Imperial caterpillar
Friends! I did something semi-bold yesterday. I spent two and a half hours in the morning volunteering at The St. Louis Area Foodbank!
Why is this a big deal? Because, it involved going someplace I'd never been before, talking to strangers and being stuck with them for a few hours. The last time I did any volunteering was for the CineVegas film festival in 2006, and that was a mostly selfish endeavor. It was also easier since I'd been there the year before and knew a lot of the returning volunteers/staff, and, you know, it's Vegas. There's no shortage of stuff to talk about with strangers.
This was different, and I must say, I aced it! I worked my ass off packing and unpacking donations. I also spent my time working with a nice retiree named Fred from Memphis. We talked! I socialized with people I'd never seen before! I got out of the house for something other than errands! I helped people! Yay!
Our volunteer group actually finished early because we worked so efficiently. At the end of our shift the volunteer manager left hand outs that listed our stats. We processed 8,811 pounds of food which translates to 7,193 meals for the hungry. Isn't that cool? I'll definitely be back.
I signed up through VolunteerMatch on Monday for this gig and also contacted a couple of other places (a no-kill animal shelter and a not-for-profit news site) about volunteering for them, also. I like this. I get to help others and myself at the same time. If I weren't so chicken around strangers I would have done this much sooner!
What have you done lately that you loved enough to wish you'd done sooner?
5 comments:
How great of you to give your time to this. I am envious that you had the courage to just pick yourself up and get out and just "DO IT" You have now inspired me to think about doing something in my own community.
Thanks for that. :-), Susan Cooper
Hey, Good for you. Glad you will be volunteering again.
Rah, rah! That's great.
My son needs to do some "community" hours for his school (he's in a private high school that encourages community involvement and helping others as part of the curriculum), so we may together be volunteering for a food bank or soup kitchen soon.
Thanks for visiting everyone!
I can't tell you how rare it is for me to immediately get off my ass and do something. Since I am nothing if not a fear-based creature, there's usually a lot of planning, researching and pondering involved.
Luckily, I felt I needed to get something scheduled soon, and the foodbank only had that daytime shift open for this month. The universe forced me into it!
Good for you, City Girl! You're braver than you think you are. There are two things I've done this year. Both involve writing. I started writing children's book in January of this year, and I started a blog on 2/6 of this year. I was terrified to do either. I mean, what if I don't have the talent? I just dove in head first and I'm still afloat, Hey now! As mentioned earlier, we're braver than we think we are. http://mylmnopreadstokids.blgospot.com
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