Today is a great day to be active and to serve our community! Being active and serving do not require much time or effort, and we improve our lives as well as the community when we serve. As we serve, our community becomes cleaner, healthier, happier, more satisfied, and better connected. We love and care more. Our compassion and empathy increase. We are more kind and patient. We succeed. The best part is that it is so easy to get started!
By spending a few minutes each day, we each contribute to hours of community improvement per year. Serving only five minutes per day results in thirty hours of service per year, fifteen minutes per day results in a total of 91 hours of service per year, and 30 minutes per day results in one hundred eighty-two hours of service per year! We can serve as frequently as we choose for as long as we choose. No minimum or maximum time or effort is required. Also, community service encompasses far more than removing or painting over graffiti or picking up trash. Simply choose a service opportunity that interests you.
Serving is so easy! Here are a few simple ways to serve minutes at a time:
• Take a neighborhood walk, collecting litter as you walk and disposing of it properly.
• Clear litter from roadways, waterways, and parks and dispose of it properly.
• Rake leaves, mow, pull weeds, or trim away dead vegetation for a neighbor, a single parent, a veteran, or an elderly or disabled individual.
• Teach a child to read or help with homework.
• Cook a meal for someone in need— anyone.
• Ask elderly or disabled neighbors, veterans, single parents, or those taking care of sick family members if you can shop for them. Follow through by shopping and delivering their items.
• Run errands for others to lighten their burdens.
• Write letters to individuals confined to rehab centers and nursing facilities, members of our military, and students who need some encouragement.
• Send care packages to deployed members of our military or their family members.
• Make some delicious treats and surprise members of our community to let them know they matter.
• Adopt a local single parent family and then attend school and extracurricular events to support them, spend time helping the kids with homework, and simply be supportive.
• Volunteer with a local organization: Bristow Social Services, medical or veterinary and rehab facilities, student services, military or veterans’ services, park services, service-oriented groups, etc.
• Deliver meals to homebound elderly and disabled individuals for senior nutrition services.
• Wash a load of laundry for a single parent, grieving spouse, veteran, or military household.
• Collect and deliver donated items for charitable causes.
• Create a work of art, craft, or other item to donate to a charity for fundraising.
• Babysit free of charge for single parents or guardians, affording them a moment of respite.
• Coach a sports team.
• Provide free lessons: instrumental, vocational, linguistic, technological, artistic, etc.
• Offer free tutoring sessions.
• Join a volunteer organization (CASA, American Red Cross, Salvation Army, etc.).
• Use a personal skill to build or create desks for local students, shelters for the homeless, blankets (for elderly, homeless, sick, animals, new parents, etc.), pens for animal rehabs, picnic tables for neighborhood families, etc.
However we choose to serve, our community and our own lives improve. Please serve today. Minutes become hours. Hours of service accomplish great improvements to our health, happiness, and satisfaction. Our community’s health, happiness, and satisfaction lead to broader enhanced quality of life for individuals, families, and businesses. As our quality of life improves, our families and businesses grow and multiply, creating new employment opportunities and a blooming economy. Bristow is a beautiful town filled with the potential to flourish and grow. That potential resides within each of us. Let’s do this together, Bristow.