JCWP VOLUNTEERS:ALWAYS AND FOREVER HAMMERING
Eunita Shields has become well acquainted with the sounds of a Habitat construction site. Lately, the sounds follow her home even at the end of the day. "I go to--bed--hammering," she jokes.
Shields, a Houston resident, has worked many a long Saturday on Habitat build sites with Racheal Powell. "She's my cousin and my best friend," Shields explains--and the future owner of a house in the Sakowitz neighborhood being built as a part of the 1998 Jimmy Carter Work Project.
The new house will be quite an improvement over the apartment Powell once rented. "They had to put radios under the beds to keep the rats from jumping up onto them," says Shields, who encouraged her cousin to apply to Habitat.
This week, she's using her remaining vacation time to build alongside Powell as the house is constructed. The experience of many Saturdays shows on Shields' hands, which are taped up over the spots where she most frequently gets blisters. She has only one request of her cousin in return--a meal in her new kitchen.