I had a rather rare two afternoons off of work this week, and used my time to start getting our house in order for Pesach (did I mention my cleaning lady decided to go back to the Philippines? Baaaaad timing) and cook for chesed. As more (and more) men have been called back to reserve duty, there is a huge need to assist their families. Some of these men have been "in" for more than 400 days......
I reached out to the local contact person for HaOgen for Drafted Families and told her I could make two meals for families. They used to keep a spreadsheet that was accessible by volunteers; the last time I checked, there were 34 families. She told me that, in our city alone, there are now 270 families asking for help from the organization.
I was so happy to be able to help a woman with 7 year-old twins. She likes to eat healthy, and when I offered her some dinner choices she jumped at tofu with brown rice. She they got that, spring rolls and a fruit salad.
The other family has 9 (!!) kids and ate gluten-free. That was quite a challenge as I really have no idea of what are appropriate quantities for that number of people (and I also thought the mom was telling me that there were only three at home. Gd bless my lousy Hebrew.....She was saying that three people would NOT be home that night. Eek. Good thing I put in my "regular meal" plus a deli platter and baguettes, assuming that I was not understanding something)
And then the woman who organizes meals for families in my little neighborhood asked if I could cook for two families this week as well. While I'm not really friendly with either woman, these are (English-speaking) people who live right me. In for a penny, in for a pound, I decided. I bought a LOT of chopped meat, woke up early before work and rolled over 4 dozen meatballs and made oatmeal-chocolate chip bar cookies.
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everyone got meatballs, rice, fresh vegetables with hummus and cookies |
(Lucky for Shalom Shachne and me, we had lots of leftovers from Shabbos so, aside from making a soup and some salads, I didn't cook much for us!)
Then last night, Thursday, I did my usual baking for families with a medical crisis and then looked at the lists going around for what food was needed for soldiers. Having had a big food chesed week already, I did not sign up for anything until Thursday night, in case I was "done". Ended up making a vegan main (there are lots of vegan soldiers. Actually, just lots of vegans in general) of quinoa brown rice pilaf with chick peas. Then two trays of oatmeal chocolate chip bars (I think I've got the recipe memorized by now!)
Woke up this morning to do my Shabbos cooking and felt it was no problem to do a little more: one of the lists going around had only one blank on it: gluten-free cookies. As Henry V says, "Once more: into the breach!". Or, in this case, to the oatmeal-chocolate chip bars but this time with GF oats and GF flour. (PS: in this vein, the organization WheatFree Warriors could use a little financial help. 100% of donations goes to getting GF food soldiers and displaced families with celiac disease)
This post is not to get nice comments from people, it's to encourage ALL OF US to do more to help others and stretch ourselves to make the world a better place.
Shabbat Shalom. May it be peaceful.