Cement and Giving: The Bottom Line of Our Communities

In the community I grew up in, there was a cement business whose motto was, “Find a hole and fill it” (Kaiser Cement).

That described neighborhood relationships, as well as potholes. If you were sick, your neighbor knew it, and a pot was put on the stovetop to cook up some soup for you. If your neighbor needed a ride to work, you arranged your schedule to get them there. Neighborhoods were not a totally idyllic setting, but they did revolve around relationships.

Relationships are the bottom line in the warp and weave of our communities.

The last two holiday seasons, Giving Machines have been placed in our southwest Idaho communities. They are vending machines, where you can buy services and products from targeted community and international nonprofits. You can buy a goat for a family who has food insecurity in their village, or a month’s worth of diapers for a local family, or the transportation means for a domestic abuse survivor to escape her living situation. You have control of what your money is going towards, so people generally and generously choose items that resonate with them.

I don’t know what is different about Giving Machines that brings out people’s generous love, but it feels like holy ground. It feels like this is the way we were born to feel towards each other. This feeling often gets lost in the noise and distraction of the world. When we reach out and truly give of ourselves, we get hints of that feeling again.

How can we have experiences like this more often, in the divisive environment of our current society?

With the Giving Machines, I’ve heard of children and youth doing fundraising, so they can donate the money to the programs being supported that year. There are families that are not exchanging gifts at Christmas, so they can donate that money to the Giving Machine projects. And some folks are saving money all year, to be able to buy one of every service from the machine. How does that translate into the Neighbor to Neighbor concept? Going back to the cement motto, if you see a hole, fill it. If the community garden down the street is getting littered, put on some gloves and clean it up. When you’re grocery shopping, pick up some extra snacks to give to local Community School programs. Volunteer to help with childcare for a program that’s teaching Parenting classes.

If one of the keys to the success of the Giving Machines is the instant warm fuzzies you get by knowing specifically what you’ve done to help, then the Our Idaho: Neighbor to Neighbor could be an answer. It is an avenue for folks to generously share the love for each other that we inherently possess to nonprofits and other programs, sharing needs that they or individuals have, by giving folks the opportunity to fill them. We need to be able to create or tap into that higher form of love more consistently, and these opportunities will be available to support that in real time.There is a myriad of ways to reach out and help lift our neighbors.

Let’s do this Idaho, one person; one need; one heart at a time.

*To learn more about Our Idaho: Neighbor to Neighbor, get involved, and lend your voice, connect with us!