Helping hands reach out to isolated
FOUNTAIN HILLS, ARIZ . In the Sonoran Desert, you just never know when a reptile will take part in Make A Difference Day activities.
“We had to get rid of a gila monster,” explains Paul Appeldorn, one of about 300 Fountain Hills, Ariz., volunteers who spent Oct. 25 helping elderly and infirm neighbors. “But he unfortunately keeps coming back again.”
Heather Ware, director of the Fountain Hills Volunteer Program, says townsfolk provided assistance to 67 residents of this suburban Phoenix community — doing household repairs and cleaning, painting, landscaping and building fences.
Ware says residents used to take part in a Take Pride Day, sprucing up municipal facilities, but it didn’t provide the emotional rewards that come with serving others.
“Benefits for the town were kind of cheesy,” she notes. “And volunteers — they want to feel good when they finish a project.”
Ware, who has a ministerial background, says she shifted gears when she learned about the Make A Difference Day project. She promoted the new event through newspaper ads, clubs, churches and other groups — and saw a groundswell of support.
The program serves “people in need who are often invisible in a community,” Ware says, especially those who feel isolated and may be too embarrassed to ask for help.
Fifteen employees from Anytime Fitness, a Fountain Hills gym, teamed up at the home of Maureen Kelley, who has Par- kinson’s disease. They lowered closet bars, fixed a bed lift and did a deep-cleaning.
“It wasn’t only the help they gave me, but the emotional lift,” Kelley says. “I know they really cared.”
Bob Kinder, an 89-year-old who has been confined to a wheelchair since suffering two broken hips, was similarly grateful.
Volunteers built a wheelchair ramp, enabling him to go out to his own mailbox for the first time in six years. “They were so friendly, and they worked real hard,” Kinder said.