Monthly Archives: August 2014

I just wanted to share a couple of quick stories:

A couple of weeks ago, when we were out feeding the homeless on the Food Truck on a Friday night on Broad Street, a homeless man comes up to me and hands me a $10 bill.  I promptly let him know that we are out to bless him, and that there is never a charge for any food/drink/etc the Food Truck provides…just as quick, he let me know that he knew that already, but he saw our faithfulness week after week and year after year and wanted to pitch in – he said it had been a good week for him and he wanted to use some of his windfall to give back to the Food Truck…he said there’s been times when we’ve provided the only meal he’s had on a given day, and he wanted to take the opportunity to say thanks with his wallet…..pretty cool, huh?

The people I work with are very caring and very generous – they are often the quickest to step in anytime I let it be known we are in a pinch…they also love getting involved with the backpack drive.  I almost hate telling stories about them, because there are too many to tell and I know I will leave someone’s story out – they are literatlly that good to me…but here’s one for ya – one of the ladies I work with is an extreme couponer – a backpack giveaway plus an extreme couponer = a marriage made in heaven!!!  So here’s the scoop, when she got the list of what we need to fill the backpacks this year, she made it her mission to make the biggest impact she could. Armed with a binder-full-of-coupons and store-bucks, she walks up to the cash register with a carriage full of travel size essentials…the woman at the counter, who is one of the assistant managers at the store, let her know that company policy does not allow for couponing/store-bucks on these size items (they were already on sale!!)…but she was very curious why someone might be looking to buy so many anyways…long story short, when my friend tells the woman that she is buying them to fill backpacks to hand out to the homeless this winter, tears begin to well up in the cashier’s eyes.  The woman working behind the register lets her know that, so many months ago, she used to be homeless herself!!!  So there was no way she was letting my friend walk out of the store with everything in the carriage – and yes it was fine to use the coupons, store policy or not – it is going to a good cause and polices are made to be broken sometimes!!!  Imagine that though, my friend innocently walks into the store looking to meet the needs of some homeless people this Winter, but ends up touching the life of someone who made it out of homlesessness…and it opened the door for my friend to put her extreme-couponing skills to VERY good use!!!!

Posted by Rhode Island Dream Center in Backpack Giveaway, Food Truck, Fundraising Events