A WORD on Why I Hang Out With Kids A Lot.

Last month I celebrated an anniversary. September of 2004 marked five years since I've been volunteering with children, and when I realized this I knew it was time to reflect.

Growing up as an only children your two "mostly companions" are automatically Mom and Dad. Thus, as a child growing up in 1980s New York City, the most exposure I had to other children was limited to the occasional fleeting friend made after an hour spent in the sandbox at Washington Square Park. I was a five year old with an abnormally extensive vocabulary and an innate sense that all that was good and decent in the world began and ended with The New York Times.

So now you get it. Mary's need to work with children stems from a need to reclaim her childhood, which was completely devoid of people who were less than five feet tall.

Nope. Although that excuse would probably hold up in court. And I certainly want to try to have more than one child in my own fairy-dusted vision of the family I someday hope to create.

But before delving deeper, I'll bring this entry up to speed. In September of 1999, as a freshman at Fairfield U, I was attracted to Campus Ministry by a group called The Sunshine Kids. Sunshine Kids was (well, is) a play therapy group that meets in Bridgeport, CT every Thursday afternoon. The kids there all share two essential common bonds: They all live in Bridgeport, which is perhaps the most poverty-striken city in Connecticut. And they all have a parent or grandparent suffering from the HIV virus. The fact that their family members were sick was never the focus of the group, however. Due to confidentiality issues, we never even spoke about it with them. The purpose of the group was fellowship, and also to get the kids off the street between 3 and 6 at least one day a week (the most fatal hours for young children, I would later learn). Looking back on all those Thursday afternoons, I wouldn't trade a single one, but oh...that first year.

Kids are loud. Really really loud. And their hands are sticky. Also, they often do precisely what they are told not to do. As a nineteen year old college freshman who was fresh out of an all girls college prep highschool where you were fined for chewing gum, I was completely out of my element. I hadn't the foggiest notion of what to do with these children, and to be honest, they weren't entirely aware of what to do with me. There were little moments of triumph amidst all the chaos, though. I found I was really useful at the crafts table, and volunteered to try and coordinate some projects. Still, I didn't feel like I was making one bit of difference other than doling out scotch tape and tacky-glue.

I had already decided that I had given it a fair enough shot and wouldn't be returning for sophomore year when I was asked not only to return, but to take on a role as one of the leaders of the volunteers. Were they nuts?! I guess my usefulness at the crafts table had gotten me into this mess, and I didn't have the heart to tell them no. So suddenly not only was I a Sunshine Kids volunteer, I had an obligation and a contract.

I walked up to that door on the first day of volunteering sophomore year with a knot in my stomach. "What the hell was I doing back here?!" That's when I learned something I'd never known about children: they value consistency. The kids approached us, excited, but particularly excited to see some faces they recognized. I can still hear one of the girls exclaiming "Hey! You were here LAST year!!" as she threw herself into my arms. Here were older people who had gone away for a long summer with their experience and hadn't gotten distracted enough to forget about them. I ended up spending four years with these kids. During this time some of them grew into teenagers, some grew from babies into little people. Many crafts projects were done, basketballs dribbled, spills wiped, and piggyback rides given. They helped me let go of my 'bad' pride ("oh my lord, your hand is covered in frosting and you just gave me a high-five....") and replaced it with a deeper sense of dignity that comes from realizing that it hardly ever is all about me. Moreover I realized that the more time you invest on a person, the greater the rewards you reap. Four years. At the time that I left, I had been present in those childrens' lives for a staggering percentage of their total lives.

Leaving Connecticut and college life to return home to the City and to a job in an office didn't mean that working with children was something I had to leave behind me. I just started my second year as a Big Sister for Big Brothers Big Sisters today. My new Little is Ahlaysha. She is an only-child Virgo like me, and boy is she quiet, but getting her to open up is all the more rewarding. My reflections on BB/BS have yet to fully mature. But, as in my Sunshine days, I've learned that persistency is the key to making my experience worthwhile.

This finally gets me to my original point: What on earth has kept me doing this for so long? I guess the best way to put it is to say that I'm continuing a legacy. It is entirely fitting for me to have had my first day of Big Brothers Big Sisters today because it is also my Aunt Barbara's birthday. My aunt was a nun who spent her career in education as the principal of a series of inner city schools. She had a shot at positions in suburban schools plenty of times, but she always refused them because the inner city was where she wanted to be. Last Wednesday marked six years since she passed away at age 55 of cancer. What it comes down to is that she was taken much too early from us, and though it's been six years since I last had a conversation with her, I'm closer to her now because I do work that she loved and I understand why she loved it. So Aunt Barb, before my readers, this is my memorial to you. And I can't thank you enough for the motivation.