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Community service day at work.
Oct. 9th, 2002 02:15 pmThis morning, I spent four hours sorting food at St. Mary's Food Bank with four other employees. It was an interesting experience for many reasons, and it felt good to do something useful, as opposed to what I do all day at work.
First of all, I spotted lots of inmates. There were some in bright orange putting food into boxes, and when I went to the bathroom I noticed that the women who helped me find it were all in striped uniforms.
Also, while I was impressed at the variety of food people chose to donate, the most common items were tomato sauce and canned tuna. They had one bin just for tuna, and we got easily as much tuna as canned soup by volume. I saw surprisingly little in the way of creamed corn and other canned food nobody eats. And though many people donated ramen, there wasn't enough for it to warrant its own box, much less a bin. There were many donations form the "tried it, didn't like it or chickened out" pile, as you can imagine. But some lucky family out there is getting some of that yellow saffron rice I used to really like, or one of the two chocolate oranges I sorted.
Of course, we had to check everything to make sure important labels were intact, especially the Nutritional Facts. And we had to throw away anything that was too damaged to give out, and we wiped everything with bleach because we had no idea where it's been. I had to scrub lots of dried apple concentrate off of those bottles of same which survived. We had to contend with broken glass, and at one point, at the very end of the morning, a maggot colony that seemed to be in, of all things, a case of damaged store-brand soda.
Unfortunately, there seemed to be too little food for us to sort for a full four hours. It's the slowest week St. Mary's has seen in at least two years. Fall slump plus huge recession without the September 11 boost, I suppose. It makes me wish I brought those canned peach halves that I knew I'd never get around to eating.
But I will say it was much more rewarding and meaningful than doing my real job. I wish I'd tried volunteering back when I was unemployed. Of course, this particular site is too far away for me to get there myself, but I'm sure I could find something closer should I find myself with the time to spare.
First of all, I spotted lots of inmates. There were some in bright orange putting food into boxes, and when I went to the bathroom I noticed that the women who helped me find it were all in striped uniforms.
Also, while I was impressed at the variety of food people chose to donate, the most common items were tomato sauce and canned tuna. They had one bin just for tuna, and we got easily as much tuna as canned soup by volume. I saw surprisingly little in the way of creamed corn and other canned food nobody eats. And though many people donated ramen, there wasn't enough for it to warrant its own box, much less a bin. There were many donations form the "tried it, didn't like it or chickened out" pile, as you can imagine. But some lucky family out there is getting some of that yellow saffron rice I used to really like, or one of the two chocolate oranges I sorted.
Of course, we had to check everything to make sure important labels were intact, especially the Nutritional Facts. And we had to throw away anything that was too damaged to give out, and we wiped everything with bleach because we had no idea where it's been. I had to scrub lots of dried apple concentrate off of those bottles of same which survived. We had to contend with broken glass, and at one point, at the very end of the morning, a maggot colony that seemed to be in, of all things, a case of damaged store-brand soda.
Unfortunately, there seemed to be too little food for us to sort for a full four hours. It's the slowest week St. Mary's has seen in at least two years. Fall slump plus huge recession without the September 11 boost, I suppose. It makes me wish I brought those canned peach halves that I knew I'd never get around to eating.
But I will say it was much more rewarding and meaningful than doing my real job. I wish I'd tried volunteering back when I was unemployed. Of course, this particular site is too far away for me to get there myself, but I'm sure I could find something closer should I find myself with the time to spare.
