Weekend Happenings:  One big event was the annual Garden Tour sponsored by LACASA, featuring a Garden Party at the Bocks.  Fortunately, the evening was perfect, the food good, and the music delightful.

Another event was the Opera House's Red Wine and Brews party at the Opera House and flowing over to Walnut Street.  The band there had rave reviews, too.  And that party shared the same perfect weather.

The Court House Concert had a huge audience for a Jimmy Buffet band that featured songs made famous by Mr. Buffet.  There were several "groupies" who must follow this band around because they were swinging and swaying all night long.

Did anyone experience triskaidekaphobia last Friday?
Triskaidekaphobia \tris-ky-dek-uh-FOH-bee-uh\, noun:
A morbid fear of the number 13 or the date Friday the 13th.

Howell students volunteer thousands of hours to their communities through club

Without the nearly 50 students in the Howell High School Interact Club, thousands of hours of community service work in and around Howell would never get done.

At last count, 1,663 hours of volunteer work had been logged over one year by the students in grades 9 through 12. Each year, students spend between 1,200 and 2,000 hours of time doing projects in their communities.

They do it not as a requirement, but because they want to be involved, says current Interact President Candyce Hill, an outgoing junior who said she has been impressed with the willingness of students to help. "I'm just surprised at how many people want to help and how they rise to it,'' said Hill, who joined the club as a freshman. "I wanted to do community service, and this was really the gateway to do it.''

The six-year-old club does everything from tutoring elementary students and helping in classrooms to organizing an annual 5-K run that this year raised more than $2,100 for Special Olympics. In years past, the club has given money from their major fundraiser to LACASA, the Livingston County United Way, the Howell Skate Park and St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital.

Interact is Rotary International's service club for young people aged 14 to 18. In Howell, the Howell Rotary Club is the sponsor. Advisers are Howell High School counselor and teacher, Jennifer Starkey, and Howell Rotary Club adviser Peter Bowen of the investment firm Morgan Stanley.

Brighton High School also has an Interact Club sponsored by the Brighton Rotary. Bowen said the Livingston Sunrise Rotary Club has agreed to start a second Howell club.

Starkey said student hours vary. "They can spend anywhere from 2 to 70 to over 100 hours,'' she said. "Anything they do, we're grateful for. We just want to help in the community - that's our whole goal.''

Some of the regular projects worked on by students include book fairs, science fairs, carnivals and other events at Howell schools, peer tutoring at the Freshman Campus, Day of Caring for the Livingston County United Way, bell ringing for the Salvation Army, work for the American Red Cross, volunteering at the Howell Carnegie Library and helping with snow shoveling and yard work for local senior citizens.

"Over the years, we've been in every elementary school in the district,'' Hill said.

Jeanne Clum, a member of the Howell Rotary Club and development-marketing director for the Livingston County United Way, said a United Way-sponsored "Make a Difference Day'' was the student group's first exposure to community service. "They were so proud of what they'd done,'' she said. "To hear them share their stories was really powerful.''

Clum said each year since, the Howell Interact Club has remained involved in the agency's annual "Day of Caring,'' which grew from that first make-a-difference event.

Bowen said the Interact Club not only builds leadership but instills the Rotary ideal: Service above self. "Certainly it plants the seed'' for volunteering, he added. "It's nice to see them doing it from their hearts.''

Casey Hans can be reached at chans@livingstoncommunitynews .com or at 810-844-2005.