If You Give a House a Cookie Jar, You Must Keep It Full
It all began with a cookie jar filled with homemade cookies. This was our introduction to Welcome Home and to the dedicated volunteers and delightful residents therein. This is a place filled with love, a place for people suffering from terminal illness who are facing death alone. Somehow our drive of more than 75 miles twice a week, just to visit and keep a cookie jar full, doesn’t seem so long.
On our first visit to Welcome Home we were both a little apprehensive, not knowing what to expect. We climbed the steps to the back porch entrance and hesitated. Before we could knock, the door opened and a smiling Sally invited us in. It only took us a little while to know that we would be coming back. This is truly a special place filled with loving caregivers, volunteers and special residents.
At first we wondered about the water bowl in the corner of the kitchen floor until we met Banjo and Cleo, just two of the “therapy dogs” that come to visit. This is a pet friendly place and even Dozer, our pot belly pig was invited to come. At fourteen he’s too old to travel, but a video of him taking a mud bath had everyone laughing.
Charles and Fred – green and purple hair!
There is a sense of humor shared by the residents that is infectious. It was decided by the ladies that it would be fun to color their hair with washable dye. When they “chickened out”, Charles, the truck driver, ex-marine and resident curmudgeon said, “You can do me.” With the ladies’ supervision we turned his hair blue with purple highlights and his beard purple. He was magnificent ! Then he turned to Fred who was trying to hide and said, “And you shall be GREEN.” We all laughed ’til we had tears in our eyes.
On the evenings that we have volunteered to cook we eat dinner at the long table with everyone. Some nights there are only 6 to 8 of us but on other nights unplanned visitors come and are invited to share the meal. On one such night, Sherry Campbell (Director)came into the dining room and smiled at what she saw. She said that this was just the scene that she had envisioned when planning Welcome Home.
Welcome Home could never have come to be without Sherry’s vision and the help of many awesome volunteers. There are lots of ways that people can be of help.
Please contact:
Social Justice at sj@uucc.org
Sherry at sherry@welcomehomeofchattanooga.org