ONE Colorado: Day 7 :'(

So this morning we needed to be at the office around nine am, which means that we didn't have time to stop for caffeinated beverages on the way. Such a poor decision on our part. Today was mostly filled with tying up some lose ends around the office, and cramming as much last minute information into our heads as we possibly could. Anna and I were able to work a bit with ONE Colorado's Deputy Director, Jess, and help her to better organize some storage around the office. Myranda and I made about two hundred more buttons, if anyone was wondering. Go team.

At noon we were all fading quickly from lack of coffee, and peaced out of ONE Colorado for lunch at our favorite townie hangout, Saint Mark's Coffeehouse. I DIEEEEEE. We returned an hour later feeling much more alert, and had the opportunity to interact a bit more with Daniel Ramos, the same ONE Colorado team member that gave the "how-to" presentation to the Denver Public School faculty members the night before. Daniel told us a lot about his background, and that he had graduated from a school in Colorado just the year before. It was interesting to hear from someone so involved with LGBT advocacy that was so close in age to our group. During our discussion, we covered some of the same topics that he had discussed in the previous meeting, and opened the conversation for us to ask questions. Currently, he is working on tallying which schools in every Colorado school district are currently up to date on their anti-harassment, anit-bullying, and anti-discrimination policies, and requesting that each district mail or e-mail the ONE Colorado office with the correct documents and information. The number of districts that are up to date on current policies is incredibly small, so Daniel asked that we call in to those districts that have not provided any information, and we were happy to help (even though we all have phone anxiety, sans Anna).

Post spending time with Daniel, we had a sort of "closing conversation" with Shannon. We did an exercise that we had done on our first day that she calls "Head, Heart, and Feet." Basically, everyone writes what they learned, what the felt, and what they can do with those things. We also added a "what was your least favorite part" category. Mine were something like this: I learned more this week than I can successfully verbalize. I learned about myself, I learned about my group members, and I learned how to better communicate my feelings on issues that I feel passionately about, particularly with the LGBT community. I felt ALL OF THE FEELINGS. Mostly, I felt inspired, and proud of all of the work happening around me. I feel hopeful. I "feet" part is tricky, but I think that what I can do on a day-to-day basis is use the knowledge that I have gained from this trip, to buil upon the things that I already had a pretty good grasp on. I can be more confident in standing up for things that I know are right, and feel like I have a stronger back bone to support my argument. I feel that I can better inform those around me, especially within my own personal life. My least favorite part of the volunteer work that we did with ONE Colorado was making the phone calls to help gather signatures for the petition supporting Civil Unions. I think that normally, I would have not put forth a full effort because of my own insecurities/phone awkwardness in that type of situation, but this week we all felt like we were able to play some type of roll in an important movement, and it was worth it to brave the phone traumas.

On our car ride home from our last day at ONE Colorado, our group discussed in length the ways that we could all become more involved with the LGBT community within the KU campus, and incorporate some of the things that we've learned this week. I think that all of us are walking away from this experience feeling enlightened and brave.

We dropped the last $50 of our rations on a fancy-pants dinner, and now I'm the only one awake and blogging because we are leaving the church at 5 am. CUTE. We're sad to leave but ready to be back in our own Lawrence beds. Bfflz. <3