I volunteer a lot. I volunteer a lot because I care. I care because I have been there. On the street, homeless, in shelters and missions, eating at soup kitchens and parks and under overpasses, sleeping in those same parks and under those same overpasses, or in abandoned buildings, parking garages, under bridges next to rivers, in dark alleys behind dumpsters, or in hotels with seedy characters whose main concern was not, shall we just say solely confined to my general welfare.
Anything I can do for anyone to ease the pain and torment of such an existence I will do. I don’t want anyone to suffer one day more the agony and destitution of homelessness.
So, like I said, I volunteer a lot. Lacking any impressive letters after my name it’s about the only thing I can do. It’s very important to me, and I take it very seriously, just as I would any paying job.
My major volunteer gig is with a local free clinic for homeless people. I am the Vice Chair of their Consumer Advisory Board. This is our Mission Statement.
All of us on
this board are formerly homeless men and women. We have to answer to some pretty
important folks with an incredible vision for what they want this clinic to be.
Let me tell you, they have done an incredible job. We have added several
wellness, self-help, and mental health programs to give our clients a more
rounded style of care. We just remodeled, doubled in size and added a four-chair
dental clinic. We have a mobile outreach team that visit those sleeping rough at
their campsites.
There is also a
pharmacy in our facility to provide crucial medications on site for no cost.
More
importantly, we are tasked with providing accurate information to those homeless
people to whom we reach out concerning healthcare services at our clinic, and
must properly handle any concerns and complaints of those who have been served
by our clinic. This is rarely easy.
We set up
outreach tables at community events and in community buildings, such as
libraries. We hand out snacks and socks and hats and gloves and pamphlets and
smiles.
The most
important thing we do is listen. We listen to people’s stories. we listen to
their woes and complaints. We listen to their pain. we listen to them tell us
how we can better help them.We share our stories and woes and pain with them. We
pray this gives them hope and helps them realize that a lot of people want to
help them.
Our similar
shared experience gives us a unique channel through which to reach homeless
people.
We do this at
the request of, and with the blessings from, the medical professionals and
administrators and staff—many of whom are also volunteers—that have to try and
make a great number of sick folks feel better every day in a very frantic,
frequently frustrating, and occasionally even hostile, environment.
But rarely as
frantic, frustrating, or hostile as what our homeless friends deal with day in
and day out.
Widespread
rejection, harassment, and violence by the public, the police, and at the hands
of fellow homeless people, exposure to harsh elements, struggles with addiction
and severe mental illness, hunger, unemployment, and poverty are part of the
everyday struggles of homeless people.
Every
compassionate individual that makes up this Consumer Advisory Board on which I
have the privilege to serve have experienced, confronted, and overcome one or
more of these obstacles and survived to a better life.
We hope that
message reaches as many as we are able to share it with and that it gives them
enough hope to never surrender.
Hope is what
homeless people need more than almost anything else. We are proud to have the
opportunity to try to give it to them.
Stay safe; Stay
alive; Stay hopeful, my friends.
We survived and
so can you.
Let us know how
we can help you.
Your
editor
Links:
Shelter in Salt lake
City:
The Road Home Rescue Mission of Salt Lake City
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National Consumer Advisory Board
The Rio Grande Report ™ on Facebook ™
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