Deeds Not Words

Today was my first day volunteering at the food bank I support, Emmeline's Pantry - and I'm exhausted!

We spent a couple of hours discussing some pretty big admin projects that I'm going to take on but then two deliveries arrived.

The first came from Real Junk Food, an organisation that takes food destined for landfill and turns it into food for their restaurant which is offered on a pay-as-you-feel basis. They have recently become involved with a supermarket and take all the returned home deliveries. If someone orders food online, but they are not home to accept it, the food is returned to the store and sent for incineration because the supermarket can't resell it. I can understand that might be an issue with fresh meat, but tins of soup and bottles of bleach? There was hundreds of pounds of food and products in the van that are now going to help families that are struggling, food that was just going to be thrown in the bin because someone wasn't there to meet the delivery driver.

The second delivery was from a local high school and was a minibus full of food from their Harvest Festival - and when I say a minibus full of food, that's exactly what I mean. It's going to keep the shelves stacked for months.

The Pankhurst Centre, where the food bank is housed, has just had a new garden with some lovely benches. My blip is a picture of the back of the bench with Emmeline's Pankhurst's famous words. I love the leaves on the ground that are peeping through in the background.

Today I understood the true meaning of 'Deeds Not Words'.  Previously, at my two groups I have organised a monthly collection and just dropped it off at the door of the food bank. Today it was good to roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty.

Quote for today:
As you grow older, you will discover that you have two hands - one for helping yourself, the other for helping others.
- Audrey Hepburn