Walk and Knock Turns 25

On the day I saw my breath, more than anything else, this internal wind was overwhelmed by the width and breadth of the kindness that surrounded me. Not just kindness, but selfless compassion. My second VISTA term has brought about a few worthy service sequels. However, none has compared to Clark County's Walk and Knock. It was the twenty-fifth anniversary and the need was, and is, far greater this year then ever before. To make this one truly spectacular, we started planning months in advance. As I had been of a particular help with recruiting youth and families last year, the planning committee asked me to participate in this way again. I attended meetings and also offered this event up to numerous high school and college volunteer fairs. The response was truly gratifying. Everyone seemed to see the urgent necessity for Walk and Knock 2009! All I could do now was hold my breath that the turn out would reflect the intent I had witnessed. December 5th, 2009. Has it left your mind yet? I doubt it. The cold slowly sunk into our skin as a few of us waited for a ride and wondered how long we were going to be outside. As it happens, last year I walked and knocked, picking up bags of food enough to fill two cars! I got a glimpse of the aftermath this year. We were taken directly to the boxing portion, where car after car dropped off literally loads of food and we stuffed the boxes full of both nutritional nourishment and macaroni and cheese! Not that I hold anything against this delicious dish! It is probably the most given item of food at Walk and Knock, from my experience . All the boxes were loaded onto a gigantic truck, the kind you see cars loaded in, to be transported to our very own, Clark County Food Bank! I observed teams of every age work as efficiently as I imagine they would in a factory. We had just the right amount of people and I breathed a very cold sigh of relief. Special shout out to the Hudson's Bay Key Club! What a tremendous job you all did! In fact, this is them in the photographs that accompany this story. Such a well run, committed and consequential cause lets me know that working together, we can make sure that our neighbors have what they need.