humbled and grateful.

The combination of factors that led to entreAmigos being where it is today, is a bit unbelievable really.  Just a month ago we were closing the doors, with nowhere to go.

As much credit as I get for leading entreAmigos, the truth is that I’ve never been much of a leader. Things just came together, or they felt right, or they fell in our lap and we followed them and later looked back and said, hmmm, that was cool! I was actually at peace with the closing of entreAmigos, it isn’t that I wanted that to happen or thought it was best for the community or even for myself, but I also felt that things happen as they should, and maybe the closing of entreAmigos meant the opening of a different path.

When the 2:1 grant offering from the Three Swallows Foundation expired and I had nothing to show for it, I will admit that I felt like I had failed the community but I also knew that I had done everything I could to get the government to provide us  a space. I was spent physically and emotionally, it wasn’t meant to be and I had to accept that or I’d make myself crazy with guilt and grief.

One week later, the famous letter comes through that granted us rights to the Bodega and I contemplated it for a minute.  I could go back to the foundation and ask for an extension, then I would have to fundraise $76,000usd from the community (in the beginning of the economic slump) in order to have enough funds to actually do something with the building and then…  there was the huge responsibility of keeping it all going.  The letter came in and I didn’t say anything to anyone.

Am I up for this? Is this the right thing? Could we even do it or will I spend the next portion of my life fundraising rather than dedicated to the work that I love?  I made a deal with myself.  I decided that I really could and really wanted to dedicate at least 5 more years to this work but that I wasn’t willing to do it if it was only going to be a struggle.  I wasn’t going to take on the bodega and try to work out of a building that was in shambles, I needed support to make this happen and so I decided that I would put it out there.  I would ask people to support this project and see what happened.  If we didn’t raise the funds necessary to create a space that would allow entreAmigos to grow to the next level, then I would recognize that, not get caught up in the challenge and I (for my own personal sanity and health) would let go, recognize that now wasn’t the time, and move on with my life.

The rest is really just a fairy tale.  I sent an email requesting financial support for the project and set up a thermometer sign.  In 7 days we had raised around $50,000usd in cash and another $45,000 in in-kind donations.  Three Swallows not only extended the deadline but considered our in-kind donations as qualifying to consider the 2:1 requirements completed in full.  They approved the additional $36,000usd and all of the sudden we had a budget that would allow us to do what we needed to do.

I am not a particularly religious person but I do consider that my path with entreAmigos has been a path of faith.  I believe strongly that we are doing the right thing for this community, that our intentions are guided by love, respect and a shouldering of responsibility for the changes that our presence here brings.  I trust my instincts and my relationships and have been witness to a quality of human interaction that represents the very, very best of people. I carry a deep faith in the people of this community to do the best for eachother, and helping to make that happen is the path that I have chosen, or has been chosen for me, and I am humbled and grateful.

an intro. about this blog.

all through the history of entreamigos people have suggested that i keep a blog, or notes or something about the process.  i thought about doing it many times but never quite did.   and wow.  some crazy stuff has sure happened.

now. as we embark on the new phase and stage of entreamigos and with the construction and the bodega in front of us… it seems like it might be time to make time to keep a record of what is going on.

i’m not sure what or how this blog will be.  for now, i will write most of the entries and because i can’t write about entreamigos without it being part of a very personal process, this blog will likely have a very first person voice to it… at least for now.