some pics, and a first day of work overview

This is one of my favorite pictures of the summer from the 4th of July...that was such an awesome weekend and I've been thinking of it so I wanted to post it. I miss the Cape and being in New England with everyone I care about!

This pic is during our trip to the mountains...Erin is one of my housemates and also from Massachusetts!

The wildflowers were sooo pretty...we couldn't pick them so I just took a picture.

This just shows the landscape...so very pretty. I am so lucky I got to go out there.

Anyway, today was my first day of work...It was a great day at work, and I think I am going to really like it. The Department of Human Services is absolutely crazy, but that was expected. The most challenging part of my day was sadly the transportation situation...I had to take the bus and it wasn't difficult or anything..I know my way around Denver easy enough to know where to go (sweet grid system). I just felt really out of place and people could tell...I got bombarded with questions and I became a little overwhelmed. It will just take some getting used to which is fine. Solidarity, babyyy.

Work will be really cool. I have a few cool jobs that I will overtake in maybe a week or two, and then at mid-year I will be a case manager. I think I will have a decent amount of responsibility which will be great and I really like the organization. I think I already posted this but in case I haven't, the website is workoptions.org.

Thanks for reading and I will talk to you guys soon.

Peace and Love,

Lianne

Orientation Week!

Hello,

I am writing after my first week here in Denver! I arrived last Saturday and jumped into my orientation. I moved into my house and we pretty much went full-time with different discussions and reflections, team-building activities, and a trip to Shrine Pass in the mountains. Our neighborhood is pretty interesting...it is pretty poor but there has been some recent gentrification in the area and it has now a variety of socioeconomic statuses. The house I am in used to be an office building for the archdiocese, so it is a really wierd building to live in. 10 of us are living in it, and we all have our own rooms, there's a good kitchen/dining area, a couple of living areas, a cool tv room, and some other stuff.

The mountains were absoultely beautiful...I will try to post pictures at some point this week. There were gorgeous wildflowers everywhere, and the scenery was really cool - there were mountains all around us and really cool red stone when we were driving in...the pictures will be better than me describing it. We also did a team challenge course with some high and low ropes courses. That was really fun and I felt really good after conquering my fear of heights!

Work starts Monday, but this past Friday I got to have a short orientation there. I didn't get to meet my supervisor, but I met my other co-workers, the executive director, a member of the development staff, a couple of the chefs, and one of the students. The tour of the building was helpful because I will be in the Denver Human Services Department - a huge building with a ton going on. I haven't got my exact job description yet, but I think I will have quite a bit of responsibility which I am really happy about.

Otherwise, I've just been hanging out...everyone is really nice in the program so they have been very fun and I am glad to have such cool people around me this year. I will write again maybe mid-week for a work update!

Peace,
Lianne