After such an exciting day Friday it was hard to believe
that I still had a full day of things to do ahead of me. Saturday morning
marked my first weekly meeting with my accountability partner for Leader In Me training. We met at a local
breakfast spot, Johnny’s Bagels, and discussed habit 1: Be Proactive over
bagels and coffee. We talked about how we lived the habit over the past week
and planned on how we would use habit 2: Being With the End in Mind in the
upcoming week. Once we parted ways I had time to kill before I had to report
for my volunteer duty at the Hispanic Center, so I saw the sights on Main
Street and visited some of the adorable shops! After buying some Tchotchkes it
was time to head over to the Hispanic Center to help with their food bank.
When I got there people were already lining the street, set
up with their lawn chairs and umbrellas. The experience was more fun than I
ever thought it would be! Not only did I get to practice my Spanish (which I’m
currently learning for the first time), but I got to know some of the people in
the community. It was really great to be able to help people feed their
families, but the food bank is small and the rations are strict. However,
people were very understanding of our limits, and it wasn’t uncommon for people
to deny foods that they knew they wouldn’t eat so other people could have them.
As fulfilling as some of the experience was, it was also
heartbreaking. In order to qualify to use the food bank patrons have to bring
social security cards for every member of their family every time they come.
Unfortunately some people forgot some of the social security cards so for
example even though they had come before and had a documented family of 6, they
could only get the rations for a family of 3. I don’t know about you but I
don’t know where my social security card is, and I don’t know about the rest of
my family. For families living in poverty the paperwork and documentation
needed is endless. It is practically a full-time job to attain the assistance
you qualify for, on top of everything else going on in your life. We want
reform!
It was a very eventful and eye-opening weekend, but I was
happy to do absolutely nothing on Sunday and get ready for my first week out of
training!
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