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Coffee #38 and #39

9/29/2013

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Josh and Laura thought there house was under attack one day when they heard loud noises that sounded like gunshots. They panicked until they went upstairs and realized that the beer they were brewing had exploded because there was too much sugar in the mix.

We sat on an eclectic blue sofa and multi-colored arm chairs at Foam, located near Cherokee street in St. Louis, while Josh and Laura told me that they are originally from Nebraska. They moved to St. Louis in 2010 because Josh got a job as an environmental engineer working in air quality, something he had done an internship in during college and really enjoyed.

I asked, “So what does that entail? You just walk in and sniff the air?” Laura chimed in, “Pretty much! It’s crazy!” I wasn’t exactly correct. Josh works with large companies, household names that you would recognize, to help them get out of trouble with the EPA. Usually the company has already accrued a large fine and that’s when they contact him.

Josh and Laura met...you’ll never guess…at band camp! They both enjoy music, Laura played for a band in college and even auditioned for colleges to study piano performance, but she got burnt out on it. Instead, she studied social services.

Before moving here, Laura reached out to a new non-profit in the area called The Covering House. She volunteered for the first year and a half, until she was hired. Now she is developing their life skills program. The Covering House helps girls aged 12 to 18, who have had extensive sexual trauma, for example trafficking. The life skills program will help them learn how to cook, garden, take care of their physical fitness and more.

“We’ve had a lot of long distance in our relationship,” Laura said from the rocking chair where she sat. Josh and Laura have traveled pretty extensively throughout the U.S. but their favorite trips took them outside of the country and their comfort zones.

In 2008 Josh flew into an airport, took a 4 person airplane to a native village and then canoed up a river for 5 hours until he reached Angel Falls, where he spent the night in a hammock. He was in Venezuela for the summer doing research near the Colombian border and decided to take the trip to see the waterfalls. He also took a day trip to a lagoon where he jumped off a 20 foot waterfall into a freshwater pool. “There was no one there, it was amazing…”

The following year Laura went to Argentina. “I just goofed around, but it was one of the greatest experiences of my life.” She Googled a family who would let her come stay with them and it was kind of sketchy...but she didn’t tell her family that. They were social workers too, who were opening a home for mentally disabled kids and she contributed to their efforts. On the weekends she traveled and on one particular 24 hour road trip she went with a guy she had met. They drove to the Iguazu waterfalls, between Brazil and Argentina. When they arrived Laura started crying, no doubt because of the amazing view. Her friend, who didn’t speak much english, pulled out a joint, lit up and said, “This all I want...to see waterfall and smoke a weed.”

Josh and Laura are forcing their disparate groups of friends to get to know each other, through food! “There’s something special about eating together.” They regularly host food-centered events at their apartment where “we make them food and force them to talk to each other.” Sometimes they even manage to squeeze about 30 people into their 700 square foot apartment. That would force you to mingle! I warned them that they wouldn’t want me there and told them about the lavender cookies I baked that were NOT a hit.

Once again conversation turned to books and Laura surprised me by recommending one of my favorites, ‘Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain’. We enthused over Oliver Sacks’ writing style and how he “tricks” you into learning about the brain.

After a 2 hour conversation, we all hit the road. But it didn’t end there (it never does). Josh sent me an incredibly nice e-mail telling me how much they enjoyed our conversation. They also sent out an e-mail to many of their friends about their experience. It just keeps growing!

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Coffee #37

9/14/2013

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This blog is to tell the stories, good or bad, of St. Louisans as they are told to me. This is the story of Marshelle. A woman who almost "went postal" when she took on the United States Postal Service.

Marshelle worked two jobs for many years in order to support her 8 children, purchase her home and pay her bills. For 16 years she worked at the Postal Service and for the past 8 she has also worked as a cab driver. She had no complaints about either job until she tried to receive $8,000 in back pay that she believed she was owed.

One day, after she made a phone call regarding her back pay, a female co-worker became angry with her and tried to stick a pen in Marshelle’s eye. Marshelle says this was an attempt to get her to retaliate so she could be fired. Instead of retaliating, she went into the restroom and overdosed on pain pills. The person who found her made a statement supporting her case and stood by her throughout the entire 5 year ordeal (this witness, and Marshelle’s friend, was shot and killed in 2009).

Marshelle filed a workman’s comp claim for the incident. After returning to work, her desk was moved and she was forced to sit directly in front of the woman who had harassed her with the ink pen. This began a downward spiral for Marshelle. She began bringing a weapon to work, she filed 3 complaints, and she signed up for mediation but USPS didn’t respond.

It was then that Marshelle filed in federal court. She had to sell her home to pay for everything and she and her 8 kids moved into a motel. While living here she met another family in a similar situation. In an attempt to tell her story, Marshelle has enlisted the help of the mother of this family and has helped them in return by paying their rent. “People ask why I’m helping this other family...I understand. She’s depressed,” Marshelle said as she started to cry. As a matter of fact, she had asked this other woman to join us for coffee, but she refused because she thought she was too ugly. “This is what’s in my heart to do…”

During our chat, she briefly mentioned that the case had settled, but that’s as much as she disclosed.

Imagine if Marshelle’s drama were actually a comedy. I can’t quite picture it, myself. But Marshelle says that comedy has helped her get through her ordeal. She’s hoping to have her story turned into a movie with a message, but to make it a comedy.

To stay positive, she has begun organizing an annual comedy competition. A portion of the proceeds will be donated to organizations in St. Louis because, “there are a lot of organizations out there, doing a lot of wonderful things, that nobody knows about.”

Interpret Marshelle’s story however you will. It was pleasant to meet her and see her resilience and that’s what I took from our meeting.


Here is a brief video of Marshelle's story.
Here is audio of Marshelle's story.
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Coffee #35

9/13/2013

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You may have seen Danielle before. She’s the girl from an MTV commercial a few years ago. Feel free to say “Hi”, she’s used to the fame.

Danielle and I met at Crave, a coffeehouse that I learned about from Tyler (Coffee #23). Immediately we dove into one thing we knew we had in common, the St. Louis Social Media Club! Danielle is a board member and regularly appears on panels at their events. When we met, she was preparing to speak at one of the conferences I was planning on attending.

She says she got into social media marketing through “sort of a happy accident”. During her last year at Mizzou, Danielle had a conflict with the last course she needed for her business minor. Her advisor told her to change her minor to Marketing Communications and take this Social Media Marketing course, instead. This put her ahead of the curve, because she was one of the first several thousand users on Twitter. “When I first got started, the only people on Twitter were Comedians and VH1 reality stars.” Now here she is, a social media extraordinaire!

Our voices echoed off the vaulted ceilings of the church turned coffee shop, while we discussed her job at Atomic Dust where she handles the social media for their clients. She considered working at a gas station at Table Rock Lake after graduation, so she could just live at her parents house and work on her tan. But, she applied for an Administrative Assistant position and they hired her for Online Marketing. No way she could pass that up for a tan.

Inevitably we ended up talking about our yards, because I had to bring up my garden, it’s my pride and joy! Danielle said she and her boyfriend recently moved into an apartment in a really great community and their yard is like a “secret garden”. But, she’s clueless as to how to clean it up. One morning while they were having breakfast they saw a lot of people cleaning up their alley. Assuming it was the congregation of the church behind their house, they ate their breakfast and went on with their day. Later they found out it was the community clean-up day and they hadn’t attended. Danielle felt awful. “We’re the 20 somethings that move into the neighborhood and don’t help out!” But they love their community. My favorite story that she shared was when a neighbor came over with a plant in a solo cup and gave it to them to celebrate spring.

Moving into the professional advice arena, Danielle says that some people don’t see the connections if they’re moving into a new field. “You have to be able to draw parallels between your experience and the job you want.” While we were sharing, I told her that I had once sent a singing telegram as a thank you for an interview.

Jumping topics again, Danielle plays softball! But she says, “I’m not athletic, don’t let that fool you.” She and her boyfriend are playing with some friends on a team. Problem: Her team keeps adding really good players and she’s going to become the worst. She’s currently recruiting for moderate players, “If you’re bad at softball, come play with me!” Being the middle child is hard, but it’s even more difficult when you have two athletic siblings who have all kinds of trophies. So, Danielle’s proud moment was when she was able to call her dad and tell him she got on first base.

Is TV a hobby? It is for Danielle! For an online journalism class (journalism was her major), the teacher wanted them to start blogging. He told the class to choose a topic they’d never get sick of talking about. Danielle thought, “Well, I’d never get sick of talking about TV…” and years later her blog is still in existence. To stay on top of what’s happening, she reads TV guide from cover to cover, every week. Also, she lays the smack down on people who say they don’t have TV, because she has the FULL cable package with HBO, Showtime and Starz. “It’s not a lazy thing, I’m very passionate.” There aren’t many things that could take her away from St. Louis or Atomic Dust, but a job to write for TV Guide might do it.

Danielle says that her ability to talk about almost every TV show is a “weird icebreaker”. But speaking of weird, Danielle was chosen to be a part of a Twitter Jockey contest for MTV right after graduation! “It was the highlight of my life because I was in these commercials. This is real! This is my face!” She didn’t win the contest, which involved things like attempting to promote a band and get a celebrity to follow you via Twitter (she tried to get Mr. Belding to follow her, but he didn’t), but don’t feel too badly for her. She has stayed in touch with many of the 20 other contestants and they’ve formed some great friendships. When they told her she hadn’t won, her reaction was “Alright.” She was ready to be finished, because the contest was very stressful and took up a lot of her time. Plus, what do you do after you’ve been an MTV personality? “I wouldn’t learn business. I wouldn’t get the experience I need. It would’ve been fun, but I wasn’t disappointed.”

After the contest was finished, the contestants were flown to New York and she got to sit in the audience for the finale. Danielle brought her sister, who ended up sitting right next to Ashley Simpson and Pete Wentz. Afterwards her sister said it was the best day of her life. Danielle, in what seems to be her usual, slightly sarcastic (and pretty hilarious) sense of humor, replied, “Better than when you got married last year? Better than that?”

One more thing worth pointing out from our conversation, is that Danielle is an extreme lover of Road Rules. “If History Channel ever makes a documentary on it, I want to be the talking head, the ‘Real World Road Rules Challenge Expert’”. Maybe it will happen, Danielle. Maybe.

I would love to meet someone who has a crazy hobby. Do you paraglide? Mountain Bike? Collect coins? Sign-up here for a free coffee! I’d love to meet you!



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Photos used under Creative Commons from TeppoTK, Cristiano Betta, lilivanili, visualpanic, visualpanic, kevin dooley, Nomadic Lass, Myrone Delacruz, visualpanic, H4g2, Ambernectar 13, JeepersMedia