I’ve worked with many non-profits and their volunteers, but what I see at the Cambridge Food Pantry is unique in my experience.

I am drawn to the feeling and emotion of it, and I am working to capture this powerful feeling in photographs; they always speak the truth. They don’t yet know how to lie or screw things up.

I am not an official volunteer at the Pantry or a staff member; I am just someone with a blog who wants to use it for good, and this need is about as urgent and promising as I have found.

So far, so good. Very good.

I have the easiest job in the pantry; I write on my blog and take pictures.

(FYI, Sarah’s choices for today are newly requested by a number of visitors to the food pantry. They are  Homel Canned Ham, Smoked, 5 Ounce pack of 12, $22.95.

And Ben’s Original Ready Jasmine Rice, Easy Dinner Side, 8.5 Oz Pouch, Pack of 6, $9.98. all requested by pantry guests, as Sarah refers to them.)

I’m too old and sometimes too leg and foot impaired to do the work. I see everyone doing such hard work at the pantry, and I see people of all ages, genders, and backgrounds. One common denominator is that they all grew up in the country and seem to understand what it means to need more food.

They won’t let me lift heavy things; they take them right out of my hand.

I am permitted to help stuff the backpack food bags assembled on Thursdays for the children of the pantry families. I am struck and moved by the physicality of the volunteers’ jobs.

They constantly lift, move, and stack things, clean up waste, and tear up boxes, working so long and hard that they all know where everything goes.

Sarah Harrington, the new director, is central to this remarkable group. She knows where every box, bottle, and package goes to be frozen or stacked on a shelf. She knows everyone who comes in for good and what they need, want, and feel.

Unlike every leader, she treats everyone with great respect and is shy, humble, and self-effacing.

She would prefer never to be photographed or written about, but she also understands the importance of visual images so that people who donate know what they are giving, why, and who gets it. She’s a good sport.

So far, our collaboration is working.

She is getting most of the food at the pantry from a regional food bank and other donors and farmers. Still, she has also embraced the idea of getting donations that expand the quality and range of the food, especially for children.

Every food she requests comes from the mouths and lives of the people who come in there. All of them are things they want and need. Most food pantries need help to do this.

Volunteering for this non-profit is different from volunteering for most others. I am happy and proud to be helping the pantry with my excellent and always dependable army of good. These photos capture what it feels like to be there and show how complex and complicated this work is. What on earth would happen to people in need without people like this?

I will only use names once I know all the volunteers and can spell them accurately. They deserve that, and I’ll get there.

I am curious to know how Sarah does everything she does.

She has help, but she is always working, lifting, recording, ordering, greeting, and speaking with the people who come in for food. She is bringing exciting new ideas to the pantry; I look forward to seeing it come together.

The pantry building reminds me of the basements beneath the Paris Playhouse in Phantom Of The Opera. The pantries I’ve seen lately have the money for new and roomy buildings; the money goes to food, which is tough enough. I want to help her get a new truck; the one they use is older than me. But food donation comes first.

There were fewer volunteers than usual on Tuesday, but they all worked much longer and lifted much more than normal, and no one complained or got grumpy. They have been working together for years, and in her short time as director, Sarah has learned every inch of the place and knows exactly where everything goes and what she needs to get.

The fanciest tool in the pantry is rolling carriers. She has started a new website (for the first time) and is the first person at the pantry to have an e-mail address. I see no iPads, iPhones, or computers around (Sarah has a cell phone.) The volunteers, many of whom are older, work with their hands and bodies.

The building is aging next to freezers, refrigerators, shelves, and a storage room.  Everything is cleaned and scrubbed. It’s a photographer’s dream but a logistical nightmare. Still, everything gets recorded, labeled, and stored in the right place.

It’s fantastic to see these scores, even hundreds of boxes, pouring in and melting into these corridors and refrigerated rooms.

Food only stays in the pantry for a short time; it goes out almost as soon as it gets in. And the need is growing; the lines are longer, and the hunger is spreading.

Sarah records it as soon as it comes in. She knows where every box goes, and so do some volunteers.

 

Many of the volunteers grew up doing hard work on farms. They get tired, but they never quit.

It’s almost a joke between us. Every time I see Sarah, she has a huge box, and I have a giant camera. We both laugh.

It’s all about food for the vulnerable. The challenge is to keep it stocked and to try to get the food the “customers” and their children need and want. The pantry is doing a lot of good, and we are doing good by helping them.

Thanks for supporting the food pantry. It is healing and hopeful in a time of anger and division.