Neighbors helping neighbors

When Margi Maynard heard from her friend, Dianne Crews, that St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Eastport needed help restocking its food pantry, Margi wanted to help. Her church, St. Anne’s Episcopal Church in Annapolis, and various other neighborhoods had already helped with donations.

Margi and Dianne thought maybe some of their neighbors in Admiral Heights might want to help too. They were right.

A flyer was made up with the collection details on one side and suggested donations on the other side. Another neighbor, Alex Hill Dooley, posted both sides of the flyer on Facebook. Still another neighbor, Carole Coss, volunteered to transport the donations from five of her neighbors to Maynard’s house.

Once the word was out, bags, boxes, laundry baskets and even a wagon full of donations started arriving. Coss delivered at least 10 bags of donations and Margi estimates that she received about 50 bags.

For Margi, one of the most heartwarming parts of the food drive was seeing three children bringing a wagon full of food to her house. “It was so good to see the children getting involved,” she said, “and it was good for me to meet some of my younger neighbors.”

The sun was shining and the weather was wonderfully warm during the food drive, but on the day the donations were to be delivered to St. Luke’s, it was raining. Luckily, Margi and her husband, Bill, had already loaded most of the donations into their car. A granddaughter and her friend arrived to help load the reminder of the items. It took two trips to get the donation to St. Luke’s, but everything went smoothly despite the rain.

“I just want to give a big THANK YOU to everyone who helped,” Margi said. “This is the way it’s supposed to be … neighbors helping neighbors.”