Onions and Underwear

This past week I have been volunteering at some of the sites I will be taking groups to this summer. My week has progressed with its share of ups and downs. Here are a couple of experiences...

I started out by volunteering with the DC Central Kitchen, an organization that receives volunteer help and prepares food for shelters across the city. It is an amazing organization that also trains people in struggling positions for food preparation, equipping them with these culinary skills which can qualify them for better jobs in the city.

While I was impressed by the organization, I had a miserable time there. :( I was in the area where people were cutting onions but I was secretly pumped that I only was preparing the lettuce. However, I finished this and was placed on onion duty, something I thought I had avoided. For the next two hours I peeled and sliced onions while stinging tears streamed down my face. The rest of the day my eyes stung, reminding me of my awful morning. I respect people so much that prepare unfortunate food each day and am even more avid in my dislike of onions.

I also volunteered at 6am the next day in a soup kitchen where I sorted clothes to hand out to the men eating breakfast. This was an interesting task. I have become accustomed to picking out my clothing, with little thought to the price but only thinking of the style. I have had the luxury of choosing clothing that is in my size. However, for these men, they only requested a t-shirt or other type of clothing, receiving what we could find in the pile of donated clothes.

I was torn between many different thoughts while doing this. Part of me felt pity, seeing the brokenness that existed in some of these men, waiting in line for a t-shirt that had been a cast-off from another person. On the other hand, one man approached me and showed me something he had received and told me it was too big. I didn't have anything else and he yelled at me, asking what he was supposed to do with it since it was too big, and then threw it down at my feet.

At first, I was annoyed, I mean I was not even the one who brought it down for him. He is getting this for free and is a regular here, making this soup kitchen and the handouts a part of his daily life. I lost the pity and instead felt judgement in my heart. However, as I continue to reflect, I am reminded that it is not my choice who to love or who to show patience to. Even worse, this was a pair of underwear. Despite this man's personal choices and outside effects that might have brought him to this place in life, I cannot imagine a more humiliating experience but to come and ask for underwear from these young and affluent kids. The fact that it was too big was probably just too much for his pride, causing him to lash out in anger, attempting to regain his dignity.

Throughout the summer, I pray that I would not become immune to poverty and devastation but that I would instead be a loving and understanding presence in this city and with my groups. I pray I would be quick to love, quick to listen, and slow to judge these people that I do not know.