Newsletter - 7-01-09

City Kids

Aldon and Calle met on the Sausalito Ferry. They both commuted daily from Marin: he to his dental practice on Market Street, she to her job as one of the first paralegals in San Francisco. A few years later, they got married and moved to Los Gatos. They stayed for twenty three years. Aldon built a thriving new practice in San Jose specializing in sleep apnea*. Calle helped start the San Francisco Paralegal Association. Together they raised two daughters. When the kids moved out, the house felt big and empty. One day while reading an article about Mission Bay in the New York Times Magazine, it struck Calle that she needed to be back in the city. She missed the buzz, the culture, the diversity. She and Aldon moved to San Francisco about a year ago.

Last November, while shopping at daily Food Runners donor Whole Foods in Potrero Hill, Calle happened to see the Food Runners truck parked outside. She was intrigued. When she got home, she looked up Food Runners on the internet. She loved what she saw and immediately sent in a donation. She then clicked a "volunteer now" button and filled out the online form to become a food runner. When I received her form, I emailed her back and within days, Calle and Aldon were doing their first food run. At my suggestion, they began as 'on call' runners, venturing forth on an as needed basis to see how they liked the job. They liked it. It didn't take long before Calle called me asking for a weekly run. She and Aldon signed up for Sunday mornings. Each week, they stopped in at Rainbow Grocery on Folsom to pick up donations of fresh produce and various other items that would otherwise be thrown away. Each week, they delivered the haul to New Life Center a residential drug and alcohol recovery program in SOMA. "We just loved running food on Sunday mornings," states Calle with her warm as toast smile. "There's no traffic and the city always looks so beautiful. More importantly, we really enjoyed getting to know the people on our run. The folks at Rainbow were always so helpful and New Life Center couldn't have been more appreciative. What a great way to start our Sundays."

After several months, Calle and Aldon had to give up the Sunday morning run when obligations from a new business venture they are working on rendered a fixed run impossible. They haven't given up running food however. They usually volunteer once a week, sometimes more, taking on whatever run best fits their constantly evolving schedule. They especially enjoy doing food runs together when possible. Besides getting to spend quality time with each other while doing well by doing good, they like how parking problems become a non-issue when one person can wait in the car while the other checks in with the donors and recipients.

Before I left on vacation, Calle and Aldon volunteered for a run to the Academy of Science in Golden Gate Park where they picked up the daily donation from Loretta Keller's Moss Room. When the usual recipients couldn't take all the food, I directed Calle and Aldon to a low-income hotel for seniors just a few blocks away. The surprised residents lit up when Calle and Aldon arrived helping make the extra time and effort spent on the run feel ever so worth it. Of course, if you met Calle and Aldon, you'd know that don't need the pay-off of smiling, happy faces to do what they do. They would do it anyway because helping those in need is what they're all about. It's what Food Runners is all about too, one delivery at a time.

Food Runners picked up 114, 915 pounds of food in the month of June. Volunteers performed 756 runs and the truck did 173. Please welcome June's 9 new volunteers most of whom, have sallied forth multiple times already! Also welcome new donor Zynga Games Network, who is donating overage from their in-house catered meals several times a week. Many thanks to Jeanne S. who subbed for me while I was on vacation and, who set up the Zynga regular run schedule.

Is your local market throwing away viable food? Tell them about Food Runners. Food Runners volunteers are ready to pick up their excess food and deliver it to those in need at any time. Food Runners is safe, it's legal and it's free.

Nancy

* Sleep apnea is not a joke. It can be life threatening. To learn more about sleep apnea and its solutions go to www.draldonhilton.com

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