As I’ve mentioned before, I’m using this blog to help me to break out of my hermit-like existence that I’ve fallen into since returning to Minnesota in 2007. I also need to improve my general health by getting out of the house and do something besides go to the grocery store and the Post Office. So I was happy to find a new outside activity that would also incorporate my inner gadget geek.
My brother-in-law is a Vietnam veteran. He was a Marine who flew in helicopters. He came through the war reasonably unscathed, but he was injured in the early 1970’s while still in the service and stationed in the San Diego area and had to have a hip replacement (one of the first such surgeries performed in the US). So he’s been all too familiar with the VA hospital out by the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport and Fort Snelling. His most recent hospitalization there has also included several follow-up appointments. Earlier this year, one of his doctors suggested that he might enjoy working on a project for recording the experiences of veterans for The Library of Congress called The Veterans History Project. He then asked me if I would help him. I was excited about the idea and naturally created the Voices of Veterans website to serve as a focal point for the project.
The basic premise is to interview veterans with a video camera and then collect, edit, and submit them to the Veterans History Project. Since I’ve only played with digital video using my Canon still camera’s video feature, I knew there was a lot to learn about capturing and editing digital videos. I used to dabble in portrait and wedding photography, so I have some fundamental knowledge of lighting and composition. Still, video is much more complicated than still photography.
In August, we bought a new High Definition video camera and I’ve taken a handful of movies just to get familiar with the camera and transferring the videos to my computer. I took the camera with me on my recent trip to California, but I didn’t have a chance to use it as much as I’d hoped. When I got home from my trip, I giggled like a little girl when I hooked the camera up to my high definition television and watched my movies. To me, they looked gorgeous. To anyone else, they would have been a jumbled mess of meaningless clips. But I was seeing how sharp, clear, and colorful the images were. I had been worried that the movies would look rotten and we had wasted our money on the camera, so I was happy as a clam.
What I’m really looking forward to is doing the interviews – reaching out to veterans’ organizations to arrange things and then actually doing something that’s worthwhile and fun at the same time. I credit my dad for my newly-found desire to volunteer. He was often a volunteer for various community and veterans groups. When I was growing up, he helped our Boy Scout troop by going on camping trips and supervising meetings. After he retired, he was a volunteer at the Armed Forces Service Center (a.k.a. The Serviceman’s Center) at the Minneapolis airport for many years. The Center provides a quiet place for service personnel to rest, relax, and maybe get a bite to eat during stopovers. It’s a 24-hour service, which meant dad’s shift would often start during the wee hours. He was also a volunteer for Meals on Wheels, bringing a hot lunch to seniors and the disabled. I helped him do that a few times and it was very rewarding. And it took so little time each week that I have been embarrassed that I haven’t volunteered myself yet.
The upshot is that if you’re looking for a staycation that satisfies, volunteering is a great choice. There’s always a need for willing people to help and and endless variety of things that need to be done. It doesn’t have to be onerous or require a hefty commitment of your time. The Meals on Wheels gig took about an hour and a half every other Tuesday, for example. On the few occasions I helped out, for that 90 minutes I got an enormous amount of satisfaction. We were directly helping people who lived within a mile of our house. If you need a place to start, there’s a Volunteers Needed section on Craigslist that has lots of opportunities available every day.