All the volunteers were friendly and cheerful towards each other and clients. An unspoken standard of calm behaviour, politeness and working with ease was modelled by Sara, one of three paid workers. My skillset was about to grow, along with my physical health. I had not had a job requiring me to be on my feet for hours since I was a waiter in my twenties, decades ago.
There was little training, jumping in the deep end started with wheeling big trolleys of food from the giant fridge, freezer and cool room to waiting vehicles. Next came checking the correct order was going to the right organisation, then cramming goods into car boots, filling trailers, stacking passenger seats with as many frozen chickens as possible. Lifting and positioning crates of fresh fruit, vegetables, boxes of bread and more until the vehicle’s barley had room for a driver. Waving goodbye to the grateful workers who will take the goods to the next stage, delivery to those in need.
The people who come to collect were usually welfare workers, often volunteers themselves. They arrive between eight and eleven, men and women driving old vans, utes and timeworn cars towing trailers, coming to collect much-needed supplies. When asked what they see as the common cause behind people lacking basic needs, the answer is often the same. Rents have gone up and up, to a point beyond the stretch of limited incomes. People need to find more dollars per week to keep a roof above their heads and the safety of locked doors. Little money is left over for other essentials like food.
Something had briefly crossed my mind on my first day at Foodbank, but I had quickly become too absorbed with new people, learning and activity to give any more weight to it. ‘What if I meet someone here that I know and who knows me?’ Three weeks later I saw Joy, loading pasta and rice into her trolley, focussed on her task, not looking beyond to where I was stacking a shelf. I knew her as a good neighbour and an active member of our community, she was a few years older than me and a fellow member of a local tree-planting group. We had often talked over plots of freshly dug soil whilst tucking young seedlings into wet compost. A public servant in local government, she said tree planting was good for her soul after dealing with bureaucracy every day. I liked her forthright nature and commitment to giving back to the world “before I no longer can”, Joy would say. She usually provided homemade cake for our shared morning tea.
