Monday, August 13, 2007

Always have an answer to the question,

What would I do
if I lost my job tomorrow?


I've lost two jobs. Neither time did I know what I was going to do next.

Right now I do volunteer work at a soup kitchen for the hungry and homeless. We serve breakfast four days a week and lunch two days a week, totaling approximately 18,000 meals a year. Most of our guests are individuals that you'd consider "unemployable" due to issues with mental illness, physical disabilities or substance abuse. A good number are elderly. A few are families where the parents can't work because there's no one else to take care of the children.

For the most part, I'm always surprised how gracious and thankful our guests are. Plus there's a strange sense of contentment when you see one of the homeless on the street and you 1) know them personally and 2) know they've recently had something to eat.

One good thing for me, there's pretty good job security when you don't get paid in the first place.

Tant pis.

.

4 comments:

john said...

I would love to volunteer at places like that. Once I finish everything, I would love to volunteer at free clinics--I think giving back to the community is the best job you can have.

TWISI said...

I am working on putting in place what I want to do so I can quit. It would be great to factor in the volunteer hours as you have!

Gill said...

Good for you Paul. What a feeling it must be to help out those who need it. I despise that some people go hungry. Great work!
xo
Blue

Anonymous said...

It makes me sad that "the unemployable" have to be homeless, or that children would have to grow up homeless because their parents had to tend to them and couldn't work because of that. Our society does some mean things.