to him. I didn't, however, it did spark an idea for my fourth week gesture. The next day, I decided to change my usual morning trek to work in order to pass in front of the Ottawa Mission. I brought along a pair of warm wool socks because I figured that someone might put them to good use, especially since we were expecting even colder weather later on in the week. I approached an older gentleman who seemed to be chilly in front of the Mission and I asked if he was interested in accepting this small gift. The man looked at me for a moment, with kindness in his eyes, and said "Oh yes please", followed by many thank yous. I asked how his day was going so far and he responded: “It just got that much better.” Seeing the gratitude that this man was expressing had made my day that much better in return.

*Side note - a local radio station from the County of Simcoe will be talking about my project on air at 6pm on Wednesday, January 30th! A friend from my hometown, who is now a radio host for the francophone station Vague FM 88.1, was following me on Twitter and noticed what I was up to. She sent me a message asking if she could talk about it on her show because she thought that it was such a neat concept and felt like sharing it. Listen to the coverage here: http://vaguefm.ca/lecteur/.  

This is truly amazing. I feel good about this thing. 

Instagram: geneseguin. #k4kproject

G.