The OCP Blog

The Blessings of Service

Annie has been working with a long-time community member. We’ll call him Abe. In recent months we all noticed Abe was getting slower and thinner, even falling asleep at the table at OCP.  Abe was getting so bad he just couldn’t get himself to the doctor anymore. Annie finally took him only to discover severely swollen legs with open sores. Abe is now under treatment, which requires bandaging his legs every three days, and already he seems to be getting some life and pep back. During her work with Abe, Annie visited him at his apartment only to discover that it was in quite a mess. Abe lives in public housing because he is elderly and disabled, but public housing has rules, and if people don’t keep their apartments clean, they are subject to eviction. So Annie arranged a cleaning party and recruited a community member and 2 other volunteers to help. They worked for 3 hours and successfully got his place cleaned up. As one volunteer said, “I was so grateful to be able to help. Abe has been part of OCP since the beginning. This is what community is about.”

Last Saturday master electrician Peter Poage led a team of 5 volunteers to install 58 new LED lights at OCP. This is a huge job since the ballast must be removed from each fixture and wiring reconnected. But OCP is now brighter! LEDs will save us about 2/3 on our lighting bill over the old fluorescents that were in the building, last 10 times longer, and reduce our carbon footprint! While we were working, someone yelled “There’s a guy driving up outside.” I went out and was greeted by a Mennonite farmer and his boy. They unloaded 3 large boxes with perhaps 100 fresh tomatoes. They didn’t want a tax receipt and never told me their names. But I was deeply moved by their humble generosity. Getting to serve at OCP is such a blast!

If you would like to help Annie by volunteering to take someone in need to a medical appointment, please email annie@ourcommunityplace.org.

Sam Nickels

Executive Director