The cookies at Hope House today were provided by Rayna. She's been a client at Hope House for a year or so, and often enjoys coffee and cookies while she waits. So today she decided that she was going to bring the cookies. She brought gingersnaps. They were very good.
Rayna's gift of cookies highlights a larger trend at Hope House: many of our clients are also donors, sometimes our donors are also clients.
There are two red doors at Hope House. The front door, where the clients enter and the back door where volunteers and donations come in. Sometimes people get confused and bring donations through the front door and find themselves in the midst of a packed waiting room. Sometimes clients come through the back door and hesitantly ask, "Is this Hope House?" Sometimes the people coming through the back door to drop off donations are the same as those coming to the front door through shop for clothes. Hope House is not a one-way street.
Rayna brings cookies; a client named Mattie donated a telephone that she didn't need; Curtis brings boxes of Bibles; Tina comes to Hope House for children's books and brings them back after a month or so; Julissa donates all the clothes that her children grow out of. All of these people are Hope House clients, and all of them are Hope House donors.
Hope House recycles. We take in donations of clothing and housewares that would otherwise be thrown out or just take up space in the back of a closet. We turn these around, sort them, and put them out for clients. Instead of clients purchasing new clothes, they find often almost brand-new clothes at Hope House and save their budgets and the environment. It's called community.
No comments:
Post a Comment