Today I had an evening shift, Rec 3 (Reception 3 - there are 2 morning shifts and 2 evening shifts which differentiate when you take your breaks). So I woke up in time to go to breakfast (they finish serving at 9, but there is no guarantee that they'll still have bacon left, so its better to go earlier) and ate with a couple residents - Ilse (who is interning at the Shakespeare Globe Theater), Niki (who is studying "make-up"), and I honestly can't remember the third girl's name. I got the community members down in three days, but the residents are killing me - so many of them look similar to me, and I don't get to interact with them as much since they are gone most of the day at school.
After breakfast, I went up to my room and cleared out all the stuff my old roommate left, taking it down to the community room for any and all to stake claim (although not after taking a few cute pieces of clothing and a nice portmanteau for myself). Then I put all my laundry away, which was hanging on racks from washing yesterday. After my room was all cleaned, I grabbed a new book (finished Sherlock Holmes' "Study in Scarlet" yesterday, today began "The Song of Troy" by Colleen McCullough) and grabbed a cup of tea to sip out in the garden while reading. Tea and coffee are served twice a day, at 10:30 and 4:00. If you're lucky, there are sometimes "biscuits" (crisp cookies) at afternoon tea.
The garden is one of my favorite places right now, since during the day it is usually quiet and COOL. London weather is a little on the warm side, ranging from 70-80 degrees depending on whether the clouds are covering the sun at the moment, but there is a nice cool breeze. Lee Abbey, however, is a good 5-10 degrees warmer with no breeze unless you're in a room with a big open window. We have been eating almost all our meals out on picnic tables in the garden because the weather is so nice.
I pretty much lazed around, chatting now and then with community members, until lunch. Lunch is exclusively for community on the weekdays - board for residents includes only dinner and breakfast on weekdays. Three of the four teams (House, Kitchen, and Maintenance) can stop working for our hour lunch, but the Office team has to leave at least one person behind to cover the reception desk, so we take turns . The team has between 8-10 people on it, so you don't have to miss community lunch often.
Lunch is promptly at 1:00. We eat for half an hour, after which one of the Admin people -- David and Mary (Warden and his wife), Chris Barry (Head of Personnel), or Helen (Head of Accommodation Office where I work) -- give "notices" or announcements. They list off the people that are in charge of certain duties for the next day, including: leading morning prayers, leading music at prayers, DPR (duty person who is called in case of emergency), running coffee bar, House Team On-Call, and finally, night duty.
Side note - I had night duty two nights ago. Consists of carrying around a mobile phone and master key around with you from 10:30pm to 8:00am and handling any emergencies that come up, which tend to be people who have locked themselves out of there room. Sure enough, I had a lockout at 1:00am.
Back to lunch. After notices, lunch is pretty much over. Normally everyone would go back to work at 1:30 or 2:00 depending on their shift, but this week is "rest week," which means our morning prayers are at 2:00 instead of 7:30am, so we get "a bit of a lie-in."
"Prayers" are really just a short worship service. Community members (all of them - volunteers and administration) take it in turn to lead a service in which we usually sing a couple songs, read a bible passage, and hear a short homily on the passage, followed by intercessions. Sounds slightly daunting, but its very structured. They go through books exposition-style, so your passage is already chosen for you, and already in context. And Lee Abbey has both a thick song-book of almost all the worship songs you can think of (everything from old hymns to very contemporary choruses) as well as a compilation of liturgical services that have prayers and congregational reading. You have quite a bit of flexibility in how you put it all together. At the end, you pray for specific needs: one or two present community members, a past community member (from the last year), a specific population of the resident community (like 1st Floor residents or Language students), and finally, a prayer request from the large Lee Abbey Community. Prayers are in the little chapel (seats about 35) and attendance is mandatory for those who are working that day.
After prayers, I had a few minutes to change into my office uniform (I promise a picture of that will be forthcoming) and report to work. And evening shift is usually filled with residents coming through at meal time and stopping at the desk to check their mail, get meal passes, report maintenance problems, inform us the vending machine is out of Fanta, or check out table tennis bats. If we're lucky, we get one of our other reports or projects finished before we close 7 hours later (the morning shift tends to be quieter and so easier to complete office paperwork).
I'm picking up the office tasks very quickly, and I feel very confident dealing with residents. I my old Info Desk supervisor, Linda Yochum, much credit for this. Most of the skills I used for that job have transferred nicely to this one.
The absolute best part about working the reception desk is that you eventually get to meet ALL the residents. I see their name in print 10-12 times before they even show up as we book their stay in the computer, send them correspondence to iron out details, compile welcome packets with important information, create their files, collect their room deposits, make their meal cards, and collect their mail. Then they actually show up! It really helps me to remember their names if I've seen it a lot before I meet them.
I get an hour break for dinner, and then another 20 minute break at 9pm before finally closing the desk at 10:30. Then my evening depends on what I need to get done or who pursuades me to hang out with them - sometimes I watch movies with community members, sometimes call home, sometimes check my mail, and sometimes just collapse into bed. Tonight, I checked in with Rachel to see how her first marriage counseling class went (she has been here 11 months and is engaged to a past community member who is working an hour away from London), checked in on a member of the Office Team (Lizete) who has been sick, and then had to call night duty because I realized that I left my keys in the Reception Office :) I called my goombah back in the States, then decided to post this blog before my eyes crossed permanently and caused me to invert all the words.
So, there's a not-so-short, but hopefully vivid picture of a typical day at Lee Abbey. The morning shift days usually give me more time to mix with the residents, as I can go to the coffee bar and chat with people or go out on the town with the girls I've made friends with, but otherwise don't substantially change my day.
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