Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Cleaner chaos

Today I finished a big filing/organizing chore - getting all the docs I have filed in my Jubilee Women's Center file for the past six years in order so I could pass them on. Jubilee Women's Center, which has been offering housing and hope to homeless women for the past 25 years, is close to my heart. I was on staff there for four years in the late 1990s, and the women of Jubilee taught me most of what I know about leadership and presence to others. They were not all gentle teachers, but they were good! For the past six years, I've been on the Board, as the designated Sister of St. Joseph of Peace member (we were the founders of Jubilee and continue to be sponsors), but now Sister Margaret Parry has taken my place (she'll be great). I've delighted over those years in watching as Jubilee Exec. Director Susan Fox led the way in raising funds to rehabilitate Jubilee's old convent building (no longer recognizable as a convent!) and to purchase the beautiful old house next door. And today I've organized, pruned and passed on the files of the Board Development and Operations Committee, which feels glorious.

These were almost entirely electronic files that I was organizing and pruning, and they were no neater than any set of paper files I've ever kept. But at least the Jubilee files were all in the Jubilee folder on our system, and the pruning created only electronic trash. Still chaos, but it's cleaner chaos.

Twenty-five days to go!

1 comment:

  1. Birdbone and Mary Lou wish you well in your cleaning (frenzy?). When you're done you'll be so experienced you can come clean our closets, and the gardens, not to mention the filing cabinets, the picture files, the unwashed items and I'm sure we'll think of something else. Blessings, BB and MLC

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