My Favorite Recipe

I imagine I know how some of you brand new Vistas are feeling, as I am still pretty new myself. Everyone here in the North Carolina office continues to be amazing, the glue that holds me together. I get what Mamie is saying about feeling incompetent. It's always been hard for me to ask questions. But it really will save you time if you just swallow your pride and ask for help.
In the last month or so I've gone from feeling overwhelmed, to struggling to figure out what to do next, to struggling to figure out how to get done all I have to do. Now that things are slowing down again, I'm working on getting back to my project. My work on the mobile tax lab project has held me up a bit, but I realize it's given me some important skills I will need to tackle my project.
With the tax van project, I have been booking hotels for the five drivers and helping ship them supplies. It seems simple enough, but my work relies heavily on input from other OE people and the drivers themselves. Since the project is so new, and the drivers get very little notice on where they will be setting up their sites (to help low-income people file their taxes online for free, in case you don't know) it's difficult to figure out where to place them. I also got a chance to help with marketing the project, talking to the drivers about their compensated volunteers (Community Fellows) and drafted a lot of the marketing tools, sign-in sheets, etc. that make the whole thing work (hopefully). This was difficult as I have never even filed my own taxes, let alone seen a site in action (mostly because this is the first year we've ever done this).
The most important thing I've learned is also my answer to Holly's request for a recipe posting.

I can't cook, but here is my recipe for dealing with grumpy people (including one's self) and stressful situations.

Ingredients:

Courage

Positive Attitude (imitation is good, but the real thing is better, just like Vanilla Extract)

Good Sense of Humor

Patience (make from scratch with a lot of deep breaths)

Time (you may not be able to find enough this, feel free to substitute apologies and a big smile)

Yoga (optional)

Directions: Sometimes people will come at you with a million things for you to do. Sometimes no one will give you anything to do (except maybe a vague idea of your project). Mix in courage and a positive attitude and ask for directions (as I had to do this week). Keep a healthy dose of patience handy (as I've had to do since the tax project started). Slowly fold in a good sense of humor and sprinkle with time. If things don't come together right away, you may need to "let stand" for awhile or repeat these steps as needed.

Good luck everyone. Sounds like we're all off to a great start. (Great: read rocky). Keep up the good work.

Michelle Brasseur