Flagstaff: Clean Community Prosperity Grant 2020

This 2020 year Medrar Inc did not have resources to print company shirts; however, Medrar still was able to complete part of the grant process with the help of Jonathan, Mat, and Pedro!

Johnathan earned the grant opportunity this 2020 year as a young man on the street with signs saying he needs work because the fires in California smoked him out.

Jonathan wrote his poem about meaningful encounters before we started anything in the morning circa 9:30 AM. And with his acrostic poem portion of the grant completed, trash bags purchased, gloves available as needed, Medrar Inc and Jonathan began to clean. It was incredibly hot, and the founder of Medrar started to get dizzy. So, he and Jonathan returned to the vans to get some water. Help was actually really needed to get the roadside clean with so much trash, as you can see from the pictures, and like some good luck combined with blessings, two more volunteers appeared. A meaningful encounter with Mat and his friend Pedro LITERALLY occurred as the poem had described! Both Mat and Pedro joined in on the Clean Community Prosperity trash pick-up!

This was no ordinary clean up day to be honest, and that’s how all of us felt. The four of us found all sorts of surprises next to the road (Spanish translation included): signs (avisos), snake (serpiente), cash (efectivo), bottled water (agua embotellada), a full bottle of liquor, brand new energy drink … I mean even horse poop … next to the 89 highway. There was plenty of language learning opportunity during this pick up: Spanish, Navajo, and English. For example, one of the words the founder of Medrar Inc had wanted to learn in Navajo was black. The color ‘black’ in Navajo is ‘łizhin.’ And at the bottom of this page, you will read how to say the word for water in Navajo.

Us four strangers (now meaningfully united in a goal to fill at least 5 bags of trash from the ground), well we all had a great time! After the trash pick-up Medrar Inc purchased a hat, a couple of shirts, and also some used pants for the participants. Everyone got all cleaned up themselves, including the founder of Medrar Inc, who needed a shower.

Check out some of the pictures we snapped:

There are more than two lessons to be learned from this experience:

1) Everyday encounters drive so much of our world, and we should use these encounters to pursue a meaningful experience.
2) If you go out needing money, help, inspiration, liquor, water, friends, work, something good, or something bad — well you just might find it!

Please enjoy the FULL INTERVIEWS with Medrar Inc found, Jonathan, as well as, Mat and Pedro. Just click the linked audio recordings, downloadable immediately below. Lots of positive vibes and reminders this 2020 year. Please share this story to spread the good work of these three active community members, literally helping us all keep our home CLEANER.