I try to imagine her expression as she presses black and red markers to the paper plate. Does a faint smile turn up the corners of her mouth as she writes thanks? Does a worry line run deep between her eyebrows?
Is her house filled by the roars of boys or hollers of girls? Does she parent alone or with another’s arm wrapped around her shoulders? Does she wipe counters and clean scattered crumbs like prayer?
The wall directly in front of the stainless steel table where we assemble emergency relief boxes is covered by thank-yous on paper plates. I want to press pause on the assembly line of mamas and girls to take these words in. I read a few aloud to J and her friends — words of real people with real bellies a little closer to filled.
I tell J, “We’ve had people give us food when we had none. Family and friends who brought grocery bags. Checks that showed up in our mailbox when Papa was unemployed, and Sici was a baby.”
“Really?” she asks.
As we continue working in the vast room at the Oregon Food Bank, girls lug boxes, scoop, load and weigh with smiles and purposeful strides. I feel the smallness of my task, inserting cooking instructions and twisting bags closed, find my eyes returning to the mama’s words on the wall: “This program is essential for my family’s survival. The last five months these food boxes have literally saved my family from going hungry. Thank You!!”
Near hers is the paper plate of a child, written in crayon: a sunshine, covered by rainbows and carrots and “Thank you for the FOOD!” Another with Chinese characters in black ink, another in Spanish. There are words from a former social worker, from a person struggling to pay medical bills, from a child who said he didn’t eat for days and wondered when the food would come.
After the room of volunteers tapes closed boxes containing 16,696 pounds of rice (representing more than 13,000 meals), J and I head to the grocery store for a late lunch. Our bellies are rumbling.
In the eating area, my girl and I sit side by side, sharing tomato bisque soup, a bagel and salad. As we walk back to the car, I tell her, “Remember that achy feeling when we got here, and we couldn’t wait to eat. What if that feeling just stayed? Imagine how grumpy you’d feel, how overwhelmed, how tired.”
Last night, I served piping hot pasta from a pot and sliced apples with a paring knife and noticed this everyday gift of hunger satisfied by nourishing food.
I remembered a mama somewhere in this state, opening a box again this month and giving thanks.
Perhaps this is where you find yourself today. I am praying for you. Perhaps you find yourself with something to share. Might you consider a financial gift or a gift of time to your local food bank? Volunteering tends to peak during the holidays, but food instability is a year round crisis.
Join me in lifting prayers for all those going without while we recognize the grace gift of all that’s ours.
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Linking with Heather at Just Write and Emily at Tuesdays Unwrapped.
Connecting through the power of stories written, spoken and lived
Thank you, Miss Ashley. You are always convict with encouragement.
Convict with encouragement — wow, thank you, dear Becky.
Ashley,
What a lovely reminder of our abundance, and our need.
What a special event to share with Miss J!
xoxo
Abundance and need both, right? All of us. Thank you, friend.
Oh, I love this and I love your story on the MOPS “fridge door”, too. Our kids still love to hear the story of when all they got for Christmas was a new sippy cup (because I’d lost the old one. the ONE we owned) and a goldfish that the neighbor lady had given me “for your little ones” :) Oh,how I want to be grateful for those small things we take for granted, whether I have much or little. Thanks for writing today, Ashley.
I thought of you this morning as I put away our one remaining sippy cup (we’ve gotten rid of so many over the years now that our youngest is 5). Friend, what precious memories you recount here. Amazing how much gratitude we can experience in those times of having little and in these days looking around and back over years. xoxo
A great reminder! Thank you!
Thank you for being here, Marcy.
Unfortunately, I have three bags of goodies for the food bank in my town riding around in my car…hope I can get it up there soon. We give much because we are loved much…
Amen, sister. And you are giving much. Much love to you.
I felt hunger just reading this. Words are powerful, and I love that you are using yours for such an important issue.
Beautiful but devastating.
Praying for all the little bellies going hungry tonight …
Thank you, dear Christie. Praying with you…for so many.
Powerful. Achingly so.
Deb Weaver
thewordweaver.com
So glad to see you here, Deb.
It’s so important to point out this truth – suffering is all around us and in us, not only across the oceans. Thank you for this, Ashley, and for teaching your daughters to see.
I know you’ve seen much suffering overseas, friend. Everywhere, indeed. It may look different, but yes…praying for myself and my girls to have eyes to see here, there, within us, around us. May we who know our beloved-ness be bringers of the love and comfort we ourselves have received. xoxo
I love this story Ashley. Hungry Americans is hard to put ones mind around. The fact that it has become a highly political issues at times adds to the hazy conception of just what should followers of Christ do when it comes to local families in need and joining up with secular organizations. Jen Hatmaker’s Interrupted memoir really started to change my heart and mind. I volunteered with our local food bank for the first time this Summer and God really used experience to enlarge my own heart for those in my community.
Thanks for the awesome post.
I know God will use that experience to put a permanent mark of compassion on your girls.
Cheers,
Leah
You’re so right when you say “hazy conception,” Leah. Even while writing, I was imagining the judgment that could be thrown at me around this approach of volunteerism. (It’s not everything — even much — but we must do something.) I haven’t read “Interrupted” yet. Been on my list forever, but I’m so glad to hear how it effected you and of the way your own heart has been enlarged for the local hungry. Thankful for you in this world.
Ashley, thank you for telling this story of hunger and need and of love reaching out. God bless your deep heart, the tender hearts of your girls, and God bless the each and every labor of your hands! such love.