Many of us, busy with work and kids and hunting and pursuing whatever else our hearts desire, have little time for volunteering.
Yet we experience the benefits of local volunteer efforts every time we drive down Main Street and see the median planted with beautiful flowers. We experience it when our kids play sports at the Boys and Girls Club or AYSO soccer. Those coaches are teaching doing it for free – out of the love of the game, of kids, of competition, whatever. They’re giving our kids their time. We experience it when parks get cleaned up by volunteers, as pictured on page 2 of today’s newspaper.
And we’ll experience it this weekend as Sweet Home kicks off its annual Christmas holiday celebration.
Volunteers have organized the Christmas caroling that will follow the Christmas tree lighting Friday night – which also is substantially a volunteer effort. The Grand Parade on Saturday morning is put together by volunteers, one of them a second-generation director of the event. Like mother, like daughter.
Volunteers have painted and are installing the 80 painted Christmas cards we’ll see around town. It’s a great idea, developed largely by non-professionals. Volunteers have organized the Christmas Tree Auction. The Singing Christmas tree. The downtown shopping extravaganza. Great causes brought to reality by people who did it for free, out of passion for their cause – whether it be singing Christmas carols in a picturesque setting or raising money for scholarships to send local teens to college.
Here in Sweet Home we may be a little calloused, in a way, because we are constantly surrounded by generous self-sacrifice.
This is the season show appreciation for the people behind them.
Show up. Participate in the parade, the caroling, the Singing Christmas Tree, the auction. These are as high-quality events as one can generally find in a town of 9,000. They’re worth our time.
Enjoy the postcards, the live nativity scenes. They are there to help us enjoy and appreciate the season.
Happy holidays!