When the Eastern Connecticut Extreme Makeover – Home Edition project was announced last Thursday in the ballroom of Foxwoods Casino, the number of volunteers registered on the Extreme Home by Bruno website quckly jumped from 200 to 1400.
I couldn’t help but think of those volunteers when I read Seth Godin’s blog post today. He speaks of Thanksgiving as his favorite holiday. “For me, the holiday celebrates people who contribute with no expectation of anything in return.”
Today I’m working on scheduling volunteers for the 7 days it takes to build our extreme home here in Eastern CT. Don’t feel bad that I’m spending my Thanksgiving Day at two computer monitors. Door knock day is less than a week away and it really is the perfect thing to do on Thanksgiving Day. I’m meeting the most generous people right here in my computer without even getting out of my jammies. I’ll probably even eat less than usual and that will be something in itself to be thankful for.
As I go through the volunteer entries, I stop to read the comments of those that want to help. Except for the occasional person who mentions how much they have always wanted to meet Ty, the volunteers are just generous people who want to make a difference with “no expectation of anything in return”. And they have stories to tell, some of them very personal. It hasn’t been a great year for Eastern Connecticut and layoffs are beginning to hit the area hard. Several volunteers admitted they had recently been laid off so have plenty of time to give to the project. Others write about tragedies in their own lives and how members of the community helped them. Now they want to return that favor to the community.
If you want to help, there is still time to volunteer. Although all the trade volunteers have been selected, we still have important duties like sweeping, garbage detail and heavy lifting; not the sexiest of tasks but still important.
Extreme Home by Bruno is the place to go to volunteer, find photographs, ways to contribute, and frequent “official” updates. Think of my blog as more of a collection of stories about the people and events that will change a family and a community over the next few weeks.
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