August 21, 2023 weekly newsletter

I missed you all last week! Mike and I had a wonderful visit with our daughter Dani out in Portland Oregon. She's lived there for 12 years now, and it's been probably 5 years since we've been able to make the trip. While we were there, we celebrated our 39th anniversary. Came home jet-lagged and very happy.

I was especially happy to find that the crew had done a perfect job running everything while I was gone. Not surprised in the least, but really happy! I don't know what I'd do without all of you, and your support, but last week especially these friends who stepped up and kept everything going smoothly: Melanie, Sonja, Tina, Lindsey, Kyndra, Rich, Alison, Kathleen, Becky, Rick, Debbie, Donna, Cyndi, Pauline, and Nicole. Were there more? Of course, and my deepest apologies to anyone I left out. Can I still claim jet-lag?? :-)

Events that happened in the last two weeks: 

• Mich and Jacque came from National Grid to help us sort and pack. Jacque also brought us shelves that he didn't need and set them up for us. Thank you guys!

• Debbie E led the monthly Craft Gathering on Saturday, August 12. The next one will be September 9 if you want to put it on your calendar now! 

• The August Police food drive is in full swing, and we really appreciate the generosity of our communities. Special thanks to John M, and to Chief Brian G and Mark L.

The Board and I have been doing a lot of thinking recently about what goals we want to set for the next year. Our next semi-annual board meeting is in September, which is the end of our fiscal year as well. I've been musing a lot about all the intersections between food insecurity and other things such as homelessness, marginalization, lack of community connections, and inequities in our food systems. Stone Soup Kitchen is not a political organization, but we obviously can't help thinking about political and societal issues that impact on our beloved friends and guests. I've been thinking deeply about the issues surrounding why ultra-processed food is so cheap and so addictive, and why fresh, whole, REAL food is so so so expensive. I don't have an answer yet for what our response as an organization should be, but if you have suggestions, I am more than happy to hear them. Anyone who would like to enter into this conversation, please reach out...I want to hear from you. I put together a post of images on our relatively new website titled, “This is what we do while we're waiting for the world to change.”  You'll find lots of other blog posts there about the types of issues we've been wrestling with lately. Sometimes I share these on our facebook page, but often not.

If you can shop for us this week...or even if you can't...we need your relatively clean plastic and paper grocery bags! Especially the plastic ones. They're getting harder to come by, and we'd like to recycle as many as possible, and hopefully NEVER have to buy any! If you plan to shop for us, we could really use bottles of juice (apple juice in particular), cans of coffee, canned fruit, canned vegetables, boxed mac and cheese, and baked beans. For the month of August, you have the option of dropping it in the Police Station lobby as well as at Ayer Shop n' Save. We will also be at the pantry as usual on Wednesday from 10 to noon, Friday from 4 to 5:30, and Saturday from 9 to noon for drop-offs. If you use one of the other two locations, would you please leave us a note in your bag so that we can thank you?

Have a great and glorious week of mostly low humidity and reasonable temperatures. I love you all!