Hot soup and sandwiches can teach powerful lesson

By Leigh Ann Maze

During the Thanksgiving holiday, Club Live leaders thought it would be nice to have students from Fisher Middle School volunteer at St. Luke's pantry at St. Luke's Episcopal Church. St. Luke's serves meals every Tuesday to homeless people and others in need.

Leaders Gigi La Bouff and Kathy Winkelman sent around a sign-up sheet, hoping to get a few students to volunteer each month. More than 50 signed up.

With such an overwhelming response, students from Fisher now volunteer at St. Luke's Pantry not once but twice every month, on the second and fourth Tuesdays. Even with the increased days there are still more students who want to volunteer than can fit into the tiny kitchen.

La Bouff has to turn volunteers away. "I hate saying no, but I just don't have more room," she says. La Bouff encourages those she can't take on to volunteer during the summer with friends or family members.

The students each bring some food on their assigned days, usually sandwich fixings. In addition to making sandwiches and cooking soup on the stove, they serve the food.

"The point is not to stay hovered in the kitchen, but to get out there and serve and mingle and see if they can learn something about each other's lives," says Jo Greiner, coordinator for St. Luke's Pantry. "The soup is just the intermediary, the vehicle."

The interaction at St. Luke's has obviously had an impact on the student servers.

"People think of the homeless as not really cool, but once you talk to them you find out new things. Most of them are really nice," said eighth-grader Chris Eichinger, Club Live co-president. Eichinger and three other Club Live members served the homeless shared a Thanksgiving meal with them at St. Luke's in November.

"And some of them are really funny," added eighth-grader and Club Live co-president Melissa Mullins. She points out that it's not just individuals, but families who come for a meal.

"Some of them have many different talents, and one thing goes wrong in their lives," said eighth-grader and Club Live co-president Chloe Wilder. Wilder said her grandmother often talks with the homeless around town, and she felt her experience at the soup kitchen gave her a chance to talk with them as well.

The student volunteers often write about their experiences at St. Luke's Pantry for the school newsletter Fisher Focus.

Sixth-grader Danielle Mardesich wrote that her mother had signed her up. "I was really freaked out about going. ... I felt a little scared about how they looked," she wrote. But by the end of her shift, her view had changed. "If the decision came up to sign up to help again, I wouldn't need my mom to sign me up. I would do it because I want to."

Greiner's goal of getting more young people involved is slowly being realized. She has seen not only the Club Live volunteers but high school football players and drama clubs help out in the kitchen and entertain the guests. "Some take to it better than others," Greiner said of the youth volunteers she supervises. "And some are just brilliant at it."

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