Michael: Volunteering

Poinsettia leaves
Dangle rain drops by their feet
Preventing there fall.

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Today we are volunteering. Last week I was consuming. I wish I could say there’s been a healthy balance between the two in my life, but I have done considerably more taking than giving.

I was an elementary school teacher for 25 years; a job that definitely involved a lot of give and take that went well beyond the bounds of the formal requirements in my job description. So during those years I didn’t feel much of a pull to use what time and energy I had after work to do any volunteer work.

Now, when I have the time, I still feel there are worthy goals that I should pursue that require a great deal of focus. But I do hope that I’ll spend a little less time gazing at the net and a little more time helping to clean up this country’s beautiful trails.

Today we‘re helping a group from Panama City. With that city being at least 500 miles away I doubt we’ll get the opportunity to help that group out often. But we have pledged to ourselves to go out there on a regular basis and help clean up the trails on our own. I hope I can stick to that and bring a little more balance to my life in that respect.