I thought I had sent this Friday. In my excitement to enjoy some sunshine, this email never sent. I hope you had a weekend full of small yet happy moments. It is funny to look at what I wrote Friday and can now share that I did accomplish one thing that I wanted to- I raked the back yard. I now have about 3 green bins filled with yard waste. I am grateful to the nice people who still collect my garbage, recycling, and yard waste. I also enjoyed just taking a step away from work. I did not look at email at all this weekend and ignored my computer sitting in its spot on my dining room table.
For those of you getting ready for your religious Holy Days, I hope you felt a way to worship with your group of people either on Saturday or Sunday. It seems that in this time of crisis, we need our communities of faith, of civic groups, of friends, and family more than ever. With that being said, here are my Friday thoughts- a few days late:
I can only speak for myself and tell you that the sunshine was needed after a long rainy 4 days. My flower beds now need to be weeded and little projects are on my to do list- like rake the back yard, clean the back door of doggy nose prints, and clean the steps. I was sharing with someone earlier this week that on Monday, I walked to Walgreens and got caught in the rain without an umbrella. You think I would have learned my lesson on Tuesday when I walked to the Interfaith Caregivers office but no, left without an umbrella and again got rained on. The blessing in all of that was waking up yesterday to see the sun starting to rise.
My friend, Zoe, suggested that I keep a list of things I am grateful for everyday while we stay in place. There are so many. I am happy to hear from our volunteers and hear what you are up to during this strange time. So many of you are working hard to stay connected to clients, friends, and other community members. I learned to do a multi-person FaceTime and those who know me well, know I love my phone but not enough to learn new things. I am extremely grateful to Independent Spirits Distillery. They have converted their production to hand sanitizer and donated some to us for our shopping volunteers. I promised their owner Kerry, I would visit when we no longer must stay in place. It’s a cute little place in Woolwich Township. Despite all the grim news, there are still so many wonderful people doing wonderful things each day.
I also wanted to share some of what we hope to be working on in partnership with the Haddonfield Rotary Foundation and the Haddonfield Council of Churches which is a medical device lending program. It is based on a program run by the Medford Lions where they temporarily lend things like walkers or wheelchairs to community members. If you are cleaning out your house and think you might have something that fits the description, please set it aside and I can come pick it up.
I went through my friend Paul’s memes for the week and picked my favorite few. I hope they make you smile as we all grapple to learn new ways to communicate and appreciate the “old fashioned” ways like picking up the phone to talk.
Stay well and Happy Monday!