Every 10th birthday year I celebrate by rededicating myself to service. Instead of creating a large group effort like I did when I turned fifty and sixty, Ruth and I chose to work with the Edlavitch DC Jewish Community Center's Morris Cafritz Center for Social Responsibility to find a project we could help out with. Mira Smith of the EDJCC referred us to Homes Not Borders (HNB), which assists refugee families in our area.
Along with a dedicated volunteer crew from the JCC, we set up an apartment in Landover, Maryland for a newly arrived Afghan refugee family of four. Covid health precautions were observed.
All the furniture, furnishings, kitchenware, home supplies, and food staples were donated in the process by the volunteers and HNB. I was asked to do some photographs (sigh), but spent most of my time moving and organizing stuff. Ruth set up the kitchen; dishes, foodstuffs, utensils, cleaning supplies, microwave, etc.
This work had special meaning as my own father came to America as a refugee from Nazi Germany in 1937.
Thanks to Mira Smith of the JCC and HNB founder/executive Laura Thompson Osuri for this opportunity to help others.
It was a very good day.
Note: These photos are chronological, from the start at HNB's warehouse to the finished apartment, ready for a family to move in.
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