Have you ever gone hungry? 🥪

No, this isn’t about the data surrounding food shortages or world hunger.

This is much more personal than that.

The reality is that without even knowing it, I’m sure you probably have people in your life who can answer “yes” to that question. It’s not something you typically want to advertise to others because of the feeling of shame that accompanies the admission.

It’s not something that I talk about, but thankfully, my answer is “no”. I can only say that because my mother took advantage of the local food pantry and accepted government distributed food when I was young.

My mother was a stay-at-home mom until my parents split up and she became a single mother of two. We lived with my grandmother while my mother went back to school to be able to get a job to support us.

Admittedly, as a teenager I was ashamed to admit that we got assistance. I always cringed when I was going to pay for my lunch, and it was like $0.25. I wondered what others thought about it.

Therefore, when our team sat down and were discussing what charities we would like to donate to or volunteer to, a food pantry was the first thing that came to my mind. Initially we talked about donating money to a specific charity or charities, but that conversation quickly turned into one about volunteering our time and not just throwing money at the problem.

We found that the @Connecticut Foodshare had a mobile food pantry located close to work that came every other week on Monday mornings. So, we signed up to volunteer.

Ever since then, we have had at least one person volunteer at the mobile foot pantry every other Monday for going on 2 years now.

I can’t speak for anyone else, but for me, there is no better way to begin your week than by spending an hour helping others. The people that we help are so grateful. Hearing them say thank you and seeing their smiles really warms my heart.

As cliché as it may sound, it is so true to say that I get more out of it than they do every time! I do it to help others, but I also do it to honor the memory of my mother who passed away in October 2023.

I am so grateful and blessed to work for a company that values our community, is dedicated to giving back to others, wants to make a difference in the world and realizes that the work will still be there “in an hour”.