The Day of Remembrance

As I walked out of the old Nortel warehouse in Research Triangle Park this morning I felt something small in my sneaker that was annoying my foot. I shook my Mary Jane style clad foot around and the annoyance disappeared so I kept walking. It was a good quarter mile to my car in the sea of vehicles in the parking lot of the once vibrant, but not shuttered building.

The building had been opened for the Food Bank to use today for our largest volunteer operation ever, The Sort-A-Rama in remembrance of 9/11 and Hunger Action Month. Over a thousand people from such supportive companies as Food Lion, Cisco, Net App, Duke Energy, Blue Cross Blue Shield, Sun Trust, Wells Fargo, Wood Forest Bank, Extreme Networks and more came out early this morning to help bag 200,000 pounds of beans, rice and pasta into family friendly sized bags.

It was the third annual Sort-a-rama and definitely the biggest one yet. The Governor came to help welcome and thank the volunteers on this sad day. At 9:05 the crowd in their corporate volunteer t-shirts, and requisite sort-a-rama ball caps, in keeping with food handling safety guidelines bowed their heads for a moment of silence for our lost Americans on September 11, thirteen years ago. The 400,000 square foot room was so silent you could hear a mouse try and steal a grain of rice, if one had been there.

After the national anthem the troops were off to man the pallet sized boxes of rice and scoop out five cups per bag into smaller plastic bags and after tying them off depositing them into a different pallet sixed box. My job, as past chair of the Food Bank Board was to walk the aisles as groups of five or six volunteers each worked together. I tried not to interrupt the flow of work while I thanked each person for volunteering to spend their morning helping the Food Bank and thus the over 650,000 hungry neighbors we help.

I was overwhelmed with the responses, “Thanks for letting us do this,” “I am honored to help,” “I want to do more,” “Thanks for your service.”

The work these very bright people were doing in no way taxed their brains. Bending over a big crate and scooping up dried beans is not hard, nor is it really fun, but it is humbling. Taking care of those in need often means we need to stop and stoop over and take a moment. No one in that giant room of people was any more important than the other, or the people they ultimately were serving with the food they will be getting from this Sort-a-rama. It was just one neighbor helping another.

When I got to my car after my job was done I took off my shoe to figure out what was annoying my foot. I found a single grain of rice inside my shoe. I decided to leave it there to remind me all day of the hungry people who need help. On this solemn day in our country’s history I hope you had a chance to take a moment and think about what it means to you to be an American. If you are lucky enough to have a good meal on your table tonight give thanks. Not everyone is as lucky.