Emma gets a PB too!

Not wanting to hog the limelight, I should also mention Emma got her own personal best of 1hour 47mins. Here is a picture of her at the end. It was our 11th wedding anniversary the day before so a weekend of celebrations all round and one where we were just as knackered at the end of it as we were 11 years ago!

Under 90 minutes

At last, after about 3 years of trying to beat 1 hour 30 for a half marathon I have done it. here is the photo of me crossing the finishing line of the Jedburgh Half marathon yesterday. It was a great race in perfect conditions and thanks to the advice of my coach Ian I managed to hold back some reserves for a big push in the last 3 miles. I came 77th and managed to beat a few local runners who have managed to beat me in my last few races. Official time was 1 28:57

One Year on in Dunbar continued

Back to the point...here is something of what has been achieved. The backdrop to all this is that a priority for me in the first year was to meet people..especially young people and get to know some of them so that I can work more effectively with them. it has been done without the luxury of co-workers, so I have been restricted but I still managed to meet a fair few. I hope people have or are now connecting me to the church as a result.

Dunbar Primary School have been dead kind and let me in to do RME classes, assemblies, a new SU Bible club, 2 P7 Camps, a P5 trip to York and various other bits and bobs. They also gave the project £900 and have been good fun to work with. For those who knew me in previous life in Manchester will be amused at the fact I am working with junior age kids. The Junior night at Bredbury was a living hell for me and was only made good if one of them fell over in a puddle or something. I didn't understand them so I was hostile to them. Having my own kids hasd made the difference and much of what I do is run past them before hand, before letting it loose on a class.

Dunbar Grammar School also gave me a warm welcome through the Enhanced Curriculum group, RME classes, assemblies and team meetings. The most unlikely thing I have eneded up doing is the Puppet Club! A great way to meet kids and make puppets. Before you ask, I am not a budding Jim Henson, but I can strike up a conversation with someone whilst sticking boggly eyes on a loo roll.

Dunbar Multiagency 'Youth Provision Group' has been the best way to meet all the others working with young people and trying to get some co-ordinated approaches to doing so. I have been involved in a load of different thigs as a result, like a survey of young people, trips out, a winter youth cafe, etc. It has also opened my eyes to local politics and the nonsense that goes on there. Having been on the payroll of a local authority I got first hand experience of how disappointing people in power are, and how inefficient local authorities are, which was good preparation for here. Things are looking up though so i won't grip too much.

SU Scotland have been a good back up for me and it's been good to get access to their training (very professional and relevant) and their support. I had not appreciated how useful it is to share an office with other people until I moved into my own, on my own. The informal levels of support...even from frosty admin workers are actually missed. The only sign of life in my office is the mildew growing on the walls where hot tea has been thrown. I share my office with the manager of Dunbar United.

So all in all a good year and I look forward to the next.

One Year on in Dunbar

It was the Dunbar Area Christian Youth Project's AGM on Monday and a time to reflect and chew over what has been achieved here in the last year since I started working for DACYP. Suprisingly there was a good turn out for the meeting and genuine support from people. How different to the annual meetings I went to in my last job working with a local authority where the main agenda for those kind of meetings was for local councillors to earn political brownie points for picking out the things you didn't do, rather than acknowledging what you did right. I did a little video of my work so far which went down well and put some faces to the reports I have been giving the management group all year. 'I didn't realise you did so much' said one.

People like the idea of youth work, but they rarely think through what it is. What people actually like is kids off the street, away from them, and doing something useful that won't make this generation of adults feel like failures in the way they have brought up its younger generations. They don't really think through how you get them off the street, what benefit it is to the 'young'ens' and what youth work might actually look like. In the church the adults often just want to tick a box that says 'we did our bit to stop the kids moral and spirtiual decline' by having a youth club or sunday school. Whether it functions well for the young people is normally only the concern of those at the delivery end. And here is where DACYP takes a new turn in its development.

The church...well people in it like the idea of young people somehow being able to be part of the church, worshipping there and keeping alive the faith. Good, and so do I, but as I think through what that means I realise that many in the church have not. The challenge to reach young people in this small town with the Christian faith is a tall order...to integrate them into the church even taller still. Young people are not a single unit and they all behave differently. 'Them lot on the high street' may well need to find faith, but be honest, can you see them in a church? Can you see them rolling out of bed early on sunday (if they go to Belhaven it's not too bad as it's an 11.30am start!) to join the fragranced elderly ladies and 30 somethings with kids families? Not really, and that's where the challenge lies...taking church to them in a way that is relevant and that also brings to life the Christian faith. Hopefully I will be able to report on it's progress here.

Uncle Frank

We did a flying visit to Manchester again the other day to celebrate my mum and dads 40th anniversary. 40 years is a long time and I’m sure I was not the only one there thinking about what we will be like after 40 years of marriage. What will have changed? 29 years to go until we find out. Who will have divorced, who will have survived, who will be still single. I might have snuffed by then!

The weekend involved eating lots of food and a few tipples for those who could be bothered. Friday night was an Indian take away, Saturday was pub lunch and huge buffet at night and Sunday was the grazing on a Chinese banquet where after a while it all becomes one homogenous mass of sodium mono glutamate that is squeezed into every available cavity in my girth! Actually the food was good and the fact the Chinese community were queuing to eat there was a good indicator that this restraunt was not going to try serving up crap.

Saturday night was the party. All my mum and dads old pals and some new ones turned out. The obligatory old photos were put up and a cheesy disco got the swing going. Most amusing was seeing my Uncle Frank again. He’s not really changed much and is completely bonkers. Quote of the evening when our Sarah told him her and Rob were getting married, was, ‘what both of you’. He blessed us all with his Wirral Honey (4 jars with a sell by date of 2012…just in time for the Olympics). Yes he is a bee keeper. He has always had a thing with dangerous creatures. Burnage used to have a house with a large Alsatian dog that jumped up on its gate whenever you passed. Uncle Frank tried to teach me how to silence it….’what you do is put your hand in its mouth and then open it up and it can’t do anything.’ So he then demonstrated his idea. Unfortunately the 3 seconds it takes to get your hand passed the dogs teeth was not quick enough, and the dog must have thought Christmas had come early with a big hand with sausage fingers being waved in front of him. My other memory of Uncle Franks dangerous antics is when he got me and Steve Pugmire to assist him felling trees in his garden. He survived the chainsaw and home made harness to get to the top of the tree, but the flash burns to his face from using several litres of old petrol to light the fire was almost a killer. The right of his face was a blistering red sore. There is an image of him driving home in the rain with his head sticking out of the window to cool off that will remain with me forever.

Back at the party we did a lot of catching up with people and noted the changes to people. My dad did a low key speech to avoid any embarrassment for my mum. However he soon undid any good he had done by dancing…well of a kind. It was more like rhythmic seizures….including falling down a rolling around on the floor. I could see the medics present looking for their diazepam peccaries until they realised my dad still thought he was 24 and trying to do the Hucklebuck!