Bremerton Foodline

Anyone who is familiar with foodbanks will realize that we are utterly dependent upon the support of our community.  Our agency serves approximately 1,350 households every month and it is indeed a balancing act to keep a variety of quality products available to our clients.  We are continually faced with difficult choices:  Do we spend our money on protien rich meat sources or canned fruits and vegetables?  Can we afford to buy butter or milk?  Cereal or box dinners?  And what about toilet paper or diapers?  Our everyday challenge here is to maximize the donations from our partners and the community and supplement that food supply with staples that are funded by donations to our agency.  As you might expect, though, the need is increasing and some of our major funding sources remain the same or show signs of decline.  Coupled with that is the increased cost of food altogether – some products increasing anywhere from 5-20% versus just a year ago.  So our challenge becomes all that more difficult.

We remind ourselves that people would much rather have the resources to purchase food at the corner grocer than come to our agency; so it becomes all that more important that we ensure that everyone is treated with dignity and respect.  A significant part of that experience will depend on the quantity and quality of food that we are able to offer them.  If we offer them less than they feel they need or the quality of our products falls short, it sends a powerful message, however unintended, how we value them as individuals.  In the end, it is our job to take what we have received from our community and do our best to share it with our neighbors in an equitable way that communicates our belief in the inherent dignity of every person.  Sometimes, we fall short; but like everything we balance in life, we try again the next day, fixing what we can, accepting what we cannot change, and trusting we are doing the best we can with what we have.

“Whatever you do will not be enough, but it matters enormously that you do it.” Gandhi

When I began in this role nearly two years ago, I held on tight to an idealistic belief that our community can foster a spirit of compassion that refuses to accept living conditions that contribute to poverty. “Not in our city!” Time is a good teacher and my idealism, while still fervent, has mellowed with the reality of the struggle. Idealism has it’s place…but reality is never so simple. I’ve learned that true hunger is about so much more than the simple lack of food. Deeper than the physical pangs, we are also witness to a hunger of the human spirit, a hunger for acceptance, a hunger for healthy relationships, a hunger for meaningful work, and a hunger for an end to the struggle. The depth of the challenge does not go away with a box of food. People walk through our doors and share their plans for new and better employment, or resolve to leave a destructive relationship behind or a heartfelt conviction to deal with an addiction; and with each person, I affirm their choices with a firm belief that they will follow-through, yet not surprised when they don’t.

It wasn’t long before I realized that many of these life choices were more rooted in holding onto some hope of change than in reality of actually following through. While it is always hard to stand by as some people make similar choices over and over again, I am reminded we are all human. We all have a difficult time letting go of habits and belief systems, and need the change to start over and over again. So it is with many of our clients.

So we choose to hope…choose to believe…and choose to encourage the new beginnings of the individuals we serve. Perhaps this does not bring an end to a particular life crisis, perhaps it is not enough to cure hunger in Bremerton, but it what we have to give today; and speaking for myself, I am coming to accept and find peace with the fact that that is indeed enough.