Hänsel und Gretel

You know the story. From Wikipedia:

Hansel and Gretel are the children of a poor wood cutter. Fearing starvation, the wood cutter’s wife—the children’s step-mother—convinces him to lead the children into the forest and abandon them there. Hansel and Gretel hear her plan and gather white pebbles to leave themselves a trail home. After their return, their stepmother again convinces the wood cutter to abandon them; this time however, they can only leave a trail of breadcrumbs. Unfortunately, the various animals of the woods eat their trail of breadcrumbs causing Hansel and Gretel to become lost.

Lost in the forest, they find a house made of bread (later versions call it gingerbread), with sugar windows, which they begin to eat. The inhabitant of the house, who is an old woman, invites them in and prepares a feast for them. The woman, however, is a witch who has built the house to entice children to her, so that she may fatten and eat them. She cages Hansel, and makes Gretel her servant. While she prepares to cook Hansel, she tells Gretel to climb into an oven to be sure it is ready to bake; but Gretel guesses that the witch intends to bake her, and tricks the witch into climbing into the oven, closing it behind her.

Okay, so that’s not exactly how my meeting this morning went. But close. We got there, hoping just to get the records of a specific project from the past 10 years. (I must add that this is 100% volunteer. This is not a paying job.) I had asked for them several times and was finally told that I could have them. IF (and that’s a big IF) I would come have the chair of the project for those years talk me through the contents.

Now, I have some experience with these things. I know that people become attached to projects and the way “things have always been done.” I know that there are some in older generations who feel that the new guard will simply destroy all that has been done before. That we are incapable of running a project without knowing what color the underwear was of the staff person who was the contact in 1994.

Not to mention that the redundancy of previous years is intentional and should not be changed. And that we should be careful not to give any volunteers too much credit. And most of all (and I’m not kidding here), have a good attitude. Be nice to the people from the firm that are giving us this opportunity and don’t cause conflicts. Don’t let your volunteers talk to them. This is a must.

I’m serious.

Lucky she told us, since we were planning to stroll right in there and make some serious demands, yo. (Can you see my stance? The kids would laugh!)

Now please don’t misunderstand. I am grateful for all the work that was done in the past. Really she did so much. More than anyone could ever expect. But she wanted to turn it over this year. But she can’t. Or won’t. Not easily.

But back to the Hänsel und Gretel reference. Picture this. We got there. A half hour late, I admit. And I’m really never late. I just messed up. Not a good start. So we walk in with our Dunkin’ Donuts coffees in hand. And the table is set with pastries. A beautiful spread of sticky buns and muffins. And freshly (well, half hour old) coffee. She had the table set with the good china and real silver. It was lovely.

First thought? This is going to be easy. Get the info, ingest some calories, take the book and run. I was wrong in thinking this would be painful. Oh, so wrong.

But was I?

No sirree Bob. We went page by page. Phone number by phone number. Back story by back story. Until I started thinking that being put in the oven would be a blessing.

And as we left, she called out to me that we needed another meeting to go over what I need to say to the key volunteers. Because lord knows, I can’t figure out how to train someone to do a few simple tasks. With a good attitude.