The Second Day of Christmas

On the second Day of Christmas, my true love gave to me, the early shift at Rosies place and afternoon one at Hayley House. 

On the 26th, my fellow YAVs and I volunteered together at Rosie's Place, a drop in center for women in need.  Women who are hungry, women who are homeless, women who are cold, women who need help finding a job, any are welcome.  Please visit their website to learn more: http://www.rosiesplace.org/home.  They are doing so much to help women get back on their feet when any of life's curveballs sets them back from sucess.  And they do it all without any government funding.

We spent the morning in the food pantry.  Different from the Craigsville food pantry where I am used to volunteering, at Rosies the guests can come once a month for food, whenever they can make it.  There is one room where they can choose fresh produce, meat, and eggs, and another room for canned goods.  Volunteers walk each person through to explain how much they can take, and they fill up their own bags from what's on the shelf.  The women actually get to choose which can of beans they want or if they want a bag of spinach or a bag of carrots--much like they would in a grocery store. 

Maybe having it be more like a normal shopping experience can provide impowerment that they have control over their situation and not just be handed whatever someone you don't know donated. 

One woman said she doesn't always come in for food, only when she needs it, and the holidays made things pretty tight for her on food, so she came in because she needed it.

Beyond serving meals there is a room for women to just sit, if they need a safe place to go.  Through random lottery the beds upstairs are filled as a temporary homeless shelter, with a stay for up to three weeks.  Unlike temporary shelters, or rotating shelters like HARTS that I've helped with in Harrisonburg, VA, having a longer stay allows clients to get started thinking about jobs and other things beyond just one day.  I guess it would slow you down from daily life if you had to worry about where you would spend the cold New England nights.  They are not.  They are just as broken as we are.  We are just as broken and sinful as they are.

After this shift we walked downtown to the Hayley House cafe  to serve a meal to elders in the Boston area.  Many were homeless, some I'd seen at other food pantries and free meals.  Please watch this video.  http://www.haleyhouse.org/our_philosophy.  We prepared and served soups, salad, cornbread, and cookies to 26 men who didn't have anywhere to go for lunch on the day after Christmas.  The food was good quality and pretty healthy.  This organizaiton was started in the 1960s by Catholic workers and has come a long way since then.  They provide some housing, employment, and life skills to people down on their luck, or returning to society from prison.  They offer services, classes, food, shelter, and basic needs to anyone needing a hand to get through life just like Rosies but are serving men.

That second day of Christmas was a learning day to se how different non-profits are reaching out to those in need.  An educational change of pace from normal work. 

These are people, like you and me who have to eat. Both of these organizations and others whom I'll write about decided that these people just want to be treated like people. And they are treating them as such, not as untouchables. It is our human system, not something God made, something we broken people made for ourselves that say these people are less than we are.  And weather we see it our not, our soceity  needs a lot of work.  Homelessness, hunger, and poverty go way beyond bad luck and individual choices.  That is a topic for another day, but this day we did a small part to feed some people.  To feed God's sheep, and to be fed as God's sheep. 

We are all children of God, let's treat each other that way.