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 Although she took a break in the middle, Kelly Wall has now been a Samaritan Center Volunteer for around 20 years.
“I first started volunteering with my aunt in 1987,” Kelly remembers. “That was at the old building before the Center was even open for business.”
Kelly’s early Samaritan Center memories are a tossed salad of hard work and challenges well-seasoned with friendship and fun. One of the initial obstacles she remembers was hauling their donations into the building’s basement for sale.
“Carrying all of those donations down the stairs was going to be a lot of work,” she recalls. “So we decided that we would put a wooden slab on the steps and slide them all down instead.”
Rainy days also posed a particular challenge. “In order to restock, we had to wheel racks of clothing around the building,” Kelly remembers. “It was wet, and it was cold, but it had to be done.”
In spite of these impediments, the years Kelly spent at the Samaritan Center remain a childhood highlight. For two years she was a volunteer; then, as soon as she was old enough to get a job, she was hired on full-time for two more.
“I loved to be there because everybody felt like family,” she explains, “my coworkers, the customers—all of the people involved. When I left the Center, it was really hard—maybe the hardest thing I ever did.”
But Kelly wouldn’t be gone forever. As soon as she felt her own children were old enough to make a contribution, she returned to the Center with them at her side—just like her aunt had originally brought her in tow.
“The location is different,” she admits, “but the lessons they can learn from working here remain unchanged. If they can just learn that even the little things that we do can make a real difference in others’ lives, I’ll be satisfied.”
To learn more about volunteering, click here.
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