While I Was Out Part 14: The End; Legendary Day and The Last Week of Maple.

A little more that two months after it all actually happened I've come to the conclusion of my recap of my time as a member of Maple Unit class 16A of the North Central Region. One word to describe how the first Maple Unit went out; Legendary. Headed by the now equally legendary Mike Kamen, Legendary Day was a day about Class 16A forever leaving it's mark on not only the staff of North Central, but also the Braille school and the community of Vinton as a whole. The day started with a pot luck breakfast between all the teams. I made my Mom's Potato pancake recipe with the help of Blaze. All the teams were then given projects through out the community and the Braille school.
I was given the task of leading Maple 4 (plus Blaze and Autumn) in painting two murals for the School's future Recycling and Compost areas. (I was given the task because I had designed both Murals.) The day ended with another pot luck this time open to the community of Vinton hosted by us, and after dinner we all sang altered versions of Johnny Cash's "I've Been Everywhere"(We changed the locations of I've been everywhere to locations that our teams went to through out the ten months.) and the Beatles "Hey Jude" which we changed to "Hey Jody" and sang it to the lovely Jody Burns our Deputy Regional director of programing.
Later in the week was our awards banquette which I hosted. (And later turned into a nightmare for me.) To my surprise I a was given the award for the most outstanding personal growth in the entire corps which the night go a lot easier for me. And then came Feb. 4Th. A tearful morning filled with goodbyes and hugs and shuttles to the airport. My first flight was filled with fellow Maples as we were bound for Chicago looking to catch our connections home, and then flying to Cleveland it was just me again, alone. So now I'm home again, this time in Lakewood, I've got a job and now I know I get to do it all again come October, this time in California. Hopefully the next time around I can keep my postings of these events a little more current.