Wrapless Gifts Keep on Giving
Posted on November 29, 2010 by bob in Features
By Henrietta Longstreet
Once you’ve finished wrapping the obligatory gifts on your Christmas list there’s another list you might enjoy. This one needs no colorful paper, no to-&-from cards or no fancy ribbons. It just needs you. Unwrapped. And you need it.
It is the many places and organizations which can use a pair of willing hands to make Christmas a little bit jollier for those in need. The city has a growing number of churches, agencies, outreaches, companies and groups most of which need volunteers to help fulfill their endless obligations.
You could choose from a variety of possibilities, some more exotic than others. For example, how about a Heifer, or a part of one? Heifer International is a non-profit which works worldwide to provide livestock, bees and instructions to poverty stricken communities to teach them sustainable farming. $500.00 will provide the whole animal to a family in the developing world, or $50.00 will join other contributions to cover the entire animal. Llamas in Peru or water buffalo in India will help change lives in villages throughout the world .
But if you want something more literary, you could be a Radio Reader for the blind. Every day on Alabama Public Radio volunteers read the newspaper for the sightless, and the station always needs someone to keep the pages turning. The editorial articles, the sports section and the front page are avidly followed by listeners who need a special receiver supplied free of charge by the station. During the holidays the need is even more urgent for some of the regular readers are traveling.
However, if you would rather get up close and personal, helping Hospice is a good way to go. The family caregivers of Alzheimer patients are enduring a form of slavery, and often have needs of their own. Most of all they want a little relief from the 24-hour demands from which there is no escape. They long to go and have their hair done, to stop by a friend’s for a cup of tea, to spend an uninterrupted half hour shopping, anything for a few brief shining moments of release which you, trained by Hospice, could supply just by being there.
How about your church, or some other in the neighborhood? Many of them serve Christmas dinner to those who have no other place to go, and usually the servers would enjoy an extra set of nimble fingers to fetch and carry. On a rotating basis thirteen churches in the city provide safe sleeping quarters for the homeless, and helpers are always needed. Almost every shelter/soup kitchen looks for someone to set out the bread or crackers, and to see that the salt and pepper shakers are full. Or if you like to drive, Meals on Wheels can often use a chauffeur to keep the older folks from worrying that the soup will be cold before it arrives.
On a more intimate basis, if there’s a mother with a new baby on your block, she would find an offer of help the best Christmas present in the world. She may see in her dreams someone like you willing to go pick up clothes from the cleaners or to the bank to cash a check or to drive the older kids to the baseball game or just to walk the dog. On the other hand, maybe the best gift she can think of is just someone who will hold the baby while she deals with a minor crisis of the plumbing system.
Or perhaps there’s a widow living alone down the street who needs the classic light bulb changed in all its many forms. And while you’re there, you could add a little Christmas cheer by admiring the photos, a mere 37 of them, of her grandchildren in their pink ballet tutus. Or – and this will put an extra jewel in your crown – a teenager who just longs for someone older and wiser to listen to him talk about himself (for 30 minutes? hours? weeks?) and make suggestions about his Christmas list.
One of the most successful international rescue packages is the micro-finance loan to a woman in a developing country. $50.00 will buy her a sewing machine to start a tiny business. In addition to her other duties she sells clothes to her neighbors, makes a small profit, pays back the loan, borrows a little more, and she’s on her way. That marginal profit helps in innumerable ways. She can buy her family better food or a mosquito net or pay for school in a town in Kenya.
One of our community’s greatest needs increases during the holiday season; the need for blood. Since the blood supply depends on contributions, the owners of that blood disappear during this time of the year. They’re too busy, they’re out of town, they‘re traveling to spend a few days with grandma, they’re skiing in the Rockies, they’re doing everything except providing “the gift of life” when it’s the most necessary. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas the need for blood is greater than at any time in the year because every hospital, clinic and Doc-in-a-Box needs blood to cope with year-end emergencies. You could help fill that void by contributing a pint. It will take less than an hour, and as the slogan of the blood collectors points out, the life you save may be your own.
It’s well known that the American population is growing older, a fact which brings a host of problems. To deal with those situations the Montgomery Area Council on Aging, MACOA, provides a large number of services which in turn requires a large number of volunteers. One goal of MACOA is to keep the elderly in their own home, a situation which is beneficial to society and infinitely cheaper for the community. But that demands delivery of food to homes, and transportation of the elderly to Senior Centers, doctors offices, church services and various other necessary trips.
Altogether more than 3,000 volunteers carry on the work of the organization, last year delivering nearly 87,000 meals to Seniors, with the demand steadily going up. And, to complete the circle, a large number of Seniors do an endless amount of volunteer work for the young and old citizens of the five county area which MACOA covers.
To help keep that circle intact they need you to provide unwrapped gifts of energy, time and money for your extended Christmas list.
Henrietta Longstreet is a longtime resident of Montgomery, and a founder of Montgomery Living magazine. This is her first article for Prime Montgomery.
FINAL NOTE
If you decide to use your purchasing power to give back this year, make sure your charity is keeping its word. Do some research on the charity in which you want to invest. Foundations like Charity Navigator (www.charitynavigator.org) and GuideStar (www.guidestar.org) help you see what the charity actually does, where it spends your money and how effective its programs are. The Better Business Bureau actually rates charities on 20 different standards. Use these sites to determine which charity meets your philanthropic needs.
Happy Charitable Holidays!
Heifer, International
http://www.heifer.org/
800-422-0474
Radio Reading Service
http://publicradio.troy.edu/
800-414-5756
Red Cross of Central Alabama
http://www.montgomeryarc.org/
334-260-3980
Montgomery Area Council on Aging
http://www.macoa.org/
334-263-0532
