Ryan's Journal

Two days in Cedar Rapids, Iowa to take part in Hands On Disaster Relief's post-river flood clean-up work. Most of this appears to involve gutting drywall, insulation, and other structures and elements where obscene amounts of black mold took root and grew for months.

I didn't know a thing about this world yesterday. Now, I do. The folks who put this all together have made an impressive space for useful manual labor and attracted a great group of people. I've met several wanderers and independent business owners, and, what else would you expect at a volunteering site, they all rush to lend a hand.

More on all that later. We're being given a place to sleep by a local church, Cedar Hill Community Church, with meals made for us by the amazing Pat and laundry service as needed. A huge thanks, it's great going out to work and having absolutely everything else taken care of.

There's more demolition work tomorrow, if my body isn't wracked by too much soreness.