A New Family Visits the Good Neighbor Food Pantry in Woodstock for the First Time
“Is this your first visit? Welcome. We hope you’ll come every week. That’s how you get the best deals. Come on in. Go around the room in a clockwise direction. Start here with a bottle of water. Now, as you go around the room, can you use a box of cereal? How about a jar of peanut butter? We have some grape jelly today. Take a jar of mayonnaise, too.”
“No thanks. I have a jar of mayonnaise at home now. My kitchen is almost totally empty because my husband hasn’t worked in seven months. I’m completely out of food. But I do have a jar of mayonnaise.”
“Take it anyway. You never know when we’ll get more in. Back on this wall is our USDA section. You can take two cans of each type of vegetable or fruit for each person in your household. That means you can take two cans of vegetarian beans, refried beans, green beans, corn, peaches, and tomato sauce for each person. How many people are in your household?”
“There’s me, my husband and my two little girls. They’re in elementary school.”
“With four people, in your household, you can take eight cans of each of the USDA foods.”
I was always proud to have the USDA foods. When a person’s kitchen is totally empty, it’s a godsend to be able to take several cans of different items to put on the shelves. Our tax dollars are at work here.
“While you’re making your way around the room, take what you can of the fresh produce, breads and bakery items. We’ve got potatoes here and carrots, onions, peppers, spinach, salad mix. Take what you need from the 100-lb. bags of onions and carrots. Take what you can eat in three days.”
“Over here in this section, we have a shelf of canned miscellaneous items. You may take one item from this shelf. Underneath, we have #10 cans. Take one if you think you can use something that large. As you go along, be sure and take some mushrooms, tomatoes, celery, yams. Don’t forget the Progresso cooking sauce. Can you use a box of crackers? We’ve got some Triscuits today. How about bread? There’s a lot of Bread Alone bread today. Take what you need. Up on the top shelf we’ve got corn flakes.”
On and on this went as the people circled around the room.
Months later her story revealed itself. Her husband was badly injured in an accident and will probably never work again. They owned a piece of land which they sold for money to live on. One child has diabetes. Here was a woman struggling against many obstacles to raise her two daughters properly.
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
Waiting to get into the Pantry Room, the Shoppers at the Good Neighbor Food Pantry in Woodstock Stand in the Hallway for as Much as an Hour Sometimes
The hallway was about fifty feet long and eight feet wide. It was lighted with neon lights installed in the ceiling. About six feet in on the left wall, before the Meals on Wheels entrance, was the Items of Dignity closet. About halfway down the hallway on the left was the entrance to the Meals on Wheels kitchen.
To make sure the Meals on Wheels volunteers could get in and out of the building, the sign in table was on the right side of the hallway across from the Meals on Wheels entrance.
The shoppers stood in a single line behind the sign in table on the right side of the hallway. They weren’t allowed to touch the walls or sit on the floor. They just stood there, for as much as an hour sometimes, waiting for their turn to go into the small pantry room.
“I hope they have yogurt today. Bobby really likes to have a cup of yogurt when he comes home from school.”
“Those green beans we got last week were sooo delicious!”
“Does anybody know someone who can fix my car?”
“What’s wrong with it?”
At the end of the 50-foot hallway was the storeroom and the famous left turn. The hallway turned left here leading to the rest of the church. Forbidden territory. We weren’t allowed to go down the hall beyond that point. Unfortunately, that’s where the bathrooms were.
If someone needed to use the men’s room or women’s room, they walked to the end of the hallway, turned left into the forbidden territory, and then chose the appropriate room. After the person left the restroom, a volunteer went into the room and inspected it for cleanliness and to be sure the toilet paper wasn’t stolen.
“Next 2 please.”
“Tony, here’s some more cardboard for you.”
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
Food Pantry Blog – In the Pantry Room on Wednesday Afternoons
We want to prevent waste and build community. Why throw away perfectly good food? There are hungry people who could really use it right now.” – Nancy Hahn
Rich Allen walked to the door of the Woodstock Reformed Church. “Will the first five people in line please come in now?”
For me, this was always a sacramental moment.
I stood at the door to the pantry room. “Is anyone signed in?”
As soon as a person was signed in s/he was invited into the pantry. Shoppers continued to enter the pantry as soon as they were signed in until the room’s total was four shoppers. When this happened, the persons waited in the hallway until a person finished and left the pantry. Then the next person in line was called in. This pace continued nonstop until the pantry closed at 7:00. We kept the room at a maximum of four shoppers all afternoon because there was always a line.
People shopped for the two to three minutes it took to go around the room and then left. In that short time they chose from about thirty different kinds of canned goods and whatever fresh foods were available. We rarely ran out of the fresh foods because we brought as much back from Latham as we could carry.
With four shoppers and one to two volunteers in this small room, there was no room to turn around, back up, or retrace one’s steps. The produce boxes were piled high along the four walls in front of the shelves. They held the bounty from the drive to the Food Banks. The shoppers filed through the pantry very quickly. A slow shopper might even stop the line for a few moments. As the people edged around the room with not even an inch of free space, empty boxes were sailing out of the room to be caught by Tony Cannistra, Bob Otto, or Richard and Robert Allen.
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Thurman
Hungry People Waited Outside the Building in Rain, Snow, Freezing Cold, or Boiling Heat to Shop
Everyone waiting up by the church door would have established his/her place in line. And, most of the people who came down to the barn to get food stayed mindful of that place. Some people wouldn’t come down for fear of losing their place in line. That wasn’t a frivolous decision because the wait could sometimes be more than an hour with no chairs to sit on. Leaning on the wall was not permitted by the building committee. Sitting on the stairs wasn’t permitted either. People stood outside the building in rain, snow, freezing cold, boiling heat, etc., until called to come into the building to sign their names in the shopper ledger book. They entered the hallway in groups of five. Once they signed in, they stood in the hallway and waited their turn.
Most of the people waiting outside the building did make it down to the barn though.
There was one group of hearing impaired people, five in total.
There were two women who always carpooled. Together, dripping wet, they weighed about 110 pounds.
One young woman came over from Motel 19 on most weeks. She had two daughters in their early teens. She volunteered at a pantry in Kingston regularly and visited our pantry for the produce.
Two sisters came weekly. They were both married, had 9 children between them. They carpooled to save on gas. Husbands and pets came along for the ride.
An older couple came weekly. She was ill with congestive heart failure. He was large and walked with a cane. Often he came alone because she was in the hospital or at the doctor’s. They were in a situation where they had simply not made enough money in their lives to be able to live on social security.
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
The Refrigerator…and the Storeroom!
I went upstairs to Pastor Bode’s secretary. “We’re sooo happy to be able to store our food in the room at the end of the hall. I’m wondering one other thing, though. Do you think it would be okay to bring the refrigerator in as well. There are several electrical outlets. This would be great because then we could keep eggs in the storeroom.”
“Sure thing, Thurman, bring it in.” she said as she looked at me smiling.
I went downstairs and spoke with two of the volunteers from Hudson Correctional. “Can you guys go out to the barn and bring in the refrigerator? We need the one that is 100% refrigerator – no freezing unit – just the refrigerator.”
“Sure thing Thurman. We’ll be glad to do it.”
In less than 5 minutes, the unit given to us by Barry Motzkin was hauled into the building.
“Put it against this wall” I said, pointing to the one place in the room where the refrigerator would be the least obvious.
So, I got the room. I don’t think I ever got permission to use the room permanently. It was just a squatter’s rights thing. Once I got in there, they weren’t able to move me out.”
Same with the barn. The dirt floor (mud, when it rained) was permanently covered with broken down cardboard boxes. Everything was propped up on pallets. The big freezer was actually on two pallets which were stacked one on the other.
Was I wrong to have been so pushy?
Well, I don’t think so. I DID make one large mistake, though. I didn’t bring all the refrigerators into the storeroom. After all, Meals on Wheels down the hall had five appliances. There were enough outlets.
When Ed Jabbs and his committee members saw that room full of food and the refrigerator in there, hidden on a
back wall, filled with dozens and dozens of eggs, they were one unhappy bunch of hombres.
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Thurman Greco
There’s Always More…The Refrigerator, Cont’d
“Hunger is not an issue of charity. It’s an issue of justice.” – Jacques Diouf
The refrigerator in the barn worked fine. We brought eggs into the pantry, put them on the shelves and served the food to the shoppers.
Slowly, over the months, other refrigerators and freezers appeared. We finally ended up with four. They came from Barry Motzkin, Barry Greco, Rite Aid, and Ralph Goneau. They were filled to the max with food all the time…except right after a pantry day when they were totally empty.
More and more shoppers came to the pantry. The census kept rising and rising. FINALLY, we reached the point where we had outgrown the small storage closet in the hallway which served as our storeroom. We needed a real storeroom, couldn’t function anymore without one.
I went to Pastor Bode, “I need space Pastor Bode. If you can’t spare a room for the pantry, I’ll just have to ask the caravan guys to bring the next shipment to my home. That’s it. I have no choice. The food is coming in.”
Pastor Bode, God bless him, went to his Consistory, and the building committee. Many meetings followed and I finally got, somehow, permission, maybe, to use the room at the end of the hall for the storeroom. I got provisional permission for this room because a large monthly shipment was coming in. This was our biggest shipment yet: 3,000 pounds.
Everything coming into the pantry up to this point had totaled less than 2000 pounds per shipment.
The monthly shipment arrived and the men put the food in the room at the end of the hall.
While they were bringing the food into the storeroom, I looked around. There was no one else in the building. “The universe is on my side”, I thought.
This event will be concluded in tomorrow’s blog post.
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Thurman Greco
The Woodstock B&B on the Green to the Rescue!
Finally, I realized there might be hope at the end of the parking lot. There was a barn down there with a dirt floor, a long, unpainted rattlety trap building that nobody paid attention to. Several times I’d observed that this old, unnoticed structure was filled with treasures. The guys at the Woodstock B & B on the Green stored seasonal decorations they hauled out at appropriate times of the year to dress up their B & B: wreaths, lights, statues, furniture. Occasionally, I’d gotten a peek at what appeared to be antique furniture: chairs, tables, accent pieces. If I could get a corner of that place, I could put a refrigerator on a pallet and we could use it there. Dare I hope?
Dare I hope!
I didn’t know those two guys from Adam, as my grandmother used to say but there just weren’t any other options left. I’ll call them!
“Hello. This is Thurman Greco from the Good Neighbor Food Pantry. How are you and Larry doing today? I’m wondering if we can rent a little corner of your barn for a refrigerator. I’m desperate for a place to store eggs. I’ve asked everywhere and no one in this town has space to spare. You are my absolute last hope.”
“I’ll ask Larry and get back with you. But we can do this. And, there won’t be any charge.”
“Thanks. You guys are going to go to heaven for this.”
I might be able to pull this one off, I thought. When the inspectors come, I just won’t mention the barn. If they see the refrigerator out there sitting in the mud, it’s all over. They won’t have a choice…What the hell.
I took a real chance on this one. However, the inspectors all knew how the town was treating the pantry. The people in Latham were getting tired of the phone calls from the Woodstock pantry deniers. I just had to trust the Food Bank people to look the other way…and not ask about the eggs that I’m buying from the Food Bank.
It worked!
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In the next post, we get a storeroom for the refrigerator!
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
Food Pantry Blog: Guidelines for a Successful Pantry Visit
“But the most careful lives can be derailed – by cancer, a huge medical bill, a freak slap of weather, a massive failure of the potato crop. Virtue cannot prevent a “bad hand” from being dealt. And making the poor out to be lazy, or dependent, or stupid, does not make them less poor. It only makes the person saying such a thing feel superior.” – Timothy Egan
Try to arrive an hour or so before the pantry opens. This makes for a long wait but there’s a better selection right when the pantry opens. Also, while you’re waiting in line, you have an opportunity to make new friends and learn a few new survival skills if you’re new to the pantry experience.
Bring your own shopping bags. Some pantries don’t have enough of these necessary items.
Bring some ID. Some pantries require a lot: picture ID, proof of address, proof that other family members exist. This can be a bit of a challenge if you’re homeless. Two things you need to know: No one can ask to see your social security number. Some pantries require no identification.
Be prepared to wait in a line. Use this time to meet your line neighbors. They can be helpful if you’re trying to navigate your way through Department of Social Services, if you’re being foreclosed on, need your car repaired.
As you wait in line, try to learn how the pantry works from those around you in the line. You’ll want to know how long you’ll be in the shopping room, what foods are usually found on the shelves, what other pantries the people shop at, etc.
Don’t be afraid to let people know you’ve never been to a pantry before.
Once you find a pantry you can use, go every time you’re allowed. With luck, you’ll have a pantry in your area allowing weekly visits. Because pantry shopping takes so much time, shoppers sometimes just don’t go if they still have SNAP card money or if they have a few bucks remaining from a paycheck. Your best bet is to visit a pantry as often as you’re allowed. Most pantries have different food every week and you may miss out on some real savings by not shopping regularly.
Pantry shopping requires a totally new approach to cooking. So does cooking with only an electric skillet or microwave. Some pantries have periodic visits from nutritionists. Don’t be shy about asking him/her for any tips you might be able to use to help this adjustment easier for you. The nutritionist knows a lot about the food you are trying to cook with and s/he can answer any questions you have.
You may see fresh fruits and vegetables you don’t recognize. Be open to new taste experiences. Take the food home, find a cookbook at the library or go on the net and learn how to prepare the food. If you take one new food home each week, your kitchen skills will be vastly different in a year from what they are now.
Be open minded about this experience.
You’re going to be interacting with people you never thought in your wildest dreams that you would be around.
Know that most people in pantries, both volunteers and shoppers, are in a reconstructing and healing mode. We may not know it yet, but life is finally getting better for all of us.
Try to volunteer at your pantry. Volunteering at a pantry or soup kitchen offers you an opportunity to give of yourself. Giving away food and sharing smiles with those around you opens up opportunities you never thought possible. Your life is changing, healing. Give yourself the opportunity to go with this journey.
Sometimes people cry in the pantry. Well, it’s okay. Everyone cries at one time or another in the pantry, including me. This tells us all that the pantry is a safe place to be.
Peace and food for all.
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Thurman Greco
Leaving the Past Behind – Karen
Sometimes, leaving the past behind meant leaving the pantry. Karen was a regular volunteer in the pantry.
“Hi. Welcome to the pantry. How’re you doing today? Can you please sign your name here?”
She was always punctual, She was courteous, professional, friendly.
“The line is going fast this afternoon. Also, we’ve got a lot of green beans and organic spinach salad.”
She remembered peoples’ names. In short, Karen was pretty close to being a perfect volunteer. She was a strong supporter of the pantry.
Then, in the fall, I taught a series of Reiki therapy classes to the pantry volunteers. I tried to do this yearly because I felt the Reiki therapy helped the pantry, the volunteers, and me. Besides, I loved teaching Reiki therapy and I loved being with the volunteers as they learned it.
I knew 15 minutes after the Reiki 1 class started that things were going to be dramatically different for her forever.
Everyone who takes a Reiki therapy class experiences a life change. For most Reiki practitioners the change is slow, subtle, gentle. Some aren’t even aware of what’s happening. Karen took the Reiki 1 class. She took the Reiki 2 class. She took the Reiki 3 class. Several months went by and she took one of my advanced classes. Well, Karen could have taught that class hands down. Every subject that I brought up was one that she had experienced.
One afternoon Karen came to say good-bye to the pantry. Her life had been changed by both the pantry and the Reiki therapy. What more could we ask for?
We still occasionally see her. She drops by to volunteer in the pantry when she has a lull in her Reiki therapy sessions with clients.
Thank you Karen for all you give to those around you.
Peace and food for all.
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Thurman Greco
Leaving the Past Behind…so we can Heal
“Nothing goes away until it has taught us what we need to know.”
– Pema Chodon
All of us, whether we come to the pantry as shoppers or volunteers, or both, are asked by the pantry to leave our past behind. And, of course, that’s different for everyone. But, think about it, how can we move forward into our new lives if we never give anything up?
For some, giving up the past means letting go of the job that was lost, the home, maybe the family, self-esteem, the car, good health, money, insurance, etc.
As we release our past, our baggage weighs less and less. Our prejudices become fewer and fewer. Our fears are often diminished.
Then…we can heal.
Everyone coming to the pantry heals on some level. The community offered by the pantry gives support and approval to people as they climb back on the road to wellness and something offering normalcy.
In many instances, the shoppers become the volunteers or…the volunteers become the shoppers.
The shoppers come to get food and then find out they can volunteer. Volunteering changes them. As a person gives out food, the volunteer makes contact with another person, and is able to smile. The person is drawn out of his/her own problems. In offering a sense of community, the volunteer receives so much more.
Some of these things are very physical, some emotional, and some mental. But, whether the “giving up” experiences are physical, mental, emotional, one thing is certain. All of these experiences have a spiritual aspect.
One of my “giving up” experiences was also very public.
In tomorrow’s post, we’ll continue with the stories of volunteers illustrating the “leaving the past behind” concept.
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Peace and food for all.
Thurman Greco
