My Week in the Mountains

At Our Lady of the Mountains School (OLM) in Paintsville, Kentucky, every morning begins by gathering in the library, forming a circle, and praying for each student’s special intentions. With a hint of Southern drawl, each student recites their intentions for their favorite nuns and priests, for those with Ebola, for anyone who needed their prayers, and, last week,“for the Notre Dame students.”  My days at OLM ended with students chasing after our car as they rushed to wave to us as we left for the day. From the beginning to the end, the students of OLM embraced our very presence.

            My experience at OLM was part of the Center of Social Concerns Appalachia Service immersion program. Over 200 Notre Dame students took part in the seminar  a series of 6 classes leading up to a week of service in the Appalachia region of the United States. There were various sites to pick from, each tackling an issue of rural poverty. As I hope to someday be a teacher, I was naturally drawn to education. Luckily, I was accepted to the site at Our Lady of the Mountains.

I spent the weeks leading up to the trip filled with anticipation. I planned a play for the students to put on and I got to know the group of six girls who would travel there with me. But, the week before the trip was exhausting and emotionally depleting. I was beginning to regret my decision to go on the trip- surely a week of sleep and the comforts of home might be more of what I needed. Yet, I woke up bleary eyed at 6AM and made my way to the vans.

As our trip began, my hesitations disappeared. When we arrived we met Sister Lillian, the school’s principal, and Sister Nancy and Father Hopp who hosted us in a rectory in  a nearby church. We were joined on our first night in Paintsville by some older students from OLM as well as members of the community. As we played corn hole and ate pizza, we realized how everyone we met was so welcoming.

The welcome continued as we began volunteer work  at the school. I spent each morning working with the younger students on their songs for the play. We put on a production of Noah’s Ark complete with masks and songs. We joined the students for lunch each day, eating at their tables and joining them for recess. My afternoon was always spent with the older kids, helping them rehearse their lines for the play and then helping teach social studies. It was incredibly fulfilling to watch their faces light up as we worked in their classrooms and joined them for games in the school yard after class. We also spent time doing organizational work that the school day might be too busy for the staff to get around to, including organizing a closet and tidying a science lab.

After school, we joined Sister Lillian, Sister Nancy, Father Hopp, and members of the community for Mass. Then we joined different members of the community for dinner. We ate Chinese with the grandparents of two of the littlest and sweetest girls at OLM. We went to a world famous barbeque joint with parishioners and teachers. Four different families joined us for dinner at a Mexican restaurant. It was a great way to get to know their stories and tell them ours.

In the evenings, we often participated in different activities. One night we joined volunteers from the Christian Appalachia Project for a bonfire. We also visited the thrift store that Sister Nancy operated for the people of Paintsville. On our second to last night we went to the Highway Country Music Museum for a Bluegrass and Barn Dance night. We had planned to meet up with another Notre Dame group there, but we also realized that many of our new friends we met in Paintsville, were there too. That night in particular was a coming together of two worlds, two groups of friends- old and new.

Our last day ended with a performance of the play. Every student had a part and several parents came to watch. It went perfectly! We then surprised the kids with a rendition of “The Cup Song” in which we sang about how much we were going to miss their beautiful school. They responded by singing us a song, giving us notes, and other mementos to remember them by. It was a moment of pure happiness. The students seemed so grateful to us for our presence in their school and in return we were so grateful for all the joy they had brought us that week.

In all honesty, the trip felt less like a service trip, and more like something beyond that. It was a union of two communities. Every moment we were at Our Lady of the Mountains, we celebrated the existence of the students and they celebrated ours in return. They were serving us as much as we served them. Last Fall Break, after my trip to France, I wrote, “You trust anyway and you pray with all your heart. And you find that God has taken you exactly where you need to be.” That is how I feel once again about this Fall Break. Without a doubt, Our Lady of the Mountains School in Paintsville, Kentucky, was exactly where I was supposed to be.