At the crack of dawn the heat and humidity tried to dissuade me from going to the build.  Not a chance.  There was about 60 helpers to begin with (many kids) along with the 5 home staff and 8 contract builders.  Supervisor Clarke was there and I had a brief moment to talk with her before I had to go back to sweating.  Mike Martinez stayed the whole day.  He made his speech, did the flag raising and handled the photo op.  What he mostly did was watch and talk with the participants.  I had a few occasions to have some lengthy chats (it was hot and humid and the order of the day was to pace yourself).  What a great guy.  He takes his disability in stride, usually pulling off his prosthetics and propping his legs up on the table.  He even gave consideration of going into the “misting” tent but thought better of it when considering short circuting his prosthetics .  He was really humbled and happy with the turn out and the “gift”.  He got it wrong.  He WAS the gift for us!

We got all interior and exterior walls up and wrapped in Tyvek.  Most of the trusses were up when I left at 5pm.  There were only 6 of us left by 2:30.  The home is going up fast and volunteers are still needed to spell the old geezers like me at times.  If you can find any time at all, show up and they will feed you, give you drink and put you to good use.  It was fun, I was honored to do it and would do it again.  Unfortunately, a death in the family had changed my plans so I was fortunate to give one days service.  I wanted to give more and I will do this again in the future.  My time well dedicated.