Uh Oh.

I saw something on Monday that made my heart sink.

A job. A job in Nashville. A job in Nashville at the one place I had secretly hoped would have a job for me. But it never seemed like it would happen. So I continued with my plan to go to New York and pursue display and design. Here I am. And that place has a job in Nashville!

Rocketown is a youth club. I've heard it best described as if the YMCA were starting up today, Rocketown would be the model. There's a few music venues, a coffeeshop and a skatepark. I volunteered in the Sixth Avenue Skatepark skateshop for about a year and a half, since the club opened in January of 2002. I'm a poser. I can't skate. But I admire the amazing kids who do it at Sixth Avenue.

To be honest, I got involved in Rocketown for two reasons. The first reason being that I'm not particularly interested in having kids of my own, but I like kids and think they need good adult guidance, sometimes from people other than their parents. The second reason being I was skeptical. I didn't think the youth club plan was going to fly. I thought it'd be the usual fare of Christians wanting to be relevant to modern day youth culture but going about it in all the wrong ways. I was shocked by my disbelief in the vision. I was ashamed at myself. And then I was drawn towards the opportunity because I knew I couldn't shoot it down as it failed unless I was the differing factor. I knew how I thought the thing should work, and I knew I couldn't place blame if I didn't get involved.

Things started off a bit rocky. And there was a changing of the guard, so to speak. It started getting better. The bands that played at Rcktwn got cooler. The volunteers and mentors were pretty cool. They were making a difference. It was confirmed when a post-high school age girl at work overheard me talking about the club. She said she knew somebody there and they'd really helped her younger sister out while she was pregnant. This was not the type of girl to suffer foolish Christians gladly. I realized the staff and volunteers and Rocketown were actually doing what they'd set out to do, guide youth. Not by preaching at them, not by requiring religious commitments of them, not by asking them to be who they are not. They were guiding youth by being there for them and influencing their lives by being the kinds of people those kids would want to grow up to be.

I've made some calls. A resume and letter are on all the right desks. Now it's time to wait.