Personal Narrative: Creating The Elderly Christmas Organization

Ever since I can remember, I have had the intense desire to help people. In high school, I joined Kiwanis Key Club and National Honors Society; both organizations allowed me to gain hours of volunteer experience helping families in need within my own community. Both organizations have annual events to benefit our community. At Christmas, Key Club adopts a few families and we buy clothing and toys for the kids. Our efforts to make the holidays a more enjoyable time for the families removed the parents’ burden of having to worry about being able to pay bills after getting presents for their children. Also, National Honors Society holds a blood drive every year in coalition with the American Red Cross. Last year our blood drive was in honor of a little girl in our community with leukemia.

In Youth Core we spend a lot of time cooking meals for those staying at the Ronald McDonald house, which is a place for families to stay who have children at Children’s Mercy Hospital under long term care. These families always walk in with their faces down and bags weighing heavily under their eyes and when they walk in and see that a large dinner is already being served, a smile can be seen stretching across their face. For them to be able to come back to the house and not having to worry about dinner during such a stressful time really helps them. After dinner they always come up and make sure to thanks us for what we've done. Through Youth Core I have also helped with the many city events such as Breakfast with Santa, the Daddy-Daughter Dance, The Princess Party, City Garage Sale, and a Fishing Derby. These events have led to me getting to know many community members and getting to know a lot of people around the city, as well as building connections and feeling like I truly am helping my community. I know these events have helped children enjoy their time as youth. My favorite experience was helping a little girl make a craft that said “baby girl’s first Christmas” due to her mom being pregnant, and once she went back to her mom, her mom looked at me with a genuine smile and said thank you. Seeing other people happy truly makes me happy, even if it’s just over the smallest things. I’m there to help those who are making memories and knowing this has made me a happier

It is curious that as children, humans have the ability to observe and remember details of specific situations and instances yet lack the ability to describe them. Truman Capote, as a grown man, took advantage of his vivid memories and composed the short work, "A Christmas Memory." The story begins in late November, a month symbolic of all the years gone by that Capote could remember beginning preparations for Christmas fruitcakes.

This past summer, I acquired an internship at Baldwin and Lyons, an insurance company in Indianapolis. Every Wednesday during my internship, a couple of employees and I would participate in a prodigious community service project, Meals on Wheels. Throughout the three months that I worked at Baldwin and Lyons, I got acquainted with some of the individuals whom we delivered to. These inspiring individuals were so grateful and appreciative that we took time out of our day to volunteer to do such a service. One elderly woman who we delivered to would sing to us as she came to the front door “good meals, good meals, good meals.” She is one woman that I will never forget. First going into this, I was elated knowing I was I getting out of the

As a student, I have demonstrated many works of service to my community and school. Service opportunities have shaped me into the person I am today and these projects have made me realize how fortunate I am for all that I have. While I've been doing these service projects through the years, it has been a pleasure seeing the joy on the faces of people that aren't as fortunate as I am. Service projects that I have completed include managing the fish booth at the St. Leo's Parish Festival, being an altar server at St. Leo's Parish, helping cook dinner for the Ridgway Fire Department during carnival day setup, participating in the St. Marys Light Up Night by dancing, and Christmas caroling to local residents. I also participated in a zombie/princess

From shoveling driveways or helping rake lawns for the senior citizens in my neighborhood I’m always there to lend a helping hand. However, some actions I take in my community are not done for other families but for my own. The responsibilities I have overtaken through the years in my household have definitely helped improve my maturity, and my character. I do these actions not to gain recognition, but instead to service my community and to aid those in need. Each day I aim to improve myself and to improve the community around me. Through doing that I exemplify these ideals, and will teach others of doing the same to keep our community

I’ve dedicated Tuesdays and Fridays to mentoring 9th-graders about making their high school experience easier. My brother’s compassion leads me to mentor another class of special needs students. My passion for giving back to the less fortunate has led me to be a spokeswoman for the "Promise of Gwinnett" campaign and to speak in front of the GA Board of Education about my experiences with education. I made connections and strengthened my relationships with the underappreciated cafeteria staff and custodians through the Chick-Fil-A Leader Academy (CLA) as we threw them a celebration for their service. Every day I’ve been selling candy for CLA to raise money for a scholarship for those in need of financial aid. But my biggest success that triumphs in my heart is my dedication to Holiday

Last May, I traveled with Alternative Breaks to New York for community service. During this service, I worked with Meals on Wheels who dedicate their time to provide food for the elderly of Manhattan. As I delivered the food to the seniors, I got a sense of fulfillment because I made them smile by providing them with food. Thus, I chose MDC’s Single Stop because I wanted to make a difference in my home campus by providing and assuring nourishment to those that do not have it just like I did in New York. As my first two years of college comes to an end, I wanted to leave a mark of my own here at home at Miami Dade College North Campus. During the month of September, I decided to partner up with a few of my peers to serve at MDC’s Single Stop.

I remember my company had various volunteering activities for employees to volunteer there assistance in areas such as, the Meals on Wheels program or, helping at the local children’s hospital. I decided to volunteer my time and assistance at the “Meals on Wheels” program. “Meals on Wheels Association of American’ mission is to support senior with

However, due to my experience volunteering at Forest View Center, my decision to work in occupational therapy has brought me even more joy. Throughout my life, I really enjoyed being around children and older adults. However, through my volunteer experience, I recognized that I would also have to assist those individuals who were middle aged. This seemed challenging, as I had not previously anticipated working with this age group. Nevertheless, I was able to relate to these people as well, allowing this instance to become a growing experience that I was pleasantly able to overcome. This made me certain that I could overcome any challenge in this field that I may be faced

I believe that one of the most precious things in our lives is our elders. It is sad to see that so many of them are neglected in a day to day bases. As I went through this course I learned so much not only about an issue with aging but also about the many services and organizations that help the elderly. Before this course I knew that there were service out there, but I honestly couldn’t tell you where or what they offered. One agency that I actually volunteered at for the day was the City meals on Wheels. City meals on Wheels is a program that provides meals for elderly whom are homebound in New York City. They provide meals for people in all five boroughs. City meals have been opened since 1981 and 57% of the elderly whom receive meals live alone. 40% of the meals delivered are for the elderly that very rarely or never leave their homes and 66% of their recipients are women.

Nothing feels better than giving back to a place that has given so much to people. A majority of the little things that we do day by day are taken for granted or they are just seen as nothing major. In reality there are so many things that are given to us and we do not always see the little things in life as anything of mass importance. For our kindness project we decided that it was time for us to give a little to ensure someone had a smile at the end of the day. We partnered up with the Rho Nu club here on campus and together we made tie blankets. These blankets that we made will be donated to the Sacred Heart hospital in Spokane later this month. We decided to do this project in the hopes of giving a little, but making it count for a lot more. We hoped that the children receiving these blankets always get a smile on their face or simply that they just find comfort in these blankets. In this project I was the leader of the group and I did most of the organization of

children, and cleaning up Cavalier Fields. Each event was meaningful and helped me become a

This particular service project reached home, which showed me the importance of involving myself in the event. I could be buying items for a father, mother, fiance, or

I think Christmas has always been one of my favorite holidays. Maybe because of the special atmosphere that you can feel everywhere, in shops, restaurants , pubs and even streets, where you can hear the magical carols, or maybe it's because of its religious background, but what I can tell you for sure is that I can't think of anything more exciting than the image of the entire family preparing the Christmas Tree or fixing the Christmas dishes.