Anything from Ordinary

My time at The Hub has been anything from ordinary...my roommate burns hand towels with the oven, strange men climb over our patio wall in the middle of the night looking for a guy named "Richard", a guy hanging out on his bike behind the dumpster asking if I had crystal meth as I am getting in my car, which later that same car got towed by a fellow neighbor of mine, learning how to put boundaries with the neighborhood kids when they are needing help with homework at 11 'o clock at night, leaving love notes on my neighbor's cars when they parked on my spot instead of being upset that I had been paying for it...I could go on with stories of how extraordinary life is at the Courtyard Apartments. And man, what a blessing it has been! As challenging as it may be at times, it's been more wonderful than I could have ever imagined. Having to do life with a group of young adults who have an interest in discovering God's heart for the city and for their own community is a journey that will open up new understanding about yourself and God.

A treasure that The Hub has to offer is that you not only live in community with your fellows Hubmates, you also have your neighbors above you or below you, across the way, right  next door, and behind you with the connecting walls. Everyday has something new to offer, there might be frightening and wonderful moments all within a 24-hour period but it's wonderful when these moments are shared with fellow Hubmates. You can't get away from interacting with your neighbor and discovering they love to bake, knocking on someone's door to ask for help unloading your couch from the truck and discovering they recently had a miscarriage, helping a neighbor move into her house and inviting us to her new home for authentic Mexican food, and realizing that you do have neighbors that want to get out of the cycle of depending on government aid. They have dreams and hopes of pursuing  a higher education and achieving stability and provisions for their family, and the amazing part is that they ARE doing it! We have prejudices but you soon realize you're going to be smacked on the hand several times before you can even start to disengage from your habit of placing judgement before getting to truly know them. 

Vicencia Abundis graduated from Fresno Pacific University with a B.A. in Psychology in May 2010. She fell in love with God in junior high school, attends The Well Community Church, loves going on midnight hikes in Yosemite, enjoys water skiing and single skiing. Vicencia also volunteers at the Gloria Aldama Learning Center as a tutor to elementary students. Her future goals are to become a philanthropist, travel the world, go sky diving before she dies, go backpacking throughout Latin America and become a book editor.