We had a great email go out to the entire staff here at GCSAA yesterday. It was written by Bob Kidder, our housekeeping/facilities coordinator. The email was quite touching and really got a lot of us thinking. I'll turn it over to Bob's email, published here in its entirety, and come back after his closing.
From: Bob Kidder
Sent: Tue 12/9/2008 3:08 AM
Re: Toys for Tots
FedEx has a commercial stating that the odds of accidentally hitting "reply all" is 12 percent; but, my odds were 100 percent since I did it on purpose. I do not work for FedEx. I do not work with Toys for Tots. Nor am I on the Community Outreach Group committee. I am simply "Bob the 
cleaning guy" (Joe the Plumber was already taken). However, before I became the Housekeeping/Facilities Coordinator at GCSAA, I was a house father at a group home for ten years. Over the course of those years I was able to observe the various ways that out-of-home children received Christmas gifts.
Some children have family that, like us and our families, may have lavished gifts on the kids (regardless of their position on the naughty or nice list). Many youth are "adopted out" for Christmas; that is, their wish list is given to people who may, or may not, buy exactly what the child wants. Unfortunately, some children end up with a much less-than-perfect Christmas. These include many children in foster homes and youth who are moved from one placement to another during the Christmas season. Why? In the case of foster children, they are in family homes which are not approached by outreach groups, thus the "giving" of presents is left up to the foster parents and Saint Nick -- both having very limited budgets. Institutionalized youth (shelters, group homes, etc.) that move during the Christmas season will not be "adopted" out at the new placement. The truth is we sent out Christmas Wish Lists for our group home youth in October each year; any youth that came in after October we had to cover as best as possible.
There is, however, one organization that would call me and had no "red tape," no bureaucracy, no strings: Toys for Tots. Their program was simple -- you have kids who need a Christmas toy...Toys for Tots has toys. They ask that toys not be wrapped -- this is for a good reason. Toys for Tots allows the Santa closest to the child to choose gifts that match the kids. They were the only group who did this. What a great idea! Kids received toys that made them happy -- and that is what the spirit of giving should be about.
So, why did I bore you with all this? On the way into 2A this evening I looked in the Toys for Tots box. There were between five and ten toys in the box. Toys for Tots will be here Wednesday or Thursday to empty the box the first time... and it does not need to be emptied.
I can tell you, from experience, that you don't need to spend a lot to make a child happy. A football, basketball, or baseball will make most boys smile. A doll or make-up set can easily light up the eyes of a little girl. Board games, card games or a jigsaw puzzle will provide hours of fun for several kids. Stocking stuffers from the dollar store are always appreciated. In short, a gift of a few dollars will go a long way towards spreading the Christmas spirit.
Why did I write this, you ask? Well, it is simple. Sometimes we just need a reminder. And the truth is... well... OK, I procrastinated too. Please, accept this as a kind reminder, if you are planning to donate a toy to Toys for Tots... before Christmas would be good.
Thank you,
Bob (not the builder)
And, yes, I say,
Merry Christmas
Well? Quite an email, eh?
I don't know Bob other than the occasional, "Hi, how are you?" But I know he hit a home run with this email.
His email has spurred some action, too. The Toys for Tots box is filling up, almost overflowing. Also, our Community Outreach Group committed to putting $100 worth of toys in the box. I get the feeling that a lot more toys are en route to that box as well. I know me and the missus plan on getting some stuff in there soon. I plan on making a Spider-Man fan somewhere happy.
If you'd like to find a Toys for Tots drop-off near you, click on any of the Toys for Tots links in this post. The kiddos say "thank you!" and "Merry Christmas!"
And to Bob the Cleaning Guy: thank you for a great reminder of what time of year it is. Sometime we get so wrapped up in what's going on, we need reminders like this.
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