This week brings forth an annual season of wanting to make memories with our loved ones. Although many of us have lost our more senior relatives over the past few years, we must pause to be grateful for the time we’ve had with so many. If your family is large and has limited time to be together it represents an opportunity for the older generation to share their stories and memories of when your parents were children.
If you are 13 years old or younger, maybe it’s not as interesting a topic to you as it will be in 20 years, but maybe your relatives won’t remember as much then either. We always have plenty of time to haul out old photos and scrapbooks to reminisce, to share stories and if someone is smart they will write the stories down or better yet, video them with your phone.
What a blessing it was to find so many people reaching out to those who found themselves without immediate family this year, taking time to “be family” to some of our area seniors. We have numerous senior living communities here. Every years, if you sit at a distance and watch, you see those who come downstairs, or to the front, early because they are going to be picked up by family to be taken to where festivities will begin.
It makes you think of who all you know who would love to see someone smile or hear a friendly voice. Next year, if want to, let this be the motivation to consider calling the Activities Directors of area communities to see if they need any volunteer help. Imagine the good you can do, just to bring a smile to a stranger’s day.
If Thanksgiving dinner with family is not possible for someone you know, you can offer them a seat at your table next year and tell them to “just bring themselves.” It’s a gift not to be lonely at holidays. Even if it is not someone you know, you can still help provide for others.
This is the 34th year that area superhero volunteer Gloria Kennard provided Thanksgiving to serve 800 community members this year, thanks to her faithfulness and “donations from First Financial Bank, College Station Rotary, Rotary Club of Aggieland and area churches.” And she has done this from her home! Community members are also used to dropping by and just dropping off a few items to help the overall goals. The power of one person never goes unnoticed or unneeded.
Over in Caldwell, for 19 years now, Melinda Palicka has been the Facility Director of “In God’s Hands Ministry” and her commitment to provide meals at Thanksgiving has included local merchants making contributions to her efforts. On Thursday she provided meals at an area senior living center. If you’d like to help Melinda next year, check out the link on the community story on KAGS-TV and save the information for next year.
And now, that the meals have been prepared, the feast has been served and someone was nice enough to clear and clean the dishes, take a deep breath. In fact, take several of them. Many of you woke up after two hours’ sleep to take advantage of Black Friday sales ahead of Christmas.
But what is available for you to do now?
As featured on KRHD Friday, there’s a story about spreading holiday cheer, Jesse’s Taqueria and Bakery, Golden Corral, and College Heights Assembly of God Church are three groups who are partnering with the Home Instead caregiving group to host Christmas trees with names of seniors written on ornaments. Gifts that they will enjoy are suggested and you can imagine how comforting it would be to lotions to combat dry skin, blankets, socks, and warm items at Christmas time. There’s a Dec. 12 cutoff date for you to return the gifts you’d like to give to the places where you pick up the ornaments.
Now, what else?
One of the best presents you can give to those you love is your time. You don’t need to get into massive debt to show those you love your great care and regard. It’s a gift that, once given, can never be returned. In turn, people will never forget the time you spent together, especially for those at a distance. Have a senior who loves to send and receive Christmas cards each year but for some reason this year, they can’t? You can help by getting the cards, sitting down with your seniors and going through their address list.
Or, you can volunteer to help them prepare a Christmas message and get it copied and mailed out. Maybe even buy the stamps this year as they are $.60 each for standard snail mail. Postcards are $.40 each. Or you can record a video message or story or memories from your seniors and send it to all of your family members (which will remind them to be sure and include a Christmas card or call for your senior from them!).
Organize a holiday phone tree for seniors who are homebound and cannot join you for the holidays, so you can make sure they hear from everyone. Children love to color and draw and maybe if they don’t have grandparents of their own alive to send cards to, you can encourage them to create greetings cards for children who are in the hospitals for the holidays with a simple message: “I am sorry you are in the hospital right now, but please know that you are being thought about and prayed for today, and I wish you a very Merry Christmas and many good days ahead very soon.
The one factor in common with all of the above is a simple gift of your time offered with love. There’s no magnificent gift in a splendid box that could mean anything more to someone who truly loves you than time, thoughtfulness, and action. The next four weeks are yours for the giving.
What are you going to do now that all the meals are served, the dishes are cleaned and put away, and you’ve wrapped up the season’s football games (more or less 😊)? Season’s Greetings to all of you. And please remember to support your locally owned businesses—we are here all the time, you know us, and we appreciate your trust in us. Now, let the holiday season resume in full force!
Cody D. Jones ‘02
Owner & Community Member
