The Music Connection

People make a living in all sorts of ways, and one of the problems with Sandy is that not only were homes damaged, but also businesses.

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We met John in his store “The Music Connection”, that supplies all sorts of things for school music programs, band instruments, guitars, drums, etc.  His home was damaged, but worse, he nearly lost his livelihood.  He has been trying to get his store back into ship-shape for almost a year.  The problem is time, energy, and working around mountains of music “stuff” that are piled everywhere in the center of the floors so that they can get at the walls to fix them.

EVERYTHING is a series of interconnected steps.  Can’t reconnect the gas until the hot water heater is installed.  Can’t install the hot water heater until the walls of the utility room are fixed (drywall, paint, etc.), can’t fix the utility room unless you can actually open the door to it!  We were able to get the room painted–walls and FLOOR–so that this week he can get the hot water heater and the utility sink installed.

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Same with the walls of the storage room and the floor below, so he can move the shelving from the middle of the room to the walls (where they used to be), so that he can empty the POD out back that he has to get returned by next week, so he doesn’t have to pay another months rent on it.  We got him fixed up so he could do that this week.

And same with the main store area.  Can’t put down carpet or move the displays back in place until the walls are primed and painted.  We got most of it primed and some of the final color in place.   (See the pretty blue at the bottom of the picture?)

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Hard work, but along the way, we got to know John.  He got us coffee and we had a really good day.  Another Sandy victim “unstuck”…

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Posted in New Jersey Mission Blog.