Guest post by Nic Soucy, client services assistant
Every day, the client services team at Project Angel Heart takes calls from clients, like Gwen*, who recently relayed to me how much she loved and appreciated the meals for her family. She was particularly blown away by the decorated meal bags she’d received with the meal delivery! At the start of the pandemic, Project Angel Heart was forced to temporarily suspend bag decorating. Now, with our bag decorating program up and running again, Gwen was finally getting to see the real creativity and talent of our volunteers.
She received one bag in particular that caught her eye. It was beautifully decorated with a large moon. She shared a beautiful story of how she and her grandson speak on the phone in the evenings and look at the moon together, remembering that they are looking at the same moon, which makes the distance between them feel just a bit smaller. She ended up sending that bag to her grandson, so that he could always have his own personal moon to look at whenever he was missing her, connecting them despite being states away.
Gwen was so inspired by the decorated bags that she wanted to get involved with the process. We sent her a stack of plain bags with her next meal delivery so that she and her neighbors could decorate them and give back, even while staying safely at home due to the pandemic.
In the end, this especially heartwarming call served as a reminder to me—and other Project Angel Heart staff—that our service is provided with SO MUCH HEART. Menu creation, cooking, dishing up meals, packing bags, decorating bags, mapping routes, answering phones, delivering meals—it is all done with love. This past year has been challenging for everyone, but when a client calls to tell us that they are feeling the love, it makes everything worth it.
*Names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals.