One woman’s door knocker was fashioned by her husband from leftover shipbuilding metal, courtesy of his job at the Kaiser shipyards during World War II.
Another used to be a cabaret singer. Yet another was a civil rights activist and friend of Rosa Parks, the black Alabama woman whose refusal to surrender her bus seat to a white person in 1955 sparked the Montgomery bus boycott.
The people restaurateur Mark Matthias met during his round of delivering Meals on Wheels last Friday don’t deserve to be marginalized with labels like “poor” and “sick,” he insisted.
“They are really interesting people” in a stage of life everyone eventually arrives at — a stage of need, Matthias said during the second annual fundraising luncheon for Loaves and Fishes, which operates Meals on Wheels.
The need is for more than nutrition, though that’s the primary mission: delivering good food to people, age 60 and up, who can’t get to it themselves and are at risk of malnutrition. There are 2,700 regular Meals on Wheels recipients in Clark County.
For 17 percent of them, it’s the only meal of the day.
But the other thing Meals on Wheels volunteers provide is friendship. Joan Smith, executive director of Loaves and Fishes, said the volunteer who brings food to the door and stays for a chat is often the only person a Meals on Wheels recipient sees all day.
“To see that gleam in their eye and how happy they are to see you,” Matthias said. “When you see that, you can’t help but want to give back.”
Smith related the story of one volunteer who used to make deliveries to a blind woman who lived alone in a nice home. The woman clung to furniture and felt her way around, and she was always waiting eagerly by the door when the Meals on Wheels volunteer arrived; the volunteer would cut up her food and help her eat because it was too dangerous for her to cook.
“She was the loneliest of the people I delivered to. I hated to leave each time,” read this volunteer’s report, as told by Smith. “This story is multiplied for us thousands of times each day.”
No waiting list
The packed event at the downtown Hilton Vancouver Washington celebrated the 40th anniversary of the first Meals on Wheels, which started out in 1970 carrying 14 meals to senior citizens in Southeast Portland.
Today, Loaves and Fishes enlists 7,600 volunteers to deliver 1.4 million meals per year in Clark County and Multnomah and Washington counties in Oregon. It’s the only local charity food service with no waiting list, several speakers pointed out — if you make a call, you get a meal within 24 hours.
Matthias was the event’s keynote speaker, and he told his own story of learning to build charitable giving into the business model and management team for his Beaches Restaurant. He’s enjoyed growing and spinning off various charitable endeavors, he said, from a classic car “cruise-in “ to a billboard on state Highway 14 whose lease fees go entirely to charity.
“It became a vital part of what we do in our business,” he said. “We know we can raise $200,000 cash for the community every year.”
Although Matthias was the event’s headliner, the show was really stolen by a certain comedy duo you could call Bruce ‘n’ Royce.
Bruce Hagensen was the littler, lighter guy and Royce Pollard was the bigger, darker guy; the former Vancouver mayors introduced themselves as “proud citizens” of the city, and then proceeded to rib each other about botching lines and missing entrances as they appealed for donations to Loaves and Fishes.
“We all know Royce never follows the script,” said Hagensen, pointing at their script. “You’re right here.”
“I know where I am,” said Pollard, paying no attention as he chuckled with the audience. Emcee Carl Click of KATU news said the pair’s act was headed for the casinos.
But seriously, folks: Pollard and Hagensen underlined the growing need for Meals on Wheels. In Clark County, Hagensen said, the organization’s workload is expected to grow 15 percent this year, and to double by 2020. Community donations make up half the Loaves and Fishes budget.
Later in the day, Loaves and Fishes spokeswoman Julie Piper Finlay said the fundraising tally for the luncheon was $130,000. That’s 20 percent more than the same event last year.
Pollard, a veteran of Meals on Wheels bike deliveries, picked up Matthias’ point — that the folks taking Meals on Wheels have lived meaningful lives during historic times. “They are the Greatest Generation,” he said. “We owe them. Without them, we would not have the liberty and freedom we have today. My main purpose being here today is to get you to think about that.”
